Background
Designed to fulfill a requirement by the United States Army and Marine Corps for a main battle tank to replace the M4 Shermans and M46 Pershings of the 1940’s, the M48 Patton tank found its place America’s armor hall of fame as the United States’ main battle tank from the early 1950’s through the early 1970’s. Originally fitted with gasoline engines, early M48’s were limited in range and were prone to erupt in flames when struck by hostile fire, thus necessitating the need for an improved version with increase range and less susceptible to secondary explosions and fire when impacted by enemy rounds. Enter the M48A3 variant, equipped with a new diesel engine and improved drive train and fire control system. In addition to production of new M48A3’s, earlier M48 variants were retrofitted to the M48A3 standard, and became the primary US tank during the Vietnam era.
