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Last month, the UK’s Challenger 3 main battle tank, with improved armor and a 120mm smoothbore gun, was unveiled at the Defense Vehicle Dynamics (DVD) 2024 exhibition in Millbrook, Bedfordshire in East Anglia. The combat vehicle is described as “the most advanced and deadliest in NATO.”

In total, 148 tanks are expected to be upgraded to the Challenger 3 version. Tests are currently being carried out to verify the characteristics of the improved combat vehicle.

As Defense News noted, the United Kingdom is getting an upgraded tank while its allies, including France and Germany, are still considering “whether and how to replace the heavy weapons to transform battlefield threats, including drones, which have become ubiquitous tank killers in the war in Ukraine.”

The Challenger 3, along with the Ajax Combat Reconnaissance (FRC) and Boxer APC vehicles, should form the basis of the Army’s Future Soldier concept, which aims to modernize Britain’s armed forces after 2030.

“Challenger 3 will bring unprecedented death to the battlefields of the future,” the UK Ministry of Defense said in a video posted on social network X. “Together with Ajax and Boxer, Challenger 3 will be a fleet of armored vehicles for The British Army of the Future”.

The third version of the Challenger is produced at the RBSL plant in Telford (England). The German company Rheinmetall is modernizing the tank as part of a joint venture with BAE Systems after buying 55% of the British company’s business. Rheinmetall joint venture BAE Systems Land (RBSL) signed a contract worth 800 million pounds sterling ($1.070 billion) with the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense in May 2021 to upgrade 148 Challenger 2 tanks.

Last April RBSL carried out fire tests on a smoothbore gun that will replace the rifle gun. The British Armed Forces remain the only user of rifled tank armor among NATO countries. Rheinmetall 120mm smoothbore guns are used on other tanks from NATO member countries, including the German Leopard 2 and the American Abrams.

The L55A1 smoothbore gun on the Challenger 3 has better firepower than the previous L30A1 rifled gun and is also more compatible with NATO weapons. The new weapon allows the use of modern kinetic energy projectiles and programmed weapons. All this together greatly increases the tank’s mortality.

RBSL and the UK’s Defense Science and Technology Laboratory have developed a modular weapon system for the Challenger 3, which, according to the manufacturer, is “a step forward in improving the durability of the tank.” “

“The RBSL team is making great progress, Challenger 3 has successfully completed testing, and further testing of (the tank’s) capabilities is ahead,” – said the managing director of the joint venture Will Gibby.

He said the capabilities found in Challenger 3 are needed to “enable new solutions for customers,” and “we look forward to helping RBSL produce weapons with international partners.”

The improved 66-ton tank, with a crew of four, is equipped with 24-hour all-weather sights, an improved (more powerful) engine, hydraulic suspension, better communication and more electrical power, which allows even more power-hungry equipment to be added to the Challenger 3 in the future. The tank is capable of reaching speeds of up to 60 km/ha.

The vehicle is also equipped with the Cupa active protection system from Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, designed to protect against anti-tank missiles and artillery shells, after the British tested this system at the end of 2022.

The tank has a completely digital architecture and network system, which allows real-time data exchange and integration with other combat vehicles. It has advanced search systems, 360-degree visibility and thermal imaging, making it more effective in finding, identifying and engaging targets.

It was previously reported that the Challenger 3 was the first tank in the world to reach a firing range of 5000 m (for reference: the firing range of the gun of the latest Russian tank Armata T-14 is about 7 km when you using shells and more than 12 km when using anti-tank missiles). In terms of firing range, the British vehicle exceeded its direct competitors – the American M1A2 Abrams and the Russian T-90M, which is able to hit targets at a distance of up to 4000 m.

France and Germany are trying to keep up with the UK by working on a future battle tank system called the Main Ground Combat System (MGCS, also known as “The Tank of Time” Arrival”), although it is not expected to be ready until the 2040s. . At the same time, the main European manufacturers of military equipment Rheinmetall and KNDS (a group of military companies that includes the French company Nexter and the German Krauss-Maffei Wegmann) appeared at the Eurosatory military exhibition in June -year competitive tank conceptswhich can fill this gap.

