Chieftain

The British Chieftain main battle tank appeared in the 1960s and quickly established itself as the most powerful tank on the market, that is, until the arrival of the West German Leopard 1 series. A replacement for the aging Centurion series, the 120mm main gun of the Chieftain was a major upgrade from the Cold War standard of 105mm and the chassis provided for a long line of variants to be issued. The system also saw widespread acceptance in the Middle East via export and was featured in extensive combat operations during the Iran-Iraq war, fighting for both sides as either purchased (Iran) or captured (Iraq) examples.

Externally the Chieftain maintains a strategic low profile. This is accomplished through its design in which the driver sits in a reclined position in the hull front while the turret and hull design are kept low to the ground. The Chieftain is also characterized by by the six large road wheels on either track side, a sharp sloping front hull and sloped cast steel turret mounted in the middle of the hull. The powerful Leyland 6-cylinder engine is kept at hull rear and generates some 750bhp. Crew accommodations amount to four personnel that include the driver, a commander and gunner seated in the turret right side and a loader seated turret left side.

The Chieftain was known for the mounting of its powerful L11A5 120mm main gun - at the time the most powerful fitted to any battle tank and carried 64 x 120mm projectiles. Projectile loading was a two-phase process which required loading charges. Ammunition types ran the standard range of armor piercing, tracer, smoke and the like. Additional armament includes a 12.7mm anti-aircraft gun fitted externally to the top of the turret though this system can be fired from within the turret itself. A 7.62mm machine gun is co-axially mounted to the main gun while an additional cupola 7.62mm machine gun is also apparent. For defensive measure, 12 smoke grenade dischargers are provided in two banks of six on either turret side. Full NBC and nightvision equipment is also installed. Later combat marks featured passive armor upgrades that increased crew protection to an extent.

Iran received the Chieftain as the "Shir" series in two marks during production with the second mark reaching some 1,225 examples. It is believed that Iraq captured some 100 Shirs in combat. Oman and Kuwait received used and production order amounts.

The Chieftain chassis proved highly adaptable and produced a slew of variants on top of the several combat type marks already in service. Among those were a range of armored recovery and engineer vehicles and an armored bridgelayer. The Chieftain main battle tank has long since been discontinued from British Army service and was replaced by the Challenger series, detailed elsewhere on this site.

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Last Updated: 11/5/2008