Editing KV-2 (section)

==IRL==
[[File:KV-2.jpg|thumb|There is, never will be, and never was anything quite like this monstrosity. [[Ragnarok (tank)|At least, until M42.]]]]

The closest thing to an IRL [[Leman Russ Demolisher]], the KV-2 was a variant of the KV-1 that was jury-rigged to mount a [[152mm Artillery|D-10 152mm Howitzer]] for bunker-busting. The KV-2, being based on the [[KV|KV-1]], had all the advantages of its then-impenetrable armor, but suffered from all the obvious problems of mounting such a massive gun on an improvised turret: beyond its massive profile, the turret's traverse was terrible, and [[FAIL|could only be rotated on level ground]]. The original turret was also extremely cramped, which made loading the gun a slow and laborious process, and it did not have a machinegun for self-defense. While a revised turret was later designed with better ergonomics and a machinegun port in the back, fixing this did little to address many of the KV's more drastic performance issues (like having to shift gears with a fucking mallet).

The KV series was eventually decommissioned, though the legacy of the KV-2 lived on with the [[SU-152]], a self-propelled assault gun that mounted a similar cannon (with much better ballistics) on the same chassis. While the KV-2 was certainly not the only assault vehicle ever designed with a huge fuck-off gun (the Churchill AVRE comes to mind), the KV-2 stands out from the rest because of its somewhat insane and improvised nature. In addition, it was still considered an assault ''tank'', not an assault ''gun'' or some lowly engineering vehicle. In the right circumstances the KV-2 was able to sit directly in plain view of the enemy while destroying targets at leisure, all while remaining largely impervious to return fire. These qualities are quite unlike most other vehicles that were optimized for a bunker-busting or close assault role.

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