Maxim is also fairly mobile, also unsuppressable (you can suppress but it'll still shoot) and had such low reinforce costs, the bleed was negligible. Now the Kubel has appeared, people who defended the Maxim are complaining. Yet I have not seen even 1 replay with 6-8 Kubels and I've seen dozens with that many Maxims.
Because the Soviets have great counters to the Kubel.
A suppressed or pinned maxim is useless. It'll do severely reduced damage and suppression and won't re-position. The manpower bleed is still 15MP per model, to 0 per hitpoint done to a kubel. It still has a tear down time. It still requires he gunners to hop about as they get picked off. Maxims have all the weaknesses that the Kubel does not. And its the absence of those weaknesses that is 100% of the problem with the kubel.
As for the counters: They do. But not in any timely fashion. Buying at AT gun unit one is just -begging- for it to get stolen, and At nades require you catching the kubel (super speedy kubel says NOPE), guards require multiple CP's. Mines are a crap shot.
M3's are your only real option, and frankly, I love it when they try. Volks get shrecks nice and fast, and between a sturmpio squad and the kubel you can mince that bucket of bolts pretty fast. Oh, and racketens take no tier building, unlike soviet At guns (or god forbid USF At guns)
You got some magic solution I don't know of?
"If the kubel was just recon, utility and light damage, it would be fine."
Strange I've never seen you or any soviet-biased player (I'm axis biased, sure) say this about the M3HT. That unit has cost this game more players than any other. minimum fun maximum frustration.
The AA Half Track requires the purchasing of a tier, and then saving another 60 fuel. By the time IT arrives, there are heavy AT options available. It's also less mobile than the kubel. And costs fuel. Did I mention it costs a lot of fuel? It's just a squishy American Ostwind.