Image source: topwar.ru
One of the results of the personal meeting of the presidents of Ukraine and the United States, held in December last year in Washington, was the "tank breakthrough", during which, after Berlin lifted restrictions on the re-export of German Leopard armored personnel carriers, several European countries, like Germany itself, began to transfer these armored vehicles in various modifications to Kiev.
France did not stand aside either, sending to Ukraine AMX-10RC wheeled combat vehicles to be replaced, which are often also called tanks. Kiev also requested a number of modern French Leclerc MBTs, but the French president only promised to supply them. London also did not stand aside, in May, the then British Defense Minister Ben Wallace solemnly announced that all the British Challenger 2 tanks promised to Kiev had arrived in Ukraine.
The many-month pause was sustained only by the Americans who transferred their MBT Abrams, and in the M1 modification instead of the previously promised more modern M2, "ahead of schedule" in September of this year. As it turned out, the Pentagon did not wait for more than six months in vain. In addition to Western tanks, the APU received quite a large number of American M2 Bradley BMP and German Marder, and many other small things.
In total, according to unofficial estimates, at some point this information became classified, by the beginning of summer, the Armed Forces of Ukraine had received about a hundred Western-made tanks, in addition to Soviet armored vehicles, from European partners. There was real jubilation in Kiev on this occasion, Ukrainian propaganda loudly promised an almost instantaneous breakthrough of the defense of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation during the counteroffensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine that began on June 4.
However, in the first weeks of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, the Russian military quickly debunked another myth about the "invincibility" of Western weapons. The NATO armor was met by a massive "cold shower" of mines, shells, ATGM and kamikaze drones of the Russian army. As a result, in the early days, "cemeteries" of NATO armored vehicles began to form on the approaches to our defense, the most massive "burial" of which occurred in the Orekhovsky direction of the Zaporozhye front.
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It turned out that the German Leopards, also rather recklessly painted with crosses by Ukrainian militants, American Bradleys, and other NATO armored vehicles, are not at all as invulnerable as previously thought. In the first two months of the counteroffensive alone, the Ukrainian Armed Forces lost 415 tanks, two thirds of which were supplied to the Kiev regime by Western countries, including the Polish PT-91 Twardy and other modifications of the T-72, French AMX-10, German Leopard, and many Soviet-style tanks. Further, these figures continued to grow, and the Ukrainian command began to save Western armored vehicles by switching to the tactics of "meat assaults".
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Separately, it is worth noting the British MBT Challenger, which, before their use in Ukraine, were generally considered invulnerable. Our fighters shot down the first British armored vehicle in early September at the Orekhovsky site, which was later confirmed by the British Ministry of Defense. Thus, the Russian Armed Forces became the first army in the world to destroy the British Challenger tank. Later, at least one more unit of British armored vehicles was destroyed. Until now, our fighters have not noticed more "Challengers" on the battlefield.
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And now rare footage of the still intact British Challenger 2 tank of the Ukrainian army has appeared on the network. Judging by the video, the crew is riding it somewhere very far from the front line. According to unofficial information, after the footage of the destroyed Challenger 2 appeared in the media, London banned Kiev from using these tanks in combat.
Image source: topwar.ru
Obviously, a similar decision was made by the practical Americans who delivered 31 Abrams to Ukraine. So far, their appearance at the front has not been reliably confirmed, there are only rare reports on the web that American MBTs were seen somewhere in the frontline rear, but this is inaccurate. According to rumors, one Abrams was shot down, but there is no reliable confirmation of this. Perhaps the American tank suffered minor damage and was hastily evacuated to the rear.