This is overly simplified. Normal battlefield conditions make it look more like this.
Enemy mech formations are approaching and are spotted by recon assets of some kind. Your arty starts to engage them with bomblets or SMArt ammunition (intelligent to attack ammo is nothing new). Enemy artillery begins counterfire and your own SPHs try to get the hell out of their firing position into a new one.
If your MBTs would also begin to shell the incoming enemy formations they would also reveal their position which would not be that good. Your line of defence could also paint "please hit me with a arty/MLRS salvo!" in big red letters onto the ground.
As to sniping out enemy tanks at extreme ranges. You are normally lucky when you get a line of sight of more than 2km. Extreme range kills are more normal only in desert conditions.
Last but not least. Ammunition is not a real good indicator for the capabilities of a tank.
The tank is really expensive. You could also buy a cheaper tank with nearly the same capabilities and just buy the ammo you want for its 120mm be it a US M829A3 DU-KE, German DM63 non DU-KE, Swedish HE or Korean guided ammo.
U wanna talk about overly simplified? My post was in reference to the "overly simplified" view that artillery is king.
Ur starting point - artillery starting with bomblets etc. isn't even accurate. When u throw air power into the equation, nothing on land is safe, let alone artillery.
Even then, any artillery that opens fire is immediately pinpointed via counter-artillery radar that extrapolates ur arty's position based on trajectory.
In the modern battlefield, any non self-propelled arty is a sitting duck, not that SPHs etc. are much safer given how slow they are.
There's also a lack of understanding of armoured tactics here. U dun throw ur armour into the mix until enemy arty has been engaged & negated as far as possible. Furthermore, armour movements are almost always covered by air / attack copter, IFV & artillery support anyway. People seem to speak in isolation of which weapon is king. Its called combined arms.
Armours job is to charge at maximum speed into &/or behind enemy lines, where Arty then finds it difficult to engage them, given the chaos & confusion and the lack of forward observers to pinpoint the enemy & call down arty.
Arty wasn't meant to kill MBTs the same way MBTs were not invented to kill arty. There's a place for every weapon system.
Bottomline, u wanna compare, do it like for like. The point which ppl dun seem to get is that this Korean tank will be able to engage ANY OTHER MBT from much further away than before - that's the point of this thread.
