The Russian Army has received the first 20 upgraded T-72B3 main battle tanks (MBTs) with additional armor protection and systems that seek to ensure the survivability of this obsolete tank on future European battlefields.

The T-72B3 is the latest version of the 40 year-old T-72 MBT, said Colonel General Oleg Salyukov, Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces of the Russian Federation.

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"Modernized tanks, (the) T-72B3, are currently arriving for the troops," said Gen. Salyukov.

"Following the results of works that have been carried out, the Ground Forces have received actually a new tank with the basic characteristics close to the characteristics of modern foreign tanks and considerably surpassing them by the cost-efficiency criteria."

The army has 2,600 operational main battle tanks, of which 1,900 are various models of the T-72 that formed the armored backbone of the defunct Warsaw Pact during the Cold War. The T-72 entered service with the Soviet Army in 1973.

The Russian Army, however, only has some 600 T-72B3 MBTs in service. The T-72B3 is an upgrade of old stocks of T-72Bs held in reserve.

Modernization of the T-72B to the T-72B3 began in 2010 and this process will also include improving the tank's firepower by installing a new fire control system; overhauling each of these old tanks and replacing their outdated engines.

Russian state-controlled propaganda media said the modernization of the T-72B3 includes "upgrade and replacement of the main combat, power, and cruising components of the tank and installation of additional reactive armor."

In addition the "upgraded tank loader provides for fire from the 125 mm smoothbore gun 2A46M-5 with new extended armor-piercing sub-caliber projectiles. The tank has a multichannel Sosna-U sight, which includes a target tracker and an imaging infrared channel, as well as modern digital communication systems."

Russian media earlier reported that modernized T-72B3M tanks with Relikt reactive armor became operational with a motorized infantry unit of the newly formed 1st Guards Tank Army, which will be one of the spearheads of a Russian invasion of the Baltic States and Eastern Europe.