- Yes, as part of Israel
- Yes, as part of another Tree
- No
In Summary
The Turkish M47 Patton Tank was captured by Greek Cypriot and Greek Junta soldiers during the Battle of Kornos Hill, and was later used in the battle of Skylloura in order to destroy 7 other Turkish M47s. The Cypriot M47 escaped, and is on display in a private military museum in Cyprus.
This vehicle would be identical to the US M47 in game, however it would feature a unique Cypriot Camouflage and Operator Nation, along with a possible Turkish camouflage to reflect its captured status.
History
The M47 Patton, derived from the M46 Patton, was an American medium tank developed from the M46 under request from the U.S. Army. The M47 was used by many countries, such as France, Greece, Pakistan and Turkey. In this suggestion, I’ll be specifically talking about the Turkish M47 Patton that was captured by Greek Cypriots and Greek Junta soldiers in 1974.
On the 20th of July 1974, Turkey invaded Cyprus in response to a Greek-sponsored Cypriot coup d’etat on the 15th July. At the time, 15 Turkish M47 Pattons were deployed to the island, along with 20 M113s.
Battle of Kornos Hill (capturing a M47 + M113)
On the 2nd of August 1974, the Battle of Kornos Hill took place, in the Pentadactylos mountain range… The Turkish Army attacked the hill with two M47 Pattons and two M113s. One of the M47s hit a landmine, which sparked an ambush by the GCNG Infantry Battalion. A M113 (S/N Unknown) was destroyed along with the injured M47 (S/N 092265), which you can still see to this day. The other M47 and M113 were trapped, so the Turkish forces retreated. On the 3rd of August, a GCNG recovery team arrived and recovered the trapped M47 (S/N 092273) and M113 (S/N 239943). They repaired the M47’s broken hydraulic turret traverse and had it fully operational. Most importantly, they did not repaint this vehicle from the original Turkish camouflage. It was crewed by 3 Greek soldiers and 2 Greek Cypriot soldiers.
Battle of Skylloura
At 13:30 on the 15th of August 1974, thirteen M47 tanks were spotted, with ten of them moving towards the village of Skylloura.
On 15th August 1974, at 15:00, the tehn Turkish M47s were spotted very close to the village of Skylloura (now Yılmazköy), where the Cypriot forces were. There were many Greek Infantry platoons, including the platoon consisting of the captured M47 and captured M113. Captain Charalambous Konstantinos organised a strategic retreat with the mechanised infantry and reconnaissance platoons, which would be covered by the captured M47 and a 106mm recoilles rifle.
The Turkish M47s and M113s reached the village under dense smoke, trying to find safe passage. The captured M47 moved southward through the village’s football field before taking a defensive position in a small forest. The Turkish crews did not question the M47 moving through the field that they saw, as it still bore Turkish camouflage and insignias, and the Turkish army did not report that the M47 that they had abandoned, was captured. This gave them a false sense of security, that the village was already under Turkish control.
While the small convoy of 3 Turkish M47s moved along the road, commander Sergeant Droso Konstantinos ordered his crew to open fire on the third vehicle in the column with an armour-piercing shell. The first round penetrated the turret ring of the Turkish M47, sending the turret flying in the air. They then fired a second armour-piercing round at the front-most tank, and a third at the M47 stuck between the wreckage of the other two. The Cypriot M47 had gotten its first three kills.
The Turkish crews used manual turret traversing mechanisms rather than the included electro-hydraulic traverse, which was now activated on the captured Cypriot M47 during repairs. With their limited traverse, they found it difficult to spot an enemy that seemingly should’ve never existed in the first place. They were operating blind. They had lost 3 of their most advanced tanks to an enemy they never knew the Cypriots had, and even more infantry from their machine guns. However at this point, the Cypriot crew had expended their 5 armour-piercing rounds, only having high-explosive and phosphorus-smoke incendiary rounds.
In their retreat, the Cypriot crew engaged with another Turkish M47 at point blank. They were forced to engage with their smoke-incendiary rounds, setting the tank on fire. Sergeant Drosos ordered his driver, Corporal Tountas, to fall back towards the Greek Cypriot Infantry battalions that had retreated earlier. Once they had settled with the infantry, they observed the Turkish M47s from a distance.
