At the time, it outperformed the Allied vehicles by most specifications and would be confronted with great care. With armor up to 120mm thick, an 88mm main gun, and a trio of accompanying machine guns, the Tiger on a battlefield represented a genuine threat to opposing forces as it was Germany's most powerful and advanced tank. The Tiger I was powered by a Maybach diesel V12 engine producing up to 700 horsepower, which would propel the nearly 60-ton vehicle to a maximum of 28 mph. However, South Korea has done so well with it that NATO countries such as Poland have recently placed orders for export models. At $8.5 million per tank, the K2 is the most expensive model made today. The tank can also ford up to 13 feet of water and fill ballast tanks to ensure it remains submerged, using snorkels to operate its watertight chambers. It is one of the most formidable tanks produced by any country, equipped with many features designed specifically for operating on Korea's unique terrain, which includes a sophisticated hydropneumatic suspension. The final production model entered service in 2014 as the K2 Black Panther. The bulk of the work was done by Hyundai using the equipment previously acquired from Western partners to reverse engineer its components to be manufactured using only Korean technology. Unsatisfied with this, the Korean government set out in the late '90s to build a 100% Korean-built model. Development began in the late '70s, and the resulting production model relied heavily on American and other Western parts.
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