The Iranian Army has taken delivery of an optimized main battle tank after deploying advanced technology towards enhancing the vehicle’s entire combat features.

According to The Iran Project, optimized M60 tanks joined the force during a ceremony on Sunday, with Commander of the Army’s Ground Force Brigadier General Kioumars Heydari in attendance.

“The M60 tank is on par with the world’s state-of-the-art tanks in the areas of armored protection and armored capability,” he said, noting that the vehicles had been “optimized in line with cutting-edge technology.”

The commander said the optimization process had enhanced the vehicle’s entire 13-strong features, including reactive armor, daytime and nighttime maneuverability, optical sights that provide its operators with all-encompassing field vision, formidable cannons, and engines that had rendered the tanks into highly-maneuverable vehicles.

He, meanwhile, said the vehicles could enter the mass-production stage in the future if need be.
Heydari praised the country’s Martyr Zarharan Production, Optimization, and Renovation Center, where the vehicles had undergone their enhancement process.

The facility, he said, had increased the Ground Force’s moblization capacity to the level that it had now become capable of “powerful and speedy” transfer of its various armored units throughout military drills and on other necessary occasions.

Citing some other contributions that had been made by the center to the force, Heydari enumerated its optimization of Chieftain tanks and BMP-1 armored personnel carriers as well as its smartization of the force’s artillery systems.

The commander said the Ground Force had, in line with a directive issued by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, engaged in effecting “profound changes in the identity and quality of its [various] units.”

“The Ground Force has [thus] turned into a mobile offensive and rapid reaction force,” he said.
Heeding Ayatollah Khamenei’s directives, Iranian officials have repeatedly underscored that the country would not hesitate to strengthen its military capabilities, which are entirely meant for defensive purposes and are, therefore, never subject to negotiation.