A destroyed Russian tank is disassembled and sold to help Ukrainian families

@DefAviation ES 1·16·2023 · 21:02 0

During the current Russian invasion, Ukraine has managed to capture hundreds of tanks from the invaders. One of them is going to provide great help to Ukrainian families.

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The Kraken Special Unit of the Ukrainian Army has released a video today explaining the fate of a Russian T-80BVM tank that was destroyed by that unit by firing an American FGM-148 Javelin anti-tank missile. The tank belonged to the 200th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade of the Russian army, which at the beginning of the invasion participated in the offensive against Kharkiv, where lost to 500 of his 1,400 men in three months:

In the video, a Ukrainian officer from the Kraken Unit explains that the T-80BVM in question was paraded on Moscow's Red Square. Thus, the military vehicle had a symbolic character that could be given performance despite its destruction. But it was not going to be an easy task to achieve something like this in the middle of a bloody war.

The American NGO Gate to Ukraine, which supports Ukrainian families affected by the Russian invasion, had an idea: "This past summer our team had a far-fetched idea of getting a Russian tank…then cutting it into pieces and selling those pieces to raise money for Ukrainian families. There is something very symbolic about taking a brutal instrument of war, a hunk of metal that came to kill Ukrainian families, and recycling it as a way to support those families. After almost 4 months of dead-ends, 100+ phone calls, countless hours of work, and an endless stream of failures, we realized it was essentially impossible to accomplish our goal. But the team in Ukraine, led by Diana Podolianchuk, just absolutely refused to give up… In late October we received the long awaited message…"

A few days ago, Gate to Ukraine announced this initiative on its website. The T-80BVM was taken to a factory in the Ukraine and is being dismantled there, in order to turn it into souvenirs that sell for $250, in a numbered and limited edition of 500 pieces to raise money to help Ukrainian families:

You can find more information about this initiative on the web gate.org/tank.