OLD AS PUTIN

Russia Dusts Off Old, Patched-Up Tanks for War, Says U.K.

Even Russia’s premier tank force is having to use T-62 tanks, says the U.K. Ministry of Defence.

Russia is dusting off and patching up 60-year-old T-62 tanks and armored personnel carriers first fielded when Vladimir Putin was still just a toddler to respond to “heavy” losses on the battlefields of Ukraine, according to an “intelligence update” from the U.K. Ministry of Defence. “There is is a realistic possibility that even units of the 1st Guards Tank Army (1 GTA), supposedly Russia’s premier tank force, will be re-equipped with T-62s to make up for previous losses” instead of the modern T-15 Armata, it said. The MoD said 800 Soviet-era T-62s had been taken from storage and given slight upgrade since last summer. “In recent days, Russian BTR-50 armored personnel carriers, first fielded in 1954, have also been identified deployed in Ukraine for the first time,” it added. “However, both these vintage vehicle types will present many vulnerabilities on the modern battlefield, including the absence of modern explosive reactive armour.”