These weaknesses are mainly in design, especially the inconvenience for the crew in real combat conditions.
Sharing with TASS news agency on May 20, retired Colonel Sergey Suvorov - armament expert, Russian Military Science Doctor - has denied the long-standing popular belief that Leopard is a "user-friendly" tank line.
According to Mr. Suvorov, the positions of the crew members in the Western tank made operations more difficult and dangerous in combat situations.
The drivers seat is the most comfortable place in the Leopard, he said. "Good seats, pedals and a relatively large space. However, new versions such as 2A5, 2A6, 2A7+ and 2A8 are all designed with additional tournage, making it impossible for drivers to exit through their own doors.
As a result, all three of them - driving, gunners and commanders - must go in and out of the car through the commander. Although the Gunners also have their own door, the situation is hard to avoid. "The commander must set foot on the Gunners, everyone sits overlapping. It is impossible to say this is a convenient design" - Colonel Sergey Sovorov said.
The same situation happened with US tanks. According to Russian experts, drivers are often in a position of almost lying on their stomach during combat - an extremely inconvenient position. The reason is that to reduce the height of the body, the interior space is forced to narrow, causing serious limited performance.
Previously, Russian Rostec Group also announced the technical vulnerabilities discovered after studying the Leopard 2A6 seized from Ukraine. Weaknesses include: uneven thyroid structure, unreasonable interior design, and vulnerability to modern punches.
After a comprehensive assessment, Russian experts concluded that the Leopard 2A6 was significantly inferior to domestic Russian tank lines such as the T-72B3M, T80BVM and T-90M, which have been upgraded according to practical experience from the Ukrainian battlefield.
These new findings not only reduce the glory that German Leopard tanks once had in the Western media, but also show the importance of field evaluation - where war prizes become living proof of the technical strength of both sides.
