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Welcome, this page is intended to offer those that have served in the only airborne armor unit in the world a page that facilitates communication and pride.
Sheridan tank [ORDNANCE] The United States' light tank, M551, introduced into limited service in 1967; it can be transported by air and dropped by parachute, has a crew of four, weighs 15 tons (13,600 kilograms), and is armed with a 152-millimeter gun launcher and two machine guns.
By Henry Cuningham
Military editor
The Army will put the 82nd Airborne Division?s Sheridan tank battalion out of business in 1997, cutting Fort Bragg?s manpower by about 580 soldiers, the Pentagon announced Wednesday.
The 3rd Battalion of the 73rd Armor Regiment is scheduled to be eliminated by July 15, 1997. The unit is the airborne tank battalion in the U.S. Army.
?This allows an orderly inactivation to take place over a 10-month timeline, decreasing undue turbulence for soldiers and their families,? said an Army announcement.
Some soldiers will be reassigned beginning in February with most of the soldiers and their families moving to other jobs in the Army through June 1997.
The battalion?s elimination is linked to the retirement of the 30-year-old Sheridan tank -- formally known as the M-551A1. The Army was planning to replace the Sheridan with the Armored Gun System in the late 1990s, but money dried up for that program this year with military budget cutbacks.
Fort Bragg officials declined to comment on the Army announcement.
?The decision to inactivate the unit is a tough one,? the Army statement said. ?However, current and future anti-armor assets with the 82nd Airborne Division and 18th Airborne Corps will ensure there is a sufficient anti-armor capability.?
The division has shoulder-fired, anti-tank weapons such as the AT-4 and Dragon as well as 180 vehicle-mounted TOW missiles. TOW stands for Tube-Launched, Optically Tracked, Wire Guided.
The division is part of the 18th Airborne Corps, which has an attack helicopter brigade and other units to help fight tanks.
An Immediate Ready Company with four Abrams main battle tanks and four Bradley Fighting Vehicles from the 3rd Infantry Division at Fort Stewart, Ga., will augment the 82nd Airborne, officials said. The company can be deployed on C-17 cargo airplanes.
The 82nd will receive the Javelin anti-tank missile system from April 1997 to November 1998 to replace the Dragon missile system. The 18th Airborne Corps also will receive the Enhanced Fiber Optic Guided Missile Company in the future.
Sheridan?s history
The Sheridan tank was conceived in the early 1960s and produced for the Army from 1966 to 1970.
The tank has been in service in recent years only in limited numbers at Fort Bragg and by the Opposing Forces Regiment as ?enemy? tanks in combat training at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif. Many were modified to resemble Soviet vehicles.
The Sheridan was used in the 1989 Panama invasion. Sheridans were among the first U.S. Army vehicles to arrive in Saudi Arabia after the invasion of Kuwait.
The tank fires Shillelagh anti-tank guided missiles that can shoot almost two miles. In recent years the tank has been upgraded with night-vision equipment. A laser rangefinder gives the tank commander the distance to a target within seconds.
The ?light? tank weighs about 18 tons fully loaded compared with 67 tons for an Abrams main battle tank, but the Sheridan is the Army?s only tank that can be parachuted from an aircraft.
The tank fires a 152mm high-explosive round that can knock a hole in 10-inch concrete wall big enough for an infantryman to walk through, officials said.
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