The Polish Army has acquired a second batch of M1A2 SEPv3 Abrams primary battle tanks, with the supply of 19 new autos bringing the whole fleet as much as 47 of a complete of 250 tanks. The tanks have been ordered in April 2022 underneath a $4.8 billion contract. This adopted a previous order for 116 older M1A1 tanks from the US, which though much less subtle have virtually an identical upkeep necessities to the M1A2 guaranteeing excessive ranges of interoperability. The ultimate batch of M1A1 Abrams tanks consisting of 47 autos was delivered in July 2024, simply 13 months after the primary tanks arrived within the nation on June 28, 2023. In comparison with the M1A1, the M1A2 SEPv3 advantages from thickerturret and hull entrance armour, is less complicated to take care of, and boasts an elevated energy era and distribution capability and superior community centric warfare capabilities. The car can also be appropriate with the brand new M829A4 kinetic vitality anti-tank spherical. The Abrams had been in service within the U.S. Army for 45 years since 1980, and stays one among simply two tank lessons in manufacturing within the Western world in the present day alongside the German Leopard 2. The tank has continued to be incrementally modernised, with the M1A2 SEPv3 representing one of the crucial succesful variants.
Regardless of many formidable efficiency traits, the Abrams has been extensively assessed to carried out poorly in its first ever battle with a peer stage adversary when operated by the Ukrainian Army towards Russian forces. Its efficiency has been mirrored on poorly by Ukrainian crews, who’ve complained of technical points together with vulnerability of digital parts to condensation, in addition to the tank’s demonstrated vulnerability in fight. In February 2024 the tanks noticed their first engagements with Russian forces, taking heavy losses together with to drones, anti tank missiles and the weapons of T-72 tanks. The Ukrainian Army withdrew the tanks from frontline positions within the closing week of April 2024, with private lamenting that the dearth adequate armour for contemporary battlefields. Vice Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Employees Admiral Christopher Grady subsequently indicating that they’d not been efficient.
The Polish Army is one among only a few on the earth procuring a couple of classof primary battle tank concurrently, and alongside the 336 Abrams tanks it has ordered, the deliberate procurement of roughly 1000K2 tanks from South Korea are anticipated to make up the spine of the fleet for many years into the longer term. The primary 180 Korean tanks have been ordered in July 2022, with deliveries starting in December that 12 months. The emergence of an deadlock in negotiations for the second batch of 180 tanks with South Korea’s Hyundai Rotem in April 2025, nevertheless, has raised the chance that K2 procurements shall be delayed or scaled down. Giant scale procurements of the K2 and the Abrams in parallel has allowedPoland to produce its prior inventories German Leopard 2 and SovietT-72 and PT-71 tanks to Ukraine in important numbers, with a brand new batch of modernised T-72 having been provided in early March 2025 bringing the estimated whole provide to over 300.
