By Boyko Nikolov
Feb 22, 2021
Bulgarian Military
KYIV – A Russian military intelligence agent was detained in Kharkiv, Ukraine, while trying to access the technical documentation of a Ukrainian-made T-84BM Oplot tank. The news was confirmed by the Ukrainian media, as well as by the online military site Defense Blog.
The Ukrainian security service, known as the SBU, prevented the attempt of the Russian military agent to obtain the documentation about the Ukrainian tank.
The Ukrainian media reported that the captured Russian military spy had acted as an agent of the General Staff of the Armed Forces (GRU) of the Russian Federation.
According to the SBU, the Russian spy tried to recruit an employee of the Ukrainian company Kharkiv Morozov, which develops the modern Ukrainian tank. The SBU found out about this attempt to recruit and set a trap for the spy. The Ukrainian security service controlled the event for the transmission of false information to the Russian spy, during which the spy was arrested.
The Russian spy’s unsuccessful attempts to get to the tank’s secrets may be related to the armor of the Ukrainian machine. According to unconfirmed information, the Ukrainians have developed a next-generation armor that provides excellent protection against tandem warheads.
Sources claim that this new “explosive-jet armor” has better characteristics than the Russian Contact 5ERA. Military experts do not rule out the possibility that in this case the Ukrainian tank’s armor is the main reason for Russian espionage.
The tank also has a modern counteraction system, and depending on the situation, T-84BM Oplot can also be equipped with an active protection system Zaslon.
The tank is controlled by a crew of three people – a commander, an artilleryman, and a driver. There is no need to use a loader, as the Ukrainian tank has an automatic system for loading ammunition.