Where old (Russian) tanks go to die

fulltimestudent

I can't resist posting this series of images, of an old tank graveyard in the Ukraine, where once old Russian tanks were repaired. Now they are left to rust:

Photographed by an 18 y.o,. photographer, the plant is located in Kharkov, which lies 300 km east of Kiev and only a few km from the Russian border, which locates in well within the area of greatest Russian influence.

My sources are:

http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/462850/Amazing-pictures-of-hidden-Soviet-tank-graveyard-in-Ukraine-taken-by-plucky-teenager

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2014-03/07/content_17330248_2.htm

The Ukraine was once an important part of the former Soviet Union's armaments production program, and still has facilities that are important in Russia's defence program, which likely explains the international fuss in that benighted country. In the east, where Russian is the native language of a great many people, their present jobs may be in those factories that are linked to Russian defence production. It is unlikely that those factories can re-tool and re-vamp to sell to Western Europe or the USA. Hence, jobs will disappear without much hope for new jobs, in a Ukraine unsympathetic to the East.

More information can be found at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Defense_Industry_(company)

http://carnegieendowment.org/2014/07/30/saving-ukraine-s-defense-industry

disposable hero of hypocrisy

Wow. What a place. I'd love to visit this. And pripyat. And a million other places...

zeb

All that top quality steel going to waste. Melted down they would make a lot of spanners, scalpels, bridges, ships,.. what a waste. and i now understand what the fight between Russia and the Ukraine is about..

DATA-DOG

Cool!! What a great hideout that would make! Tank apartments!!

DD

prologos

zeb, steel needs a serious re-constituting, not just heat and "beat into plow shares" I had knife once made from "panzerstahl" it was so brittle, would not hold an edge,

This armour reminds me of discarded WT Doctrine, once the fortress, the attack battering ram at the doors, now an ambarrasment, taking time and energy to dismantle.

kaik

When I was kid we had Russian (or Soviet, but we called them Russians) tank crashed on the main highway. They had their tank there for some times before they were able to take it out of the ditch. After 1989 such tanks dismantling places were common occurances in Eastern Europe. My father used to operate one in the 60s's. They had major technical problems, their belt felt often, and gasoline tank was at the back which you can puncture by hoe or pickaxe and lit it on fire. Between 1960's and 1980's they were rusting in the bases. Czechoslovakia was one the biggest producers of tanks in the past. During WWII every third tank used by Germans was assembled in Pilsen. During communist times there were huge defense plants in Slovakia in the Carpathian mountains. Slovakia minimized these production 25 years ago as they are not effective and obsolete. Saddam adn Milosevich had huge tanks brigades and both lost the war. Entire commie block lost the Cold War because the DoD planned on conventional warfare with tactical support near the front line using nuclear weapons.

Crazyguy

Pretty impressive site, its crazy how at one time these were thought to be the power of the nation and it was some what true. Now there just obsolete pieces of junk, how times change..