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| Slovakia Will Soon Receive 15 Leopard 2A4 tanks From Germany |
Bratislava - The Ministry of Defense of Slovakia and Germany signed an agreement to enhance cooperation in the military field. Under this cooperation, Slovakia will receive 15 Leopard 2A4 tanks with ammunition, spare parts and crew training from Germany. This was in exchange for giving Ukraine 30 Soviet-era BVP-1 infantry fighting vehicles.
The exchange illustrates continued efforts by European countries to provide Ukraine's military with Soviet-designed hardware to aid its efforts against the Russian invasion. In return, the NATO partners of these countries seek to replenish capabilities reduced or stripped by such arms donations.
The Slovak Armed Forces intend to decommission their military equipment which they inherited after the breakup of Czechoslovakia in 1993.
Previously, Slovakia presented Russia's S-300 air defense missile system, 155mm Zuzana 2 self-propelled howitzer (SPH), Grad multiple-launch rocket systems (MLRS) to Ukraine.
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The Leopard 2 is a 3rd generation main battle tank originally developed by Krauss-Maffei in the 1970s for the West German army. This tank first entered service in 1979 and replaced the previous Leopard 1 as the main battle tank of the German Army.
Leopard 2 It is armed with a 120 mm smoothbore cannon, and is powered by a twin-turbo V-12 diesel engine. Various versions have served in the armed forces of Germany and 13 other European countries, as well as several non-European countries, including Canada, Chile, Indonesia and Singapore. There are two main development batches of this tank: the original model up to the Leopard 2A4, and the upgraded batch, namely the Leopard 2A5 and later versions.