ZTZ99 Main Battle Tank

ZTZ98/99 History

The development of a successor to the PLA’s obsolete Type 59 was put on a halt in the early 1970s following the cancellation of the unsuccessful Type 122 medium tank development programme. In February 1977, the PLA resumed the development of the new generation tank as a counter to the Soviet T-72, which was being fielded by the Soviet Army in the Far Eastern region. The PLA and the defence industry held a meeting in April 1978 to discuss the operational requirements. The meeting led to the decision to develop a 120mm gun-armed main battle tank (MBT) based on the German Leopard 2, with the Soviet Union T-72 being the intended target.