Quote:
Originally Posted by RN7
An explanation to why there is no list of French tanks in Mexican service in Texas in the Red Star-Lone Star SB maybe because there are now none operational in the region because they bore the brunt of the initial invasion and took heavy losses. What was left of them could have been withdrawn back into Mexico.
The AMX-30 is not a good tank from the perspective of its armour protection. It is inferior to an M60 yet alone an Abram's, and its protection is inferior to most Soviet tanks. The French Army were glad to replace it with the vastly superior Leclerc. However its good by Mexican standards and it would have given them at least a chance. Most Mexican vehicles are vulnerable to heavy machine guns fire yet alone tanks and anti-tank weapons.
Off hand I don't know the composition of a Mexican armoured cavalry battalion/regiment. What 36-48 vehicles? Two battalions of AMX-30's would be less than a 100 tanks. A moderate force before the invasion that would likely have seen the brunt of combat against U.S. forces, and through losses, attrition and lack of spares would likely only be a fraction of its pre-invasion strength. The Mexicans probably withdrew the surviving 10-20 tanks back into Mexico as a reserve, in case American reinforcements from east of the Mississippi or the Pacific North West led to a major American counter-offensive that pushed through Texas and into Mexico itself.
HOT-1 missiles would also give the Mexican some teeth against older American tanks.
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Per Frank Chadwick who helped write Red Star Lone Star this is the canon strength
Mechanized Infantry Brigades - 2
Each with two mech inf regiments with 40 VAB APC, one armored recon regiment (which was the size of a battalion) with 17 ERC-90 and 34 VAB APC and one SPG battalion of 6 M109 and 12 M108's
Thus the total he had for SPG's was 12 M109 and 24 M108 for the whole Mexican Army (i.e. betting he didnt know they had the 5 M8 Scott's)
There were also:
Armored Cav Regiments (sized as a battalion) - 3
Each with 17 ERC-90 and 34 VAB APC
Regional Brigades - i.e. Inf Brigades - 36 regional brigades
Each averaging one motorized cav regiment (really a battalion - see below), two infantry regiments and one battery of artillery
thus an armored cav regiment had a total of 51 vehicles, 17 ERC-90 and 34 VAB APC (defined as a squadron of of seventeen vehicles of ERC-90 and two squadrons of VAB APC)
so a little bigger but pretty close there RN7! Good estimate!