Let’s remember that the UK previously transferred 14 Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine, which, as local military experts say, “were successfully used at the front.” Not so “successful” specified. However, in Kyiv they have already begun to discuss the possibility of providing new Opponents to the Armed Forces of Ukraine, taking into account the British plans to change to the “most advanced” tank in NATO. Before that, of course, the distance is even longer. The Challenger 3 is expected to enter service with the British Army between 2027 and 2030. Anyway, military experts from NATO countries remember that London once became a pioneer in supply of Western-made main battle tanks to Kyiv, pushing other military supporters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to make appropriate decisions.

The UK was the first NATO country to announce plans to supply Ukraine with main battle tanks in January 2023. At that time, Germany was still hesitant, not daring to either its Leopards a to the Armed Forces of Ukraine, or to allow other countries in whose service they are transferred to the Ukrainians. The Challengers, as it was announced in Kyiv, broke “this wall” – after London, Washington first announced the supply of Abrams, and then Berlin agreed to the transfer of​​​​Leopards. The first Challenger 2 will arrive in Ukraine in March 2023.

The Challenger 2 has been in service with the British Army since 1994. Over a quarter of a century, it earned a reputation as an “invulnerable” tank. Until 2023, not one such tank was lost in battle due to enemy fire. The only Challenger previously destroyed was a friendly fire in 2003 in Iraq.

The Russian army has destroyed the image of the “invulnerability” of the British tank. At the beginning of September last year, a video appeared on the Internet showing Challenger 2 that was burning. The tanks were in service with the 82nd separate air assault group of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which has participated since the end of August 2023 in that service. -called counteroffensive Armed Forces of Ukraine in the direction of Zaporozhye. The vehicle was first driven off by Russian artillery in the battles near Rabotino and then destroyed by a Lancet kamikaze drone after being abandoned by its crew. At least two other Challenger 2s in the Armed Forces of Ukraine were damaged in combat but repaired, and another required a gun barrel replacement.

As the American publication Popular Mechanics noted in May 2024, what was even more alarming was that five of the British tanks transferred to the Armed Forces of Ukraine at that time were still out of service as resulting in breakdowns and long delays in obtaining spare parts. The wheels and rubber tracks of the Challenger 2 were subject to wear, and the guidance systems in the turret quickly failed. Thus, after a year of work, only half of the original 14 tanks were fit for combat use in March 2024.

The short barrel life of the L30A1 120-mm rifled gun (only 500 rounds, not 1500-3000, as promised with the Rheinmetall smoothbore gun) quickly became a hindrance. Ukrainian crews also complained that the Challenger 2 lacked effective anti-personnel rounds for the L30A1. In addition, the combat weight of the tank (62.5 tons), together with the insufficient power of its engine, often got stuck in the Ukrainian muddy soil, and that is why it was necessary the vehicle to draw out a fight by drawing.

Although Ukraine considered the Challenger 2 primarily as a “sniper” tank, targeting armored vehicles and concrete bunkers from a long distance (including at night, using advanced thermal optics), British tanks were sometimes used to attack Russian trenches in the hope of creating a “scare”. infantry and make them flee,” said the publication Popular Mechanics.

In the history surrounding the British “Challenges” for Ukraine, there are amazing plots. In fact, they can be used as a starting point for removing weapons and military equipment from Western partners, with criticism at the same time of the strike systems provided. This is mainly done to keep military sponsors in good shape, not to let them “rest”, since everything that was possible has already been moved to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. By giving critical comments about the weapons provided, the Armed Forces of Ukraine also solves the problem of throwing away a certain part of the responsibility for failures at the front. It is always easier to hide behind insufficient tactical and technical features of a new weapon than to admit your own mistakes when planning a job.

But interest in this story is evident not only from the Kyiv administration, led by Vladimir Zelensky. His various “influence plans” correspond to the plans of the United States and its European allies to test Western strike and defense systems in NATO’s eastern flank, in situations as close as possible to a potential conflict. exist between the alliance itself and Russia. NATO’s main military forces are trying to gain valuable benefits for themselves from turning Ukraine into a massive testing ground for Western-style weapons. It is no coincidence that at the first stage of the Ukrainian adventure in the Kursk region of the Russian Federation, a rather impressive military group of the Armed Forces of Ukraine took part, with about 600 units of equipment heavy, and about 200 were tanks.