The best Soviet tanks have never been born

The Soviet army has hundreds, even thousands of armored vehicles, including tanks, battle tanks, and self-propelled artillery systems, but many ambitious projects have never been done.

During the Soviet era, many tank-making projects were promising to stop on paper or be done in prototype form but never be mass produced, among them a "flying" tank. ", a tank surfing on the water or a tank capable of surviving a nuclear explosion .

UFO tank.

The only "object 279" was designed by the Soviet Union in the late 1950s to prepare for a nuclear war. This heavy tank looks like an unidentified flying object (UFO) mounted on two tracks. The tank's unusual ellipse shape prevents it from being overturned by the strong shockwave caused by a nuclear explosion.

However, due to many technical errors, the project was frozen. Only one tank was built, currently on display at the Koubinka Tank Museum in the Moscow region.

Flying tank.

MAS-1 was designed to be the first Soviet tank to not only travel on land but also fly. Based on the BT-7 tank base, the body of the MAS-1 is elegantly designed with foldable wings and propellers.

This flying vehicle is equipped with a number of machine guns. The crew consisted of a pilot and tank commander, who was also the shooter and operator of the radio.

Considered too ambitious and expensive, this project was abandoned in 1937.

King of all terrains - amphibious tanks.

In the 1930s, when the first amphibious tanks and gliders were created, Soviet designers came up with the idea of ​​creating an ideal combat vehicle that could cross deserts and ice. , deep snow, rivers and swamps .

Since then the first amphibious tank was launched based on the world's first hovercraft, L-1. It is 10 meters long, has two crew members and is armed with machine guns. However, the project was abandoned for unknown reasons.

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