Have you heard the theory about why so many Russian military vehicles are getting abandoned? Cheap Chinese tires and lack of basic upkeep by the Russians to prevent sun damage to the tires

 Trent Telenko, a two-decade military veteran who ran the quality control auditing of the U.S. Army’s midsize vehicle program has a theory to explain why so many undamaged Russian vehicles, including top-of-the-line combat systems, have been abandoned by their crews with flat tires, "Those aren't Soviet-era heavy truck radials. Chinese military tires, and I believe specifically the Yellow Sea YS20. This is a tire I first encountered in Somalia and Sudan; it's a bad Chinese copy of the excellent Michelin XZL military tire design."

Most people never think about the kind of details that can sink an army in the field, the things that the great leaders are known for keeping track of, and anticipating. 

According to Telenko, what’s really causing these breakdowns is likely bad preventive maintenance, particularly when it comes to their wheels. Telenko thinks Russian vehicles are being left in place for months without preventing sun damage and flat spots.

So when they go into battle, particularly off-road, and air down for traction in sand and mud, their tires easily blow out, leaving many stuck in thawing mud. And since the Russians don’t seem to have brought enough spares either, they’re useless and have to be abandoned.

“When you leave military truck tires in one place for months on end. The side walls get rotted/brittle such that using low tire pressure setting for any appreciable distance will cause the tires to fail catastrophically via rips,” he continued, linking to video of a Russian Pantsir anti-aircraft system stuck in mud and abandoned with its tires having blown out after Ukrainian troops tried to tow it away."

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