T-62M

Dedushka has told me stories, such stories...

"The best tank terrain is that without anti-tank weapons."

– Anonymous

"Ukraine is not the best terrain for tank."

– Ukrainian army

What's this? A preview for oil wars? ALL RIGHT THEN!

Like the T55AM2 the T-62M is an old tank dug up from the endless Soviet inventory of old war machines and upgraded to stand an actual chance on the modern battlefield (but not TOO deep from within the inventory, that would be T34s, which shockingly in 2018 were STILL in inventories of some countries, and even still fighting in Yemen!). With bolt on BDD armor panels on the turret and hull, new side skirts, and improved fire control systems, it can still hold its own against all but the latest models of main battle tanks. Armed with a 115mm 2A20 smoothbore gun, this old girl can still dish out the damage whether it be traditional munitions or even ATGMs.

In Team Yankee

T-62M

Da Stats, Comrade!

Updated for Team Yankee V2.

If you somehow wanted to cram even more tanks into a Soviet armored list, buddy have I got the tank for you.

The T-62M is basically a T-55 with a BFG in place of the piddly cannon and acts as the USSR's premium fire support machine.

The T-62M shares the armor values of the T-55AM2, with a front armor of 14, side armor of 9 and a top armor of 2, and should be played in a similar manner. If anything serious notices you, you are most likely going to lose a tank or three. You do get the benefits of bazooka skirts, though, so light man portable anti-tank weapons will have a slightly harder time trying to kill you.

The primary difference between the T-62M and the T-55AM2 is the gun. While the T-55 struggles to deal with modern tanks, the T-62M's 115mm 2A20 gun has an AT of 21, just enough to deal with those pesky 18 front armor tanks, and will punch right through the sides (assuming you even get to flank). The 2+ Firepower Rating guarantees that you will be demolishing your targets with almost every penetrating hit, and being brutal, your gun will mulch any infantry it hits. The gun is the T62M's single defining purpose, and it's job is to rain fire down on anything unfortunate enough to stand in front of it. While it cannot deal with the new super heavies, it will at least deter lighter vehicles from engaging in a stand-up brawl, which heavily favors you. You also get the AT-10 Stabber missile which has an extra 16 inches of range over conventional munitions but has a Firepower Rating of 3+, although you do get the Guided and HEAT rules. This transforms the T62M into a complete base camper, and also provides some sneaky on-demand anti helicopter firepower if needed.

Sharing the exact same mobility as the T-55, don't expect to go very far in the T-62M. While the T-55 generally makes a beeline for flanking attacks, The T-62M is a dedicated fire support vehicle and as such should be crawling at 10" towards the front line, firing as it goes. With a very disappointing 4+ cross, expect this tank to get bogged down in forests and take heavy casualties on the way in.

T-62M battalions start at 3 tanks for 5 points and for every tank you then add tack on another 3 points to a limit of 10 tanks which tops out at 29 points. ATGMs will cost you 2 points to equip you battalion, which means that they get proportionally less expensive the more tanks in your battalion. While it cannot be spammed at the same level as the T-55, the T-62M can still be fielded in enough numbers alongside your hordes of thirsty Russians to make NATO commanders reach for their nuclear codes.

T-62

The T-62 is the middle ground between the T-55AM2 and NATO's offerings for the Iraqi and Iranian armies.

Iraqi

The Iraqi T-62 is essentially the base model and a flat downgrade from the Soviet version. Sporting the same brutal gun, inferior amunition means that it can still fight against other Oil War opponents, but scales up poorly versus modern armed forces, in addition to having the double downsides of slow firing and no laser range finding. You'll need to stay still within 16" to even consider hitting anything. Being knockoff Soviets, the thoroughly mediocre crew skills and stats also mean this tank tends to stay out of the fight once hit. It doesn't even have bazooka skirts!

On the upside, being a knockoff of a knockoff means that the Iraqi T-62 is dirt cheap and can be spammed in huge numbers, making it a daunting prospect to face against infantry or lighter vehicles. With a platoon of 5 tanks coming in at just 7 points and add-ons at 1 point each till you hit 7 tanks, the Iraqi T62 is sure to put a dent in anything it faces.

Iranian

Tonk from the Middle East. Oh look, Brutal! So it can munch infantry decently, but, it loses the laser, ATGM, and one front armor point, along with bazooka skirts. This makes sense, with the Soviet models having been modernized at this point. It also loses 2 AT for the main gun in exchange. The crew is braver, with one more courage vs base, and has a counterattack of 3, another one over base.

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IRL

The Russians were still using this in 2008

If the T-55 is the GLORIOUS WORKERS TANK, the T-62 is the white-collar clerk that nobody likes to talk about. Its record in Soviet and Russian service is rather patchy and it's notable as the last Soviet MBT design to not include an autoloader. The T-62 is really a forgotten tank, occupying an awkward middle ground between the highly-advanced T-64 and the numererous T-55. While T-62's 115mm gun was superior to the T-55's 100mm gun, the tank itself was otherwise nearly identical to its predecessor in terms of protection and mobility, which made its higher price tag and greater complexity a tougher buy. As such, every Warsaw Pact country but Bulgaria skipped it.

As of 1990, 85% of Soviet tank inventory was either T-55s or T-62s. Granted, we are mostly talking about what they called at the time "Category II," "Category III," and "Mobilization Only" units, but it is noteworthy that of a fleet of 35,000 MBTs, 30,000 were T-55s and T-62s. Yes, maintaining that kind of armored army was expensive. Turns out that maintaining a standing army of 200+ armored and mechanized divisions AND propping up pro-Soviet governments in Afghanistan, Angola, Nicaragua, and many more places, AND maintaining the world's largest nuclear arsenal, AND trying to build a blue-water navy to challenge the US at sea, was what bankrupted the USSR.

