Ukraine's Surviving Challenger 2 Tanks May Be Rolling Toward Their Third Major Battle
A photo essay
In January 2023, the United Kingdom pledged to Ukraine 14 of its 386 Challenger 2 tanks, 219 of which are currently in active U.K. service. The 71-ton, four-person Challenger 2 has thick frontal armor and accurate fire controls.
But its rifled 120-millimeter gun and lack of blow-out panels for its ammunition stowage make it something of an anachronism compared to the American M-1 Abrams and German Leopard 2. It’s also heavy for its 1,200 horsepower. “Cross-country mobility is difficult,” one tanker complained.
The Ukrainians were happy to the have the tanks, however, and assigned all 14 to the elite 82nd Air Assault Brigade. The unit rolled into action in the waning weeks of Ukraine’s failed counteroffensive in southern Ukraine in the summer of 2023—and lost its first Challenger 2 to an anti-tank missile.
A year later, the 82nd Air Assault Brigade joined the Ukrainian invasion of western Russia’s Kursk Oblast—and lost a second Challenger to a Russian drone.
Twenty-eight months after they were pledged to the war effort, as many as 12 of the Ukrainian Challenger 2s remain. They may be about to fight in their third major action. The 82nd Air Assault Brigade is one of the Ukrainian units rushing to block a Russian march on the town of Kostyantynivka in eastern Ukraine.
Read more:
Ukraine's Only Challenger 2 Brigade Is Rushing South to Block a Major Russian Offensive
For a whole bloody year, Russian field armies have been trying—and failing—to capture a trio of settlements in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast just east of the main Ukrainian fortress belt threading north through Kramatorsk.