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New Turkish-made main battle tank Altay has received interest from Pakistan and Gulf countries 10102162.
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Defence & Security News - Turkey
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| New Turkish-made main battle tank Altay has received interest from Pakistan and Gulf countries. | |||
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Altay, Turkey’s first domestic main battle tank in the making, has received much interest from the country’s allies including Pakistan and Gulf countries, said the Turkish Undersecretariat for Defense Industries (SSM) head Ismail Demir said January 7, 2016, during a presentation at Turkish parliament.
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 Turkish-made main battle tank Altay at IDEF 2015, Defense Exhibition in Istanbul, Turkey. |
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“Including Pakistan and the Gulf countries, we can say that countries that we have good relations with are showing a large interest in the tank. Representatives of some countries are being invited to the ongoing firing tests,” he said, adding that the tests were extremely satisfying.
The SSM officials said at the briefing that five prototypes of the tank have been produced and succeeded in tests in different spots across Turkey. The winter tests of the tank would soon be done at the Sarikamis district in the eastern province of Kars, known for its challenging climate conditions. Demir’s deputy, Köksal Liman, said the SSM had a sum of $6.2 billion of funding from the Defense Industry Support Fund and some $2 billion of the total was still in a bank account. The Altay is the future third generation main battle tank (MBT) for the Turkish army. The first prototypes of Turkey’s main battle tank ALTAY designed and developed by OTOKAR, the biggest privately owned company of the Turkish Defence Industry was unveiled at OTOKAR facilities in Sakarya on November 15th, 2012.The main armament of ALTAY is a 120 mm 55 caliber smoothbore gun suitable for various kinds of rounds. The Turkish Company MKE was assigned to manufacture the 120 mm 55 caliber Main Armament by technology transfer from Hyundai Rotem of South Korea. The design of ALTAY has been realized in order to fulfill all kinds of operational requirements derived from the technical and tactical demands of the Turkish Armed Forces |
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