During the psychodrama about the Ukrainian tanks, several press articles thought they saw, in the position of the United States which refused to transfer its M1A2 Abrams tanks to Kyiv, a maneuver by Washington to sell the American heavy tank to Europeans as an alternative solution. of the Leopard 2 urgently requested by Kyiv with the strong support of Warsaw. Today, it appears that this maneuver was mainly aimed at bringing the Ukrainian authorities back to fairer positions in order to favor a defensive posture vis-ร -vis a very likely massive Russian offensive to come, but also to open a channel of communication with Moscow for a way out of the crisis. If Moscow finally rejected the American option, and that the house Banche announced the sending of M1A2 Abrams within a few months in Ukraine, it also appears that if this was the strategy of Washington (which is very improbable), it is hardly crowned with success.
Indeed, after Oslo which announced this weekend an order for 54 Leopard 2A7+ to replace its Leopard 2A4, with an option for 18 additional tanks, it is the turn of the Czech Republic to express its interest in the latest evolution of the German tank. Indeed, after delivering its T-72s to Ukraine last spring, Prague obtained from Berlin the sending of 14 tanks Leopard 2A4 as a transitional solution, to maintain operational capacity. The first Leopard 2A4 arrived in the Czech Republic a few months ago, and was immediately tested by the armies to assess its performance and capabilities. And obviously, the tests were conclusive, since Prague announced this week that it intends to order up to 50 heavy tanks from Krauss-Maffei Wegmann Leopard 2A7+. According to Czech Defense Minister Jana ฤernochovรก, the delivery of Leopard 2A4 to the armies of his country, in fact pave the way for the arrival of Leopard 2A7+ to operate within the 7th Armored Brigade.
The Czech decision to turn to the German tank is interesting in more ways than one. First, it shows that the widespread perception of Berlin's lasting and significant loss of influence in Europe, particularly on defense issues, is far from obvious. Clearly, neither Norway, a Scandinavian country, nor the Czech Republic, an Eastern European country, blames the German defense industry for Berlin's procrastination over the delivery of tanks to Ukraine, especially as, as we have repeatedly explained, the German position in this case was strictly identical to that applied by all the major European countries in this area since the start of the conflict. Besides, the surge against Olaf Scholz and Germany having followed the German waiting posture vis-ร -vis a decision by Washington, was unaware of the very significant support given by Germany to the European countries which had delivered equipment to Kyiv to replace this equipment with second-hand equipment offered by Berlin. It is clear that for the Czech authorities, these aspects have been taken into consideration.
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[โฆ] [โฆ]
[โฆ] February 7, 2023 [โฆ]
[โฆ] Apart from doing a handstand, Armin Papperger, the CEO of Rheinmetall, will probably have tried everything in recent weeks to convince the Bundeswehr to turn to its new tank, the KF51 Panther, in particular to replace the 18 Leopard A26 sent by Berlin to Ukraine in support of Kyiv's defense effort against Moscow. Unfortunately for him, this will not be the case. Indeed, the president of the defense committee in the Bundestag, Agnรจs Strack-Zimmermann, confirmed yesterday in an interview with Frankfurter Rundschau, that the Bundeswehr was going to order new tanks Leopard 2 in their final A7V version, but also Pzh2000 self-propelled guns, to replace the armored vehicles sent to Ukraine, to the great pleasure of Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, which manufactures the two armored vehicles (with the assistance of Rheinmetall), and who sees, these In recent months, its order book has been filling up after the success of Leopard 2 in Hungary and Norway, and while waiting for the Czech Republic. [โฆ]