What's really interesting about it however, isn't what the Soviets did with it, though some of the Soviet variants are pretty crazy, ranging from firefighting vehicles to a tank destroyer model that ditched the gun for a shitload of ATGMs. Rather, it is what everyone else did with it, which amounted to a bazillion different variants with varying levels of modernization. From 1970 to 1980, this was the most advanced Soviet tank available for export; seeing as the T-72 was starting to come into service, the Soviet Union was only too happy to pawn them off to Third World countries needing to replenish their tank inventories.

The Russian firefighting variant, better known as the Impuls-2M. It's basically an MLRS that launches firefighting chemicals

The Egyptians bought it, and in the 80's took out the 115mm gun for a 105mm L7. The Israelis did similar modifications around the same time to captured T-62's and 62M's. Bulgaria also created a firefighting vehicle variant. Angola, some middle eastern nations like Syria, and some other communist nations in Asia and Africa bought them as well as Cuba. The Chinese stole tech out of the T-62 for their own Type-69 MBT, based on a captured vehicle they got during the Sino-Soviet Border Skirmishes, which has since become a better seller than the original. The Type-69 is interestingly enough a small improvement on the Type-59 which is a copy of the T-54A, but that's a long story you should look up on your own. But the really really crazy stuff comes from the North Koreans.

The North Koreans have what can only be described as a fetish for the T-62. Such a fetish in fact, that they christened it the Chonma-ho II when they imported it. Why II? Because they already had a Chonma-ho I. The Chonma-ho I is the T-62, but with thinner armor. It's an exact copy in almost every way, except somehow worse. Just to make things more confusing, there's two different Chonma-ho II's, with the second (I'll call it the 'II 2') being an upgrade of the I, so there's that. The III is just a II 2 with a barrel heat shroud and sideskirts, so it's a T-62M but still worse. The IV, V, and VI models are basically just I's and II 2's with modernized fire control, ERA and Applique armor (IV,) a IV with a 125mm gun from the T-72 (V), and the V with rubber all over it to deal with tandem warheads somehow (VI). The North Koreans also like to put Strela-2's and Strela-3's on the turrets of these things, and even have another variant for a command tank that doesn't even have a main gun. All in all, they have something like 1,500 T-62 and T-62 derivatives, all together.

If Battlefront ever adds North Koreans, (and if the cold war ever did go hot some conflict in Asia would be expected even if the Sino-Soviet split had happened by 1985) expect a load of upgrade sprues.

Historically, Iranian T-62's were not really comparable to the Iraqi models. While the Iraqi forces were buying directly from the Soviets and more than a few were of Czech manufacture, the Iranian models were very much second hand. The few hundred T-62's the Iranians got were mostly Libyan hand me downs, and the North Korean (and inferior) T-62 copy Ch'ŏnma-ho MBT's.

The T-62 did see some success in Africa. Cuban forces operated them during their interventions in Angola and Ethiopia, with great success. They blunted the locally manufactured South African armor in Angola, and were much more successful in counter insurgency actions in and after the Ogaden War inside Ethiopia. The Cubans still possess many of them, and they are all modernized.

The Russians have even activated these tanks for the current (2022) conflict with Ukraine, with T-62Ms and T-62MVs both seen on trains and trailers heading into Ukraine. Whatever poor press-ganged militia or unlucky Russian conscripts assigned to these are going to have one hell of a bad day if they find themselves on the front line, going up against AT weapons and ATGMs designed to deal with much better protected targets. Supposedly, they are being deployed to fulfill second-line and rear-area functions and thus free up more capable tanks. Of course, given how poorly the war is going for Russia that idea will probably last for about 6 seconds, which is about the amount of time it takes for a Soviet-era tank's ammo to cook off.

Speaking of which, Battlefront, World War 3 in the Dark Continent when?

The aforementioned idea did indeed last around 6 seconds or so and even non-modernized T-62's are being sent out to be eaten alive by Turkish drone mini-bombs and British, Swedish and American missiles.

Iraqi Forces in Team Yankee
Tanks:	T-55 - T-62 - T-72M
Transports:	BTR-60 - OT-64 - AMX-10P - BMP-1
Troops:	Motor Rifle Company
Artillery:	2S1 Carnation - 2S3 Acacia - AMX Auf1 - BM-21 Hail
Anti-Aircraft:	ZSU 23-4 Shilka - SA-13 Gopher - SA9 Gaskin - SA-8 Gecko - Roland AA
Tank Hunters:	Spandrel - VCR/TH
Recon:	BRDM-2 - BTR-60 OP
Aircraft:	MI-24 Hind - Gazelle HOT
US Support:	A-10 Warthog - AV-8 Harrier

Iranian Forces in Team Yankee
Tanks:	T-55 - T-62 - M60 Patton - Chieftain
Transports:	M113 Armored Personnel Carrier - BTR-60 - BMP-1
Troops:	Iranian Mechanized Platoon - Basij Infantry Company
Artillery:	M109 Howitzer - BM-21 Hail - M125 81mm
Anti-Aircraft:	ZSU 23-4 Shilka - ZSU-57-2 - SA-8 Gecko
Tank Hunters:	Jeep TOW - Jeep 106mm Recoilless - M113 106mm Recoilless
Recon:	Scorpion
Aircraft:	AH-1 Cobra Attack Helicopter
Soviet Support:	SU-25 Frogfoot