In Ukraine, a new reason to be proud of their achievements, "Ukroboronprom" announced the creation of the T-84-120 "Yatagan" tank, which should be shown at the parade in Kiev on August 24. Representatives of the department said that the Yatagan tank is "an effective solution to integrate NATO standards with Ukrainian armored vehicles", and also "the use of a NATO tank gun significantly expands the range of ammunition that can be used by the T-84-120, since it will be … and ammunition produced NATO member countries”.
The new tank is advertised not only as a new achievement of the Ukrainian defense industry, but also as the desire and readiness of Ukraine to integrate into the NATO bloc. In addition, this is timed to coincide with the unfolding presidential election campaign in Ukraine and Poroshenko's desire to show his importance as the leader of ukronation.
Regarding this tank, the first thing that catches your eye is the exotic name "Yatagan". According to Wikipedia, the scimitar is a double-curved blade known as a specific weapon of the Turkish Janissaries. A natural question arises, where do the Turkish Janissaries and the Ukrainian defense industry have to do with it?
It turns out that the Ukrainian tank has a Turkish name for a reason. If we recall the already long history, it turns out that the Yatagan tank is not a new Ukrainian development and has nothing to do with Ukraine's integration into NATO. The development and manufacture of a single sample of this tank was carried out, it's scary to think, back in 1999.
They were silent about this tank for almost twenty years and suddenly suddenly remembered what was the reason? It is easy to find out that the Yatagan tank was not developed with the aim of integrating Ukraine into NATO, but rather for mercantile purposes, to earn more money. To begin with, this is not a new tank, but the last Soviet T-80UD tank, produced in Kharkov and put into service in 1986. In Ukraine, it was quickly renamed T-84 and began to look for a buyer abroad for it.
Such was found in the face of Pakistan, in 1996-1998 a contract for the supply of 320 T-80UD tanks to Pakistan was successfully completed. As they say, appetite comes with eating, and Ukraine decided to participate in another tender for the supply of tanks to Turkey.
This tender had completely different conditions, since Turkey is a NATO country, the tank had to meet NATO standards. According to these standards, a tank gun must be 120 mm in caliber and use ammunition produced by NATO member states.
To participate in the tender, they took a serial T-80UD tank, replaced the cannon in the turret with a new 120 mm, threw out the serial automatic loader and attached a long box to the rear of the turret, where they placed a new automatic loader for unitary NATO ammunition. Considering that Ukraine did not have such a cannon of its own, a 120 mm barrel was bought from the Swiss company Swiss Ordnace Enterprice Corp, and on the basis of the breech end of the Soviet 125 mm cannon, they developed and manufactured one sample of the now "Ukrainian" cannon.
For greater importance, the tank was given the Turkish name "Yatagan" and put it up for tender. But Turkey is not Pakistan, it is a NATO member and no one was going to admit competitors to this market. As a result, the Turkish tender was won by the German "Leopard" and the "Yatagan" tank turned out to be of no use to anyone.
The project of this tank will hardly ever be in serious demand, since it was created in a hurry in preparation for the tender and the adopted technical solutions, for example, on the automatic loader, are poor.
Considering that Soviet tanks never had automatic loaders for unitary ammunition, we had to make a very long box at the rear of the turret to accommodate it. In my opinion, there have never been any tanks with such an "elongated" turret. The tank shoots not only "on the course", but also from any other angle. In this case, the stern of the tower will be removed by a meter and a half beyond the size of the hull, and any pillar or tree will be a serious obstacle for this tank. Therefore, all these years no one remembered him. The photographs from 1999 and 2018 clearly show that this is the same tank.
Tank "Yatagan" 1999
Here is such an interesting story of the appearance of the "Ukrainian" tank "Yatagan". It turns out that he has nothing to do with the integration of Ukraine into NATO and everyone has practically forgotten about his existence, if, apparently, they had not reminded Poroshenko, the “savior of ukronatsiya”. He decided this year to arrange a grand parade of military equipment in Kiev, and now everything that even can move is being pulled there. Whether it shoots or not, nobody cares.
So, almost 20 years later, they remembered the long-forgotten Yatagan project and decided to pass it off as a new Ukrainian development of a tank integrated under NATO standards. With this action, despite the comic of the situation, they decided to once again emphasize how Ukraine is expected in the NATO bloc, which has long stated that it is impossible to integrate it into its ranks.
The Yatagan tank was found, apparently, it was stored in the open air at the KMDB training ground, there are no other sites there. Straight from the field, probably without carrying out routine maintenance, he was immediately delivered to Kiev and they began to prepare him for the parade. Then there was a well-known incident, at the rehearsal of the parade, the tank stalled in the center of Kiev, as eyewitnesses said, he “smoked for a long time,” as a result, a tow truck arrived and took him away in an unknown direction.
By their actions, the Ukrainian leadership has once again demonstrated the ridiculousness of their aspirations to look like a powerful power producing modern armored vehicles. The wretchedness and shame with the demonstration of the "old-new" tank "Yatagan", which probably will not be shown at the parade now, is unlikely to stop the Kiev authorities from yet another demonstration of the mythical achievements of the Ukrainian defense industry.
