Following a number of years of delays, the license serial manufacturing of South Korean K2 major battle tanks in Turkey, and particularly the closely customised native Altay variant,formally commenced on September 5. Produced by the native car producer BMC Otomotiv, the tank is the primary in historical past to be produced in Turkey, with manufacturing being positioned within the capital Ankara at a facility throughout the Aerospace and Aviation Specialised Organised Industrial Zone.BMC Chairman Fuat Tosyali described because the realisation of a “100-year dream” for the Japanese European nation’s defence sector. “This nice dream has now grow to be actuality. The President adopted nearly each stage of this funding and offered nice help,” he added. Though license manufacturing of the K2 was beforehand initiated in neighbouring Poland, the Polish defence sector’s lengthy historical past of expertise with tank manufacturing in the course of the Chilly Battle, and the a lot decrease necessities for customisation of early batches, made this a smoother course of.
Turkish curiosity in procuring K2 tanks started within the 2000s, at a time when the nation’s longstanding adversary Syria fielded one of many largest tank forces on the earth, which was outfitted with trendy T-72 major battle tanks. The perceived want for the brand new tanks grew after the Turkish Army deployed its most succesful operational tanks, German-supplied Leopard 2s, for operations towards each Islamic State jihadists and Kurdish paramilitary items in Syria and Iraq within the mid-2010s, which resulted in catastrophic losses. Stars and Stripes assessed that the German tank’s repute “has taken a pounding in battles with Islamic State militants,” with the Nationwide Curiositydescribing a efficiency in fight that “shockingly illustrated” that they had been “not so good armour in spite of everything.” They had been “confirmed embarrassingly weak in fight” regardless of not going through properly armed adversaries. Senior Turkish officers described Leopard 2 items’ early engagements with Islamic State forces as “trauma” for his or her forces. This raised severe questions relating to the survivability of the Leopard 2, and the even much less succesful M60 that made up nearly all of the Turkish fleet, towards a contemporary combating drive.
The Altay tank differs from the unique K2 in plenty of its design options. The Turkish customised variant is considerably bigger, with an extended hull together with seven relatively than six pairs of wheels, and extra passive armour which considerably will increase its weight. This comes on the expense of mobility. A notable shortcoming of the Turkish variant is the shortage of an autoloader, which requires a rise in crew from three to 4 personnel, and reduces the speed of fireplace from twelve to simply six rounds per minute. With the K2 broadly thought of probably the most succesful NATO-compatible tank class on the earth, whereas trendy non-Western tank lessons such because the Russian T-90M and North Korean Chonma-2 have made no inroads into Center Japanese markets, the Altay is anticipated to be a number one contender for the title of probably the most succesful tank class within the area. The obsolescence of the Turkish Army’s present tank fleet makes the big scale procurement of latest K2-derived tanks a specific transformative growth for the steadiness of energy on land. The overthrow of the Syrian authorities by Turkish, Western and Israeli backed insurgents in December 2024, nevertheless, and the efficient collapse of the Syrian Armed Forces, might end in cuts to the Altay’s deliberate manufacturing numbers as the first goal for Turkey’s navy buildup has successfully ceased to exist.
