Turkey began serial production of Altay long-term tank

Turkey has launched the main battle tank (OBT) Altay, the program of which for many years faced numerous delays and contradictions. The contract includes several important components, in particular, the creation of a production line and the supply of subsystems.

Altay is expected to meet the modern requirements of Turkey's ground forces, offering enhanced capabilities for future combat scenarios.

Negotiations are also under way with several international partners, who have shown great interest in the new development. Earlier it was reported that Ankara has concluded an agreement on the supply of up to 100 such MBTs to Qatar.

The history of the project of the Turkish tank has been underway since the 1990s, and the first sample of Altay was presented in 2011. The tank is to replace the German Leopard 1, Leopard 2 and the old American tanks used by the Turkish army.

Altay has a combat mass of 65 tons, its crew consists of four tankers. The main armament of the tank is the smoothbore 120 mm MKEK 120 gun.

Altay has received modern active and passive protection systems, including reactive dynamic armor panels and threat detection systems that contribute to its survival on the battlefield.

Interestingly, in March 2017, a memorandum of cooperation was signed between the heads of government of Ukraine and Turkey, according to which the Altay tank provided for the supply of the Ukrainian engine 6TD-3.

Turkey later abandoned it, choosing the South Korean engine Do-osan Infracore DV27K for its tank. The reason is trivial - in many years, 6TD-3 was never launched into the series. It is also known about the development of Ankara's own engine.

Recently it became known that the United States began to develop a new version of the tank Abrams. It is known that the weight of the new version is planned to reduce to 60 tons (the weight of the current variants exceeds 70 tons).

It was also reported that the development of a European tank of the new generation Main Ground Combat System has moved from a dead point, as France and Germany signed a "breakthrough" agreement on the further development of the MBT.