Challenger 3: Too Few Tanks?
Key Points and Summary – The British Army is upgrading its combat-proven Challenger 2 tank to the new Challenger 3.
-While built on refurbished hulls, the key change is a new turret featuring a 120-mm main gun compatible with standard NATO ammunition.
Challenger 2 Tank. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
-This marks a significant logistical shift away from the UK’s unique gun system, which was designed for HESH rounds now considered less effective against modern armor.
-Despite being hailed as the UK’s “most lethal tank,” a major controversy surrounds the program: with only 148 tanks on order, experts warn the force will be too small to be credible in a peer conflict.
What Will the British Army Do?
The British Army has relied for years on the Challenger 2 main battle tank.
It is a carefully measured improvement of the Army’s previous MBT, the aptly named Challenger 1. While both tanks are heavily armed and armored, perhaps the most unique feature they share is their 120-mm main gun – a rifled design that shares the same barrel diameter as other NATO MBTs, but is smoothbore rather than rifled. More on that later.
Challenger 2
The Challenger 2 has seen broad service across the globe with the British Army. It participated in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, as well as in Bosnia, Kosovo, and elsewhere. Perhaps the Challenger 2’s most rigorous battlefield experience has come in support of Ukrainian forces against Russia.
The United Kingdom in early 2023 became the first country to send main battle tanks to Ukraine. It did so despite rampant heel-dragging by Ukraine’s allies, who feared an escalation of the war. In Ukrainian service, British-supplied Challenger 2s have deployed across the long frontline, and they garnered significant media attention as part of Ukraine’s armored thrust into Russia’s Kursk region.
A Sinking Sunset
Although the British Army’s main battle tank has served in combat environments ranging from the arid passes of Afghanistan to the frozen forests of Russia, the sun is setting on the platform. It is certainly still a capable tank, but changes to British Army logistics, and a desire to enhance future survivability by applying lessons learned in Ukraine, mean the tank will slowly be phased out in favor of the Challenger 3.
Though it carries a new number, the Challenger 3 is in many respects quite similar to its older sibling. In fact, it will be built on refurbished Challenger 2 hulls, which are given a new lease on life by the Challenger 3’s improved armor protection.
The biggest changes, however, are to the Challenger 3’s turret – and what is inside.
A New Main Gun and New Ammunition
The turret will be built around a new 120-mm main gun. Like the tanks in the fleets of other NATO countries, the Challenger 3’s gun will be rifled. This marks a significant departure from decades of British preference for smoothbore main guns.
The British Army’s reliance on smoothbore barrels relates to its preference for High-Explosive Squash Head (HESH) rounds. This category of ammunition is useful against a wide variety of targets, including fortified positions such as bunkers or buildings.
Historically, the malleable plastic explosive warhead of HESH rounds was also useful against armored vehicles, because it would form to the shape of the vehicle hulls before detonating. Smoothbore main guns were essential to HESH rounds: the spinning imparted by a rifled barrel on a HESH projectile would interfere with the munition’s effectiveness. While HESH-type ammunition would not typically punch a hole through vehicle armor, it would cause internal spalling, to the detriment of the vehicle’s crew and passengers. Modernized vehicle armor protection, however, has negated many of the advantages afforded by HESH ammunition.
The smoothbore barrel is replaced with a more typical rifled barrel for the Challenger 3, in recognition of the limited future utility of HESH ammunition. The design choice is a boon for the NATO alliance — British Army main battle tanks will be able to fire NATO-standard ammunition (which requires barrel rifling). Concurrently, NATO allies will be able to fire British tank ammunition; this is useful logistical streamlining.
Too Few to Fight?
There may, however, be a significant problem with the Challenger 3: its very low acquisition numbers.
When the Challenger 3 program was announced in 2021, the British Ministry of Defense explained that it would acquire 148 of the tanks. The numbers were poorly received by many online commentators, who noted that even a few irrecoverable battlefield losses would severely hamper the British Army’s ability to conduct armored warfare maneuvers. One of the most biting criticisms of the low expected procurement came from the Royal United Services Institute, the United Kingdom’s leading defense and security think tank.
“Similarly, when RUSI analysts last looked at the Army, and the combat division the UK claims to have, it measured the number of main battle tanks and self-propelled artillery in the UK’s inventory and found the numbers wanting when set against a ‘credible’ armoured division of anywhere from 170 to over 300 tanks and around 110 to 220 artillery pieces,” the Royal United Services Institute wrote. “The numbers have not improved in the subsequent four years: under the Challenger 3 programme the UK will have a total of 148 main battle tanks (in 2030).”
RUSI noted that “the Challenger 3 may be the ‘most lethal tank’ ever fielded by the British Army,” but, the think tank concluded, “it is going to be available in such limited numbers that it will have to perform heroically in the face of a notional foe in the form of Russian ground forces, such as a Combined Arms Army.”
About the Author: Caleb Larson
Caleb Larson is an American multiformat journalist based in Berlin, Germany. His work covers the intersection of conflict and society, focusing on American foreign policy and European security. He has reported from Germany, Russia, and the United States. Most recently, he covered the war in Ukraine, reporting extensively on the war’s shifting battle lines from Donbas and writing on the war’s civilian and humanitarian toll. Previously, he worked as a Defense Reporter for POLITICO Europe. You can follow his latest work on X.
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