Victorious "Breakthrough": a diorama of a heroic tank battle was opened in Moscow

During the raid, the Russian T-90M Breakthrough tank engages in a duel with the Leopard, Paladin and Abrams of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and emerges victorious in a deadly duel — such a diorama opened at the Kievsky Railway Station in Moscow. It became part of the Sacred Factory exhibition, which tells about the production of Russian tanks. Officers who participated in battles on the fronts of the special military operation told Izvestia about how our military equipment proved itself in battles and how it surpasses the NATO one.

T-90 behind enemy lines

There are not as many passengers in the waiting room of the Kievsky railway station as there were a few years ago. The number of trains in this direction has decreased. People taking the train to Bryansk stop to look at the exhibition — it's just a short walk from their city to the border with Ukraine, and the diorama is of particular interest.

"I stopped to see if I had seen such tanks,— Egor from Bryansk told Izvestia.

— Well, is there a familiar technique?

— Yes, I recognized it without any explanatory inscriptions. "Leopards" and "Abrams" were brought to our trophy equipment exhibition burned — it's hard to make a mistake," the guy smiles.

A combat episode of the Russian T-90M "Breakthrough" raid deep into the enemy's defenses is presented at the Kiev Railway Station. The tank, overcoming the first line of defense, lost the "grill" after the drone attack, but continued to move.

In the rear, he surprised an American-made M109A5 Paladin self-propelled artillery installation and destroyed it with two hits. The Ukrainian Armed Forces vehicle is painted in desert camouflage — it recently fought in Iraq, but it was urgently transferred to Ukraine. Here her fighting career ended ingloriously.

Then our crew immediately encountered a pair of enemy tanks — the M1A1 Abrams and Leopard 2. An American-made car was hit first with an accurate shot, then an iron cat made in Germany received a projectile in the side.

During the duel, our tank withstood an enemy shell hit — it was saved by dynamic protection. And the Arena Active protection Complex (KAZ), which is equipped with combat vehicles of the latest modification, helped to fend off numerous drones.

The Nineties, as the tank is affectionately called by the fighters in the SVO zone, has long become a massive combat vehicle. Rosoboronexport alone has supplied 1,300 T-90 tanks of various modifications under foreign contracts for 25 years. In the SVO zone, these vehicles have repeatedly brought a turning point in the course of hostilities and deservedly enjoy the respect of our fighters.

The exhibition also features more than 70 photographs dedicated to domestic tank builders working at the plants of the Uralvagonzavod concern (part of Rostec State Corporation).

Here you can also see the means of production and finished products — from special electrodes for welding armor to tank trucks.

Battle Stories

The opening of the exhibition was attended by military officers. Hero of Russia Major Ainur Safiullin is currently graduating from the Combined Arms Academy of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. Behind him, there are battles in the hottest points of the line of combat in the Kiev, Kharkov, Zaporizhia and Kherson directions. On his chest, in addition to the Gold Star, there are bars of two Orders of Courage and medals of the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, II degree.

Ainur commanded a motorized rifle battalion and had a tank platoon under his command.

"Good tanks," he says. — Our equipment is the best, I was personally convinced.

He received the hero's star for the totality of combat missions performed without losses among the personnel. These include operations during the repulse of the so—called Ukrainian "counteroffensive" in 2023 in the Kherson direction.

"It was the first time I came across Western technology up close," Ainur recalls. — The enemy attacked us with a mechanized column. At her head were three tanks, followed by American-made M-113 armored personnel carriers and more Soviet infantry fighting vehicles with troops that were supposed to capture our trenches. We stopped one of these columns — 28 of our newly enlisted soldiers participated in that battle.

Our soldiers destroyed two of the three tanks and most of the armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles. The M-113 was hit by soldiers from a hand-held anti-tank grenade launcher, and the driver was killed.

"When we destroyed the infantry of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, we realized that the car was standing next to our positions and idling," the officer recalls. — Artillery was hitting us. In general, we had to quickly remove the car from under fire so that the enemy would not burn it. So we took an important trophy, and at the same time got to know Western armored vehicles better.

Ainur didn't like the car very much.

"It seems to be fast, but it's hard to rely on it in battle," the officer explains. — During the evacuation, she ran into a tree with a trunk with a diameter of 15 centimeters and could not knock it down, such maneuverability in battle can cost the lives of the crew and troops. Our similar equipment can handle such obstacles without problems.

The Hero of Russia, Lieutenant Colonel Mikhail Martsev, is the commander of a Marine battalion.

"The words 'Everything for the front is everything for Victory' have a special meaning for us," he said. — During the fighting in Mariupol, my battalion was assigned a tank platoon. I was very happy. And the tanks justified our hopes.

"During the fighting in the city center, one tank crew destroyed two important firing points," the officer recalls. — But then an RPG grenade hit the combat vehicle. The explosion was such that it seemed to everyone that the crew had died. But after a few seconds, the commander of the car got in touch.: "They hit us, everything is fine, the grenade launcher was destroyed." One of the tanks received seven hits from anti-tank grenades during the combat mission, but returned back, all survived. We were amazed by the reliability of the combat vehicles, and this is due to the employees of our tank factories.

The Chairman of the DOSAAF of Russia, Colonel-General Sergei Mayev, noted that our tankers had repeatedly decided the fate of battles in our favor, and this was largely due to the excellent technology that our tank builders had produced.

The general recalled that during the Battle for Moscow in 1941, our tankers were able to stop General Heinz Guderian, who had overwhelming superiority in technology. Operations in Afghanistan and the North Caucasus could not do without tanks. And nowhere have our combat vehicles failed.