Tanks - Russia: Books - History, Types and Construction (2/2)

T-80 Standard Tank - The Soviet Army's Last Armored Champion

The Soviet T-80 Standard Tank was the last tank fielded before the Soviet collapse, and the most controversial. Despite having the most sophisticated fire controls and multi-layer armor ever fielded on a Soviet tank, its turbine power plant (rather than a conventional diesel) remained a source of considerable trouble throughout its career.

Steven J Zaloga charts the little-known history of the T-80, covering the initial construction, through the development to the subsequent variants, the T-84 and Russia's enigmatic "Black Eagle Tank."
Accompanying detailed cut-away artwork illustrates the unusual design features that made the T-80 so controversial.

T-90 Standard Tank - The First Tank of the New Russia

In the wake of the T-72 tank's poor performance in the 1991 Gulf War, the Kremlin instructed the Russian tank industry to drop the discredited T-72 designation in favour of the T-90 Vladimir.
The T-90 was in fact a further evolution of the T-72 family, but the name change represented an important break in Russian/Soviet tank design history. The T-90 has become the principal export tank of Russia, and is in service in large numbers in many countries including Algeria, India, and many of the former Soviet republics.

Using detailed illustrations and full colour artwork, this book also describes the evolution of the T-90s many failed successors including the little known Bokser, Molot, and T-95, as well as its likely successor, the new T-14 Armata, and the wide range of specialized vehicles based on the T-90 chassis such as the formidable Terminator tank support vehicle.

T-14 Armata Main Battle Tank

The T-14 "Armata" Main Battle Tank (MBT) made its debut public appearance in May 2015, at a time of renewed tensions between the Russian Federation and the United States and its NATO allies not seen since the 1960s during the Soviet era.

The T-14 "Armata" is a technically sophisticated tank, the first "production" tank with a fully automated turret entirely devoid of crew as one of many new design features. The tank is also however expensive to build and operate compared to more "low risk" tanks such as the T-90 and T-72B3 MBT types, and requires significant crew training to operate compared with other Russian tanks in service.

Today, the T-14 "Armata" remains a showpiece of military engineering, but the upgrade of earlier T-72, T-90 and even T-80 tanks is now being pursued in parallel as a more cost-effective solution for everyday needs.
Whether the "high risk" development T-14 "Armata" will become a series, albeit limited production tank, or remain a technical showpiece has yet to be seen, but there is no doubting that it has made the impression it was intended to.