Tankopedia
Early Cold WarMBTMain Battle TankChina

Type 59

In service 1959 - 2010s (reserve and derivatives)

Based onT-54 (licensed production of)

China's licence-built T-54A, produced in roughly ten thousand examples and exported across Asia and Africa.

Built byFirst Machinery Factory, Baotou

Type 59
Type 59 in the Military Museum of the Chinese People's Revolution — Tyg728, via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0

Development history

The Type 59 began as Soviet-supplied T-54A kits and became the foundation of the Chinese armoured force and tank industry. Early vehicles lacked stabilisation and night sights; successive marks added laser rangefinders, fire control, composite armour and 105 mm rifled guns, keeping the design useful for decades. It was exported widely - Pakistan used it in 1965 and 1971, and variants saw action in the Iran-Iraq War, Vietnam and Africa. Its descendants, the Type 69 and Type 79, carried the line into the 1990s.

Variants

One canonical record, 4 recorded variants.

  1. Type 59

    1959

    Baseline T-54A copy without stabiliser or night sights

  2. Type 59-I

    1979

    Laser rangefinder, stabilised gun, improved fire control

  3. Type 59-II

    1984

    105 mm rifled gun and new fire control

  4. Type 59D

    1995

    Explosive reactive armour, gun-launched missile capability

Related vehicles

Separate records that derive from this vehicle, grouped by how they relate to it.

Notable actions

  • Indo-Pakistani War of 1965
  • Indo-Pakistani War of 1971
  • Sino-Vietnamese War (1979)
  • Iran-Iraq War