Scandal with Poland’s ‘prevent Russia’ tank

The Leopard 2PL main battle tank is of strategic importance for Poland as well as NATO member states in the ‘containment of Russia’.
Poland as NATO’s “anti-Russian outpost” has a powerful armored force, well-trained and rated as Europe’s leading power, of which the backbone are Leopard 2PLs purchased from Germany. .

However, this MBT, right from the signing of the purchase contract, has continuously encountered problems, the first is the translation of technical documents discovered by a third party with a salary of up to 200 million Zloty (equivalent to VND 200 million). $2.6 million), an “exorbitant” price. But the overhead is nothing compared to the money these Leopard 2PLs have taken from the Polish defense budget. It should be recalled that in 2002, Warsaw signed a contract to buy 128 Leopard 2A4s from the German Army, the above MBTs are 25 – 27 years old and the technical condition is assessed quite well. Poland believes that the above-mentioned tanks have only worn 25-30% and can be used normally for at least 10 more years, but from the time they received the tanks until the overhaul in 2011, they just been on the payroll for more than 5 years. In addition to the components with high wear and tear such as the gun barrel, the transmission system, during the overhaul, Poland discovered many problems such as the thermal imager of the gunner and the commander and many components of the system. Fire control is almost out of service. The irony is that these devices have long been out of production, so the Polish Army decided to comprehensively upgrade the Leopard 2A4 tanks to the Leopard 2PL standard. The main battle tank Leopard 2PL of the Polish Army The upgrade package focuses on the viewfinder, front armor, bodywork and undercarriage. However, the addition of steel plates to the chassis to prevent mines was removed because it would increase the weight to 59.5 tons equivalent to Leopard 2A5, which required reinforcement of the suspension system, leading to an increase in costs. The upgrade package also requires replacing the hydraulic cannon stabilization system with electricity, reducing the possibility of the vehicle burning when the vehicle is hit, adding a reversing camera and an auxiliary electric motor. There is also an expansion pack, which includes upgraded communication equipment, integrated remote control machine gun turret, air conditioning for the crew, heatsink for the electronics. The general requirement is that the cost of the Leopard 2PL after the upgrade is only half that of the Leopard 2A6. After many biddings, finally the contract to upgrade 128 Leoaprd 2A4 vehicles was signed in 2015, the main contractor is a Polish company with a German partner, the deadline for completing the work is in 2020. The upgrade contract value is up to 575 million USD, which calculates that each tank requires 4.5 million USD in modernization money, not to mention the initial purchase cost, which is more expensive than the production T-90M Proryv-3 Brand new from Russia.