Armoured personnel carrier: Encyclopedia II - Armoured personnel carrier - The APC in action

Armoured personnel carrier - The APC in action

Romanian Transporter Auto Blindat APCs that made infamous front-line news in 1989 were mostly eight-wheeled, massive Romanian clones of the Soviet BTR-60 APC. Soldiers hated this machine, with uncomfortable access from above and heavy latches that seemed designed to snap one's fingers off. Limited visibility and clumsy manoeuvrability in an urban environment might have contributed (along with bad will, of course) to the numbers of deaths through crushing during the Romanian Revolution.

The idea of the APC has arrived in the modern era to become the IFV, from which troops can fight, firing their weapons from ports in the vehicle, instead of just being transported by it; examples being the US M2 Bradley or Russian BMP series.

Actual combat experience has however shown that infantry cannot fight effectively from their vehicle and a mounted attack is practically suicidal. As a result, most infantry vehicles no longer have firing ports; most of those on the M2 Bradley for example have been covered over by additional armour protection. They have been omitted completely from newer designs. As a result the main distinction between an APC and IFV is now simply that an IFV mounts an automatic cannon of 20-40mm calibre for heavier fire support and anti armour capability, while an APC is armed only with machine guns.

Many APC designs have been converted to IFVs by the addition of such an automatic cannon, and many chassis’s are produced in both machine gun and grenade launcher armed APC and cannon armed IFV form. The reason for doing this may be cost, or the need for more interior space on some vehicles, as automatic cannon and their ammunition supply may reduce the number of infantry that can be carried.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "The APC in action", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki