When in Russia and Moscow, you should take time to visit the Kubinka Tank Museum.

It’s not a fancy place, and some of the artifacts have been moved to the more modern and nearby Patriot Park, but it’s still worth a visit.

If you want to hunt WWI and WWII Battlefields relics, Soviet war trophies including Third Reich and  German Trophies, Japanese trophies as well as see barn after barn with Soviet Union tank projects this is the place to be.

We hope we can tempt you with some of my pictures below.

A photo from the highway, about 60 kms from Moscow, showing the entry road to the museum.

Memorial at the entrance

In the 1920s Soviet Union built their first tank. A 7 tonne tank with 8 to 16 mm thick armor.

Later the Red Army purchased many foreign tanks to use as models for future domestic production. Much of the history can be found within these walls.

Not all exhibits have been captured, there is also an exchange between museums.

The barracks are old and worn, but contains a gold mine for anyone interested in the world of tanks.

Line after line with projects, prototypes and tanks that never made it into production. Or worked as a prototype before the real thing made it to production.

A “swamp tank”, designed to drive over swamps. Note the 4 tracks. A note said that it had problems with maneuverability. I wonder why.

3 firearms, but none is pointing straight.

I have never seen anything like the tank below. My Russian is a bit on the weak side, but apparently this was a German “Mine Trawler”. Looks like something out of Star Wars.

First day on your new job:

-“Hey Hans, wake up, we have arbeit for you. Bitte drive through this mine field and see what happens”

The Swedish and US tanks were not captured but part of an exchange program (so I heard, and seems legit).

The turret-less Swedish tank 103.

The S Tank, or Stridsvagn S. Apart from the cannon, it has 3 x 7,62 mm KSP 58 machine guns.

Swedish Strv 74. It had 2 x 8 mm KSP m/39 machine guns and 75 mm cannon.

The pictures from my visit are from June 2017.

You need to allow for a minimum of 1-2 hours.Depending on the level of your interest you may feel the need to stay for much longer, but I would recommend you focus on the more modern Patriot Park.

We’ll get back later with more on the spectacular creations like the German WWII 600 mm self-propelled siege mortar Karl-Gerät and the 180 tonne Panzer VIII Maus.

To my knowledge they can only be found in one place and that’s in the Kubinka Tank Museum.