T-54 - a tank with a long history

New realities emerging in the second half1940s bipolar world and the confrontation between East and West, which led to the Cold War, forced to rethink the newly gained military experience. As a result, new models of weapons and military equipment appeared. In their system, a special place is occupied by the T-54 - one of the best tanks in the world, created in the post-war years.

This medium tank is an immediate successorlegendary models T-34 and T-34-85. Initially, it was created during the war as a means of fighting heavily armored enemy equipment at long ranges. The long-range gun D-10S, mounted on the self-propelled artillery mount SU-100, showed itself perfectly on the battlefield, but the transmission of the 34th was weak for him. The development of the T-44-100 reinforced tank was also carried out, also not devoid of shortcomings. The development of the new version was delayed, but as a result, it resulted in the creation of a new model.

Under the designation T-54, the tank was adopted by armored forces in April 1946 - a month after the speech of Churchill in Fulton, which is considered a reference point of the Cold War.

Designers have made sure that the new combatThe machine had maximum reliability and at the same time was easy enough to maintain. In addition to a hundred-millimeter gun, two 7.62 mm machine guns were mounted on the tank and an anti-aircraft machine gun was mounted on the tank. The body, borrowed from the T-44, basically left unchanged. In this design, two innovations are applied, later spread to all armored vehicles: replacement of the driver's observation slot with prismatic periscopes and the presence of a pre-heater in the running gear, which helped to start the tank's engine in the cold faster. The B-54 engine with a capacity of 520 "horses" produced a speed on the highway 50 km / h and half as much - on rough terrain, however, with a power reserve on it.

By the sum of its combat characteristics, the T-54 remained the strongest medium tank in the world for 12 years.

The most famous modification was the T-55,created in response to the receipt of the US Army nuclear weapons. The main difference between the T-55 was the anti-atomic protection system. In general, during the time of the tank (mostly before 1967, in part until 1979), many modifications and upgrades were made, including outside the USSR. On the basis of a more than successful design, such variations were developed: a commander's tank, a flamethrower tank, an anti-aircraft self-propelled unit, a minesweeper, an armored tractor, a fire truck, a bridge-laying machine and others.
The first real baptism of fire the T-54 tank passedon the Six Day War (1967) as part of Egyptian and Syrian troops. A large number of tanks, lined or abandoned by crews, was captured by the Israeli army, and after modernization it was adopted. It is characteristic that the USSR, being the ideological antagonist of Israel, in 1981-1982. sold him 50 T-54 tanks.

The most active period of combat use of the T-541979-1991: the conflict between the PRC and Vietnam, the war in Afghanistan (one of the main tanks, along with the T-62, in the South Group of Forces of the USSR), the Operation Mir Galilee in Lebanon (in the Syrian and Israeli armies) , in the Iran-Iraq war and the war in the Persian Gulf (in the Iraqi army).

The T-54 and T-55 tanks were actively supplied andThe USSR was sold to its allies in the socialist camp, friendly countries and some others. For example, Finland. T-54 tanks produced in Poland and Czechoslovakia were also delivered.

The industry produced T-54/55 for more than 30 years. This is a record figure for a modern tank.