Roadside Bombs & IEDs (catch all)

[Stan]

This sounds like a pile of misunderstandings.

Mechanical mineclearing works - although not every system on all soils.

It's way too slow. It's too slow for patrols, way too slow for convoys and it's also too slow for breakthrough battles. It was used in the latter with relatively good success under special circumstances, though.

Precisely my point – mechanical clearing devices were designed for specific tasks and conditions. Operating them out of their intended environment merely reduces their effectiveness and leads some to believe they are useless. A lot more goes into leading a mechanical demining team than just driving or operating robots. The same can be said for choosing the right detector for the soil and target.

The simple "minebreaker vehicle at the head of convoy" concept (as with that South African-inspired vehicle with the trailers) can be used for road sweeps, but it's useless for small unit movements/patrols.

I guess that would depend on the vehicle’s application. I would not pretend to keep up with a convoy. I would however employ the vehicle sufficiently ahead of the convoy in a suspect area. I’m not advocating mechanical demining as a convoy protection vehicle, just another tool in the kit bag that has some proven advantages. Instead of riding around in an MRAP awaiting detonation, I suggest destroying an element that the enemy can no longer use.

Mechanical mineclearing is a sideshow in part because it doesn't help patrols or convoys much.
It's furthermore a sideshow because 100%, god-like mineclearing would not even come close to winning the war. It would merely take away another tool fromt he enemy, liit him to less options, probably further reducing the intensity fo warfare and thus the likeliness that we run out of steam before they do because it lasts too long and isn't worth the huge costs in comparison even to the best-case victory scenario.

Exactly – reduce the enemy’s options and save lives. You then have anecdotal evidence of mechanical demining not helping a patrol or convoy ? I'm unaware of this tactic ever being employed.

Now if you think that my speeds are off then feel free to tell which system is faster in practical use.

As the fastest system is made in Germany and you contend these machines are all slow, I’ll let you do your own homework

"square click", that would be a square kilometer as far as I know.

I don't know anything short of a nuclear bomb with this kind of capability.

"square click", that would be a square kilometer as far as I know.

A system of great 10m width (way too optimistic) would need to drive 100x1000 m per hour = 100 km/h (62 mph) plus instant turns to achieve that kind of performance.
An armoured combat engineer battalion may be able to clear mines that quickly.

Yep, one square kilometer or 1,000 square meters.

It works at a maximum rate of nine meters per minute... at a rate of up to 1,000 square meters per hour under optimum conditions

... destroys mines faster than they can detonate

As you may have feared, it can be remotely operated and, it's been around since 2001.