T-55
In service 1958 - in service today
Based onT-54 (successor to)
Also known asT-55A, Object 155, Type 59 (Chinese licence)
The most-produced tank in history: small, cheap, low and still fighting in conflicts today.
Built byFactory No. 183, Omsk, Kharkiv
Development history
The T-55 took the T-54B and added full NBC protection, a larger fuel load, a two-plane gun stabiliser and, in the T-55A, an anti-radiation liner. Licence production in Czechoslovakia, Poland and China, plus decades of modernisation packages, kept it in front-line use long after the Soviet Union stopped building it. Its low turret roof limits gun depression and crew comfort, but sheer numbers and simplicity made it the definitive Cold War tank of the Eastern Bloc.
Photo gallery
Period photographs with source and licence details.
Variants
One canonical record, 4 recorded variants.
T-55
1958No loader hatch, more ammunition and fuel, NBC protection.
T-55A
1963Anti-radiation lining and improved crew protection.
T-55AM / Enigma
1983Appliqué and reactive armour packages, laser rangefinder, better engine.
Type 59
1959Chinese licence-built version, itself widely exported and upgraded.
Related vehicles
Separate records that derive from this vehicle, grouped by how they relate to it.
Variant of this vehicle
Upgrade of this vehicle
National designation of this vehicle
Notable actions
- Prague Spring (1968)
- Vietnam War (1972-75)
- Yom Kippur War (1973)
- Iran-Iraq War (1980-88)
- Gulf War (1991)