Breaking news
China participates for the first time with Type 96A MBT at Russian Tank Biathlon 2014 competition 07.
| 2014
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Defence & Security News - China |
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| Thursday, August 7, 2014 11:08 AM | |||
| China participates for the first time with Type 96A MBT at Russian Tank Biathlon 2014 competition. | |||
The Russian “Tank Biathlon-2014” International Competition
kicked off at the Alabino Firing Range in the outskirt of Moscow on August
4, 2014. The Chinese team participated in the competition for the first
time with Chinese-made Type
96A
main battle tank, and hit all targets in the single-tank shooting event
that day. |
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It
is verified by an official of the Chinese participating troops that the
Chinese team was the only one of the 12 participating teams that hit all
the targets that day. It is also learnt that the Chinese team consists
of 12 tankmen with the average age of 26 years old. According to the Russian military, the 13-day-long “Tank Biathlon-2014” will be carried out in four stages. The first stage is single-tank competition, including crossing such barriers as water, mine field, soil ridge and cliff while completing various shooting subjects on the way. The second stage is short-distance and speed competition, and the third stage is physical competition, a new event this year. The fourth stage is relay race, in which the four best-performing teams from the previous three stages will compete with each other. It will be the fiercest section of this year’s competition and the group winner will come out of this stage. Compared with the first Tank Biathlon competition in 2013 that was participated by four countries, 12 countries participated in the Tank Biathlon this year, including Russia, China, Armenia, Venezuela, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Serbia. Each team consists of three main tank groups and one backup group. |
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| The
Type 96A (also called ZTZ96A) main battle tank is an
upgraded version of the Type
96 tank. The Type 96A variant features arrow-shaped spaced
add-on armour modules, which replaced the original vertically faced front
armour on the basic variant Type 96. The main armament of the ZTZ96A or Type 96A is composed with a smoothbore 125 mm gun with autoloader of Russian 2A46M design. |
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