Classified Challenger tank specs leaked online for videogame

Just because it&#x27;s classified doesn&#x27;t mean it&#x27;s valuable. Lots of stuff is classified for bureaucratic reasons. Also, there&#x27;s little about the Challenger 2 that opposing forces couldn&#x27;t have researched. The tank itself has been around for more than 2 decades, and the Soviets&#x2F;Russians have been consistently able to penetrate British security for the last 70 years.<p>The gun is nothing special, and it&#x27;s performance is well known. Chobbham&#x2F;Dorcester armor has been around for quite awhile, and isn&#x27;t unique. The US has sold M1s to Egypt, Iraq etc with Chobbham armor.

<p><pre><code> The user identifies as a make (sic) in Tidworth with a history of “Tanks &amp; AFV’s, CR2 Tank Commander, AFV Instr, D&amp;M Instr, Gunnery Instr, Former ATDU”. </code></pre> There are less than 250 Challenger 2 tanks. Combined with the rest of their professional experience, digital footprint, and copious words written, I imagine this person has sacrificed many bits of anonymity indeed.

&quot;The Official Secrets Act is not there to protect Secrets, it is there to protect Officials.&quot;<p>— Sir Humphrey Appleby, <i>Yes, Minister</i>

When I worked in defense they made us watch “ethics” videos.<p>One of the senarios was a software developer was moonlighting as a game dev and was using algorithms and parameters from his day job in the game.<p>We thought far fetched and crazy…<p>Apparently not.

This happens more than you&#x27;d imagine. DCS World gets in hot water for this periodically. It doesn&#x27;t help that these developers are all from Russia

I would imagine that if a game developer has access to a classified document, that actual enemies already own that document and the real harm has been done long ago.

I think the bigger issue is that this rando user had the document, and I think that means it was already out &#x2F; online?<p>Amusing context, but I suspect whatever important thing happened with this document, it already happened. And that&#x27;s assuming it was actually real &#x2F; classified.

It seems like everybody is jumping to assume things that haven&#x27;t been remotely proved, e.g.: - That the forum poster is in the British Army. - That they are British. - That the manual is current and true.<p>First, low grade manuals (like UK RESTRICTED) are not very secret. This could even by an FI disinfo op to make people think a current RAC officer would be dumb enough to post a classified document online, a great way to create bad publicity from a low grade document which has nothing further to tell you.<p>Nothing in this manual will say anything about armour or engine capabilities or weapons that isn&#x27;t already known to adversaries or easily determined from photos. Chill already.

Back in the 90s my buddies in the military would say that Tom Clancy basically got it right.<p>Also private intelligence sources like Janes probably will sell you this info too, although I can’t be sure because I’m not willing to pay to find out.

A few years back some people got charged for trying to export F-16 manuals to a Russian flight sim company: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.standard.net&#x2F;police-fire&#x2F;russian-deported-after-pleading-guilty-to-smuggling-f-16-fighter-jet-technical-manuals&#x2F;article_61e7e427-24f1-5f54-9dc9-562b93f7487a.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.standard.net&#x2F;police-fire&#x2F;russian-deported-after-...</a>

My understanding was the main secret on modern MBTs is the composition of the “sabot catching” armor. Doesn’t sound like that’s what was disclosed here?

N.B. The document appears to be marked <i>Restricted</i> which is technically lower than &#x27;classified&#x27;.

Okay, but the interesting thing is what you can do now that the data is out there. Can you adjust your in-game specs to align? Or is that a problem?

Most smart missiles in the past 2 decades attack tanks by detonating on top. You don&#x27;t really need classified tank data for this well-known vulnerability.<p>A-10 pilots fire into the ground obliquely to ricochet into the bottom of tanks.<p>Neither the top nor bottom have much armor in tanks.<p>In WW2, the most successful aerial tank attacks were to drop a 500 or 1,000 pound bomb on or next to a German tank, turning it over. (You can ignore any tank attack claim numbers that were not done by large bombs or specialized anti-tank planes - P-51&#x27;s just couldn&#x27;t &quot;shoot up&quot; German tanks.)<p>The BalticaBeer channel has remarkable videos of the Sidewinder and Wall-eye missiles (the Wall-eye II could destroy anything with its 2,000-pound shaped charge. Most of the Gulf War TV footage you&#x27;ve seen is from Wall-eyes, which used analog edge detection for precise targeting of buildings, bridges and vehicles, and could fly through a single pre-selected window - in a train even!)<p>Balticabeer Military Aeronautics Youtube Channel<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;channel&#x2F;UCgUYW-I81BUzQFIe3UtAE-w" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;channel&#x2F;UCgUYW-I81BUzQFIe3UtAE-w</a><p>Source: I study war.