The Lion of Babylon tank or Asad Babil (Arabic: اسد بابل) was an Iraqi-built version of the Soviet T-72 MBT (main battle tank), assembled in a factory established in the 1980s near Taji, north of Baghdad.
This project represented the most ambitious attempt by Saddam Hussein's Regime to develop an indigenous tank production, triggered in part when some Western governments imposed an embargo in order to force a negotiated end to the Iran-Iraq war.
This project represented the most ambitious attempt by Saddam Hussein's Regime to develop an indigenous tank production, triggered in part when some Western governments imposed an embargo in order to force a negotiated end to the Iran-Iraq war.
Production History
A steel plant was in place in Taji since 1986, built by a West German company, manufacturing steel for several military uses and meeting the standards to retrofit and rebuild tanks already on duty in the Iraqi Army, such as the T-54/55 family and the T-62. But the first locally-built T-72 came off the production line in early 1989, after a license agreement was achieved with a Polish contractor to provide essential parts for assembly. The United Nations imposed an arms embargo following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, which soon limited the complex activity to the production of spare parts for the Lions and other tanks in the Iraqi arsenal.
In most aspects, the Lion of Babylon is physically identical to the basic T-72M. The Iraqi tank was upgraded to T-72M1A features with the addition of laminated armor on the front slope and rear as protection against missile attacks (see Russian link in the Armor section).
A few examples featured a laser rangefinder for its 125 mm smoothbore main gun. American military intelligence believed some of them also featured Belgium-made thermal sights. These same sources claim the tank was also provided with a better track protection against sand and mud than the Soviet T-72, by reducing the original number of dampers. Some of them carried a crude detachable pipe device made by the Iraqis in order to use the exhausts to blow up sand or dust to dig-in the tank. It's widely known that the tank had some kind of electro-optical interference pods of Chinese origin. As secondary armament, the tank mounted either the NSV or the DShK 12.7 mm machinegun and the coaxial 7.62 mm PKT common to all models of T-72.
A steel plant was in place in Taji since 1986, built by a West German company, manufacturing steel for several military uses and meeting the standards to retrofit and rebuild tanks already on duty in the Iraqi Army, such as the T-54/55 family and the T-62. But the first locally-built T-72 came off the production line in early 1989, after a license agreement was achieved with a Polish contractor to provide essential parts for assembly. The United Nations imposed an arms embargo following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, which soon limited the complex activity to the production of spare parts for the Lions and other tanks in the Iraqi arsenal.
In most aspects, the Lion of Babylon is physically identical to the basic T-72M. The Iraqi tank was upgraded to T-72M1A features with the addition of laminated armor on the front slope and rear as protection against missile attacks (see Russian link in the Armor section).
A few examples featured a laser rangefinder for its 125 mm smoothbore main gun. American military intelligence believed some of them also featured Belgium-made thermal sights. These same sources claim the tank was also provided with a better track protection against sand and mud than the Soviet T-72, by reducing the original number of dampers. Some of them carried a crude detachable pipe device made by the Iraqis in order to use the exhausts to blow up sand or dust to dig-in the tank. It's widely known that the tank had some kind of electro-optical interference pods of Chinese origin. As secondary armament, the tank mounted either the NSV or the DShK 12.7 mm machinegun and the coaxial 7.62 mm PKT common to all models of T-72.
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