The right product at the right time! That is probably what the management of KNDS Deutschland must be saying to themselves with their new Leopard 2A8. First presented less than two years ago, this evolution of the Leopard 2A7HU Hungarian, in fact, continues to record orders, especially in Europe.
Today it is Sweden's turn to turn to the most modern tank currently available in the West. Stockholm has just confirmed the order for 44 Leopard 2A8, 10 of which will be used to compensate for the Stridsvagn 122 tanks sent to Ukraine, alongside the modernization of the country's entire tracked armored fleet.
Success leads to success, this new European order confirms the dimension of the European standard of Leopard 2A8, which takes the lion's share, in number of customers if not in sales volume, against the American M1A2 and the K2 Black Panther Korean, on the old continent.
The fact remains that this wave does not make everyone happy. Indeed, with each sale of Leopard 2A8, but also KF-51 Panther and K2, it is as much of the potential European market of the future Franco-German MGCS, which is pushed back by fifteen to twenty years, in the best case. To the point that one can wonder if, when the tank enters service, there will still be customers interested in it?
Summary
Sweden orders 44 Leopard 2A8 and modernizes 110 Stridsvagn 122 for 17 Bn SEK
It was in a press release that the FMV, the Swedish army procurement agency, announced a series of measures and contracts validated by the executive. It announced, in particular, the modernization of all CV90 tracked armoured vehicles currently in service, as well as a deep modernization procedure of the 110 Stridsvagn 122 combat tanks currently in service, named Stridsvagn 123.
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