MRAPs

[jsallison]

The crew does transfer to the new tank when you upgrade. But, they lose some of their experience and morale in the process. How much is variable, but the loss isn't usually so much that they become less skilled then a brand new crew would be. Think of it this way...the crew was use to their old vehicle and knew where everything was and how it worked. Now they have a new vehicle but are still use to the old one, so while they may be very skilled they will not operate as effectively with the new vehicle as they did with the old one until they get use to it.

Even in peacetime I can attest to this. When our unit transitioned to M1 MBT's, basically, we sucked on our first gunnery after transition training. It didn't help that the qualification tables were jiggered with at the same time. A year later, when we knew what the heck we were doing it was a totally different story. Most of the units that I had knowledge of during that period had the same problem. So yeah, dropping off your M47 for an M48, or your T55 for a T62, is going to come at the cost of some level of effectiveness for some period of time.