Real and Fake

[Stephen White]

This is probably the one tank which Armortek can't build, for the simple reason that I don't believe there are any in captivity in UK, accessible publicly. Nevertheless it's one of the most important AFVs of the Cold War, the tank which put STILLBREW on Chieftain and spurred the introduction of Chobham Armour on Challenger 1. It's the Soviet T-64B, which we saw coming into service with the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany in the early eighties.

We had observed a new, enlarged gunner's sight with dual optics and a new box on the turret in front of the commander's hatch. We were tasked to get good close-up photography to identify the purpose of the box and the capability of the new sight.

It turned out that the T-64B had been upgraded with a tube launched guided anti-tank missile, the 9M112 "Cobra", known to NATO as the AT-8 Songster. Chieftain was rapidly up armoured as a result.

Well, going through some old photos taken in East Germany in 1983 (that's another story) and knowing a one sixth T-64B was unlikely, I thought I'd go plastic - sorry......

With apologies to the real Real or Fake thread.


Now back to the metal bashing.