M2A2 ODS-SA Bradley
The most consequential Western infantry fighting vehicle of the war — protection and firepower that crews publicly credit with keeping them alive.
Record
Operators
Ukraine: the largest Western IFV fleet donated to Ukraine
Battlefield role
Mechanised assault and infantry support — delivered in the hundreds, it equips whole brigades rather than symbolic battalions, and doubles as an improvised tank-hunter with its TOW missiles.
Strengths
TOW launcher plus a fast-firing 25 mm autocannon give it teeth well above its class; spall liners and armour package produce documented crew survival in hits of a kind Soviet-pattern IFVs rarely survive; numbers large enough to sustain attrition and repair cycles.
Limitations
Heavy losses in the 2023 minefield assaults showed its limits in frontal breaches; aluminium hull burns when penetrated; dependent on US spares and ammunition supply lines.
Visual identification
Tall, boxy hull with a sharply angled bow; small two-man turret offset right, with a distinctive twin-tube TOW launcher folding out on its left side; six road wheels with side skirts.
Documented conflict use
In documented combat since the 2023 summer counteroffensive, most prominently with the 47th Mechanised Brigade at Robotyne and later Avdiivka. The January 2024 Stepove engagement, in which Bradleys disabled a T-90M at close range, is among the war's most circulated armoured engagements. Trackers document heavy losses alongside a substantial recover-and-repair pipeline.
Branch & service operators
- Ground ForcesDocumented
Related key events
Southern counteroffensive falls short
Ukraine's Western-equipped push toward the Azov coast fails against deep fortifications and minefields; positional attrition sets in.