Type: Main Battle Tank
Nation: Soviet Union/Russia
Period: Cold War/Modern
Location: Embassy of the Russian Federation, Berlin, Germany
Ageing backbone
Following 1978’s T-72A, the T-72B was the second upgraded version of the standard T-72 Main Battle Tank. First introduced in 1985, it featured an improved 125mm gun and fire control system, a more powerful engine and better armour. In many cases, ERA (= explosive reactive armour) blocks were added as well. In 2010 another modernisation program was launched to convert large numbers of T-72Bs to the T-72B3 standard. These two variants were the most numerous Russian tanks during the unprovoked 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Destroyed in battle
This particular vehicle belonged to the Russian 37th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade from Kyakhta near Mongolia, a unit that lost about half of their soldiers during the Kyiv Offensive in February and March 2022. Elements of the 37th are suspected to have participated in committing war crimes in the village of Motyzhyn. On 31 March 2022 this tank was disabled by a mine on the outskirts of Dmytrivka, a village just 15 km west of Kyiv. The hull and turret show extensive damage stemming from the blast and small-arms fire.
Burnt-out war memorial
On 24 February 2023, the first anniversary of the start of Russia’s war in Ukraine, the T-72B wreck was placed right outside the Embassy of the Russian Federation at Unter den Linden in Berlin as a sign of protest. This was made possible by the Berlin Story Bunker team which includes Enno Lenze, a journalist who had visited Ukraine a year earlier and who witnessed the results of the Russian massacre in Bucha first-hand. The project was supported by the National Museum of Military History of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense.
A very special form of protest
Originally the tank was supposed to arrive much earlier and much longer, but Berlin’s communal authorities were against it. Settling the matter in court, the project’s initiators were eventually allowed to put the T-72B on display for three days – with its gun aiming right at the Russian embassy.
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