15. T-72 Battle Tank – Russia
Manufacturers: Uralvagonzavod’s Heavy Vehicles Factory, Leonid Kartsev-Valeri Venediktov
Main Users: Russian Armed Forces and the Soviet Union
Program Cost: $12.5 billion*; Cost per unit: $500k*
The T-72 was an outgrowth of the T-64, an unsuccessful project that relied on nascent technology and was expensive. Much more popular was the T-72, of which 25,000 have been produced since 1969. These tanks, developed by Leonid Kartsev-Valeri Venediktov, are produced at the Heavy Vehicles Factory at Uralvagonzavod.
©Credit: commons.wikimedia.org/Vitaly Kuzmin
The T-72 has been exported extensively and has been used in numerous conflicts in forty different countries. In 1973, the T-72 saw its first iteration. With the exception of having an optical coincidence rangefinder and a 125mm smoothbore tank gun, the Ural was identical to the original model.
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