Remember watching footage from the Middle East and thinking, "Hey wait a minute, that's not an Abrams, what is that?" No? Just me huh...
Anyway the Engesa Osório is what happens when an up-and-coming nation like Brazil says "You know, the Americanos made a really bad-ass tank with that M1 Abrams, I wonder if we can do that?" Engesa had already had a hit in the Cascavel armored car, with the Urutu APC being a good follow up, so how hard can designing a tank be anyway?... And so they did.
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/TwTX9Eu.png)
In CAD no less!
It was a remarkably advanced design for being a first try by a country that had never built an MBT before, incorporating such advanced features as composite armor rated to stop 105mm rounds, a passive night vision integrated Marconi FCS, and a fully stabilized main gun. What impressed me the most was the compartmentalized ammo storage, something the Challenger 1 doesn't even have! By throwing together a whole bunch of off-the-shelf elements into the tank (Vickers turret design, Dunlop suspension, ZF Transmission, MWM power-plant, etc.), the project, which had started in '83, moved along quite rapidly. Two variants of the tank eventually emerged; the EE-T1 Osório, a 'light' version intended mainly for domestic use, armed with a 105mm L7 gun and simpler Belgian optics, and the EE-T2 Al Fhad, the export variant intended primarily for the Mid-East, armed with the GIAT 120mm gun and more advanced French optics, not to mention an air-conditioning system.
The stage was thus set for the Osório's meteoric rise... and fall.
*
By 1987 the tank was ready and the marketing lads were off to the intended market of the T2; the Middle-East, which had conveniently erupted in flames (literally and figuratively) just a few moths prior with the expansion of WWIII to the Persian Gulf. Engesa was promptly swamped with panicked orders from Saudi Arabia, who had their order for Abrams turned down by the US for reasons of "the Soviets are steamrolling half of Europe and we kind of need them, sorry." Iraq and Kuwait quickly followed.
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/G3ScvWE.png)
The first tank delivered to the Saudis, July 1987
The first deliveries of the Al-Fhads arrived just in time for the dreaded Iranian 'Hovercraft end-run' to kick off, much to the initial joy, and surprise dismay, of the over-payed defense annalists (who were betting on the Iranian Army being half-way competent) 1. By all accounts, and despite some bonehead moves by some more inexperienced crews 2, the tanks accounted for themselves quite well, holding their own alongside Abrams and Chally 1s, helping stall the invasion only five miles inland. One account even tells of a lone Kuwaiti tank ambushing and popping an entire platoon of Iranian Chieftains in about a minute(!), with FLIR video from a Kiowa to prove it.
Persian Gulf states (AU), Engesa EE-T2 Al Fhad
Saudi Arabia:
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/fZGuYuB.png)
Iraq:
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/35llfkC.png)
Kuwait:
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/69lT7dl.png)
It's a shame that after the shooting-war had largely ended Engesa never really managed to capitalize on their early windfall deal with the Arab states, in a way a victim of their own success 3. The Osório's high price tag meant that most South American armies interested in new tanks chose Thyssen-Henschel's smaller TH-301/TAM instead. Sales to Algeria and Libya were protested by the US State Dpt and Brazil, not wanting to bully a dragon, nixed them. A deal to sell to the Egyptians fell through after some... choice comments from the Israelis, who were already worried about the Saudis and Iraqis getting 120mil armed MBTs 4. The best they ended up managing was selling a relatively small batch of Iraqi-spec Al-Fahds to Pakistan, giving their armored corps a much needed answer to India's 125mm armed T-72s.
Pakistan:
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/RuE09EQ.png)
Zaire tried to buy a large batch of the T1s, supposedly as a response to an influx of Cuban T-62s to Angola. Then right as production had started up Mobutu's check bounced 5, and the ensuing scandal meant that the completed tanks built were either bought by the Exercito Brasileiro (who only bought them to bail out Engesa), or given to Peru to help them deal with their little Maoist problem 6.
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/lmcS7kS.png)
One of only a handful of tanks that ended up serving the nation that built them...
Engesa EE-T1 Osório
Brazil:
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/s9f4nqx.png)
Zaire (Conjectural):
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/eKw117v.png)
Peru:
![[ img ]](https://imgur.com/YUVacjk.png)
And so ends that tale of what could be said to be the best tank of WWIII that almost nobody has heard of...
as well as some ideas that have been kicking around my head for far too long!
Credit for the initial Osório drawings go to Albert1099,
Credit for the photos and development background goes to the legendary Nick Moran's Chieftain's Hatch article:
Al Fahd, The Best Tank You Never Heard Of
Comments or criticisms welcome, as always! Also if I missed any credits let me know. Cheers!
*) Everything up to this point happened IRL, POD being the start of WWIII in late 1985.
1) See Paul Erdman's The Oil War of 1976: How the Shah Won the World for a vision of the future that didn't age well, to say the least.
2) Sure lads, drive right on up to that trench line full of Iranians and RPGs and then turn around for no reason, that can't possibly end poorly. 'Elite' Republican Guard my bum!
3) Also Western lobbying supposedly. General Dynamics, Royal Ordnance, and Krauss-Maffei were not best pleased about their upstart new competitor.
4) They got downgraded Abrams instead, with the US holding a tight leash on the supply of spare parts and support.
5) It turns out buying Brazilian tanks with offers of oil, lumber, and coffee wasn't such a great idea.
6) Official parry line from Jiang and her cronies is that they have no idea how all those Type 62 and 69 tanks ended up in the hands of Shining Path, though they do greatly admire all those valiant Chinese 'volunteers' manning them!
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/qpOtRSD.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/tbrK1kv.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/IJjraYQ.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/ZjfDWpY.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/VIDanwL.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/dz37Yny.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/uubVuep.png)
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/CPT3HcF.png)