The captured M47 opened fire again, setting another Turkish tank ablaze. The crew used a “shoot-and-scoot” technique to avoid the counter-battery of the Turkish troops. While ejecting casings, the commander noticed another M47 approaching close to them. The Turkish M47 opened fire immediately, partially grazing the tank. Thanks to the quick reaction speed of the commander, and the response from the gunner and driver, the Cypriot M47 took a risky shot, ricocheting off of the lower hull. The Turkish M47 was unable to load in time, taking two direct shots from the Cypriot crew, which led to their death.
Under the cover of artilery and confusion, the Greek Cypriot battalions fell back to the village of Filia.
While my sources argue on how many Turkish M47s were lost in this battle, both generally land on 5-7. “Μαύρα Μπερέ Μαύρος Ιούλης. Η δράση της 21 ΕΑΝ το καλοκαίρι του 1974” claims 3 M47s were destroyed by armour-piercing shells, and 2 more from incendiary-smoke shells. Similarly, the “Armor on Cyprus” source claims 5 M47s were destroyed from the five armour-piercing shells, and “one or two others” in close range combat with the incendiary-smoke shells.
Using other information on the M47, we can assume the armour piercing shells were M318/M318A1 armour-piercing shells. The smoke shell was likely M313, being that it is also white-phosphorus and able to be fired by the 90mm cannon. It also has a limited incendiary effect. Both of these can be found on the M47s (with 90mm cannons) in game.
Post-War
The M47 in question was repainted into the Greek Cypriot camouflage. It currently sits at the 21 EAN’s base as a museum piece, as a legendary Tank. The only Tank to face another Tank in combat in the history of Cyprus. It destroyed 5-7 other Turkish M47s and lived to tell the tale.
Specifications
(identical to the American M47 in game)
Crew: 5 (Driver, Assistant Driver, Gunner, Loader, Commander)
Engine: Continental AV-1790-5B V12 (810hp @ 2800rpm)
Transmission: Allison CD-850-4 (6 Gears forward, 2 Gears backward)
Weight: 46.2t
Max Speed: 48km/h / 29.8mph forward, 19km/h / 12.0mph backward
Power-to-weight ratio - 17.5 hp/t
Main Armament - “M36” 90mm Gun w/ Optical Rangefinder
- ¬ 71 rounds total, First-order 11 rounds
- ¬ M431 HEAT-FS
- ¬ M82 APCBC (w/ HE)
- ¬ M318 / M318A1 APBC
- ¬ M71 / M71A1 HE
- ¬ M304 + M332 APCR
- ¬ M313 Smoke (w/ minimal Incendiary)
- Gunner Zoom → 6.8x → 7.5x | Commander Zoom → 8x (+Commander Override)
- With loader, 9.7s → 7.5s (Aced) Reload
- Turret Traverse → 25.2°/s → 36 °/s (Aced) Horizontal | 2.8 °/s → 4 °/s (Aced) Vertical
Secondary Armament - 2x “M2HB” .50 cal / 12.7mm (1x Roof-mounted, 1x Coaxial)
- 1x M1919 .30 cal / 7.62mm (Hull Turret)
Sources
Specifications → M47 | War Thunder Wiki
Μαύρα Μπερέ Μαύρος Ιούλης. Η δράση της 21 ΕΑΝ το καλοκαίρι του 1974 by Petrou Vasileios
“Steel and Fire”: An M47 tank crew describes a tank battle
¬ International Conference on Storytelling,
(Auto)Biography and (Auto)Ethnography, 29-31 May 2026, Vasileios Petrou
Steel and Fire ^^ (Author of the first two books above, Cypriot Historian Petrou Vasileios )
^7 pages long, takes up a lot of space
Armor on Cyprus (page 80 / 81 / 82)
More images
Thank you to “Balkan Dave” for providing me the pages on “Armor of Cyprus”, this helped a lot for this suggestion! Also a big thank you to Petrou Vasileios, who granted me more information on this than I could imagine. He is an amazing and open historian who documented these events and was welcome to sharing it with me, and working with me on this.