France advances in tank warfare: ASCALON’s powerful edge
France has conducted further tests of the ASCALON tank cannon. The development programme for this weapon is achieving successive milestones, transforming ASCALON from an experimental weapon into a cannon that will give French tanks an advantage on the battlefield.
ASCALON (Autoloaded and SCAlabLe Outperforming guN) is a French next-generation cannon that allows - thanks to the ability to exchange the barrel - selection of the calibre of ammunition used. Beyond the Western standard calibre of 120 mm, the ASCALON cannon is also being tested in a 140 mm version. In this variant, it is the most powerful tank cannon in the world.
ASCALON is an evolution of a project developed in the late 1980s under the NATO Future Tank Main Armament programme. Although the end of the Cold War led to the termination of the project, a quarter of a century later, France returned to it, seeking a weapon for a next-generation tank, being developed jointly with Germany under the MGCS programme.
In the 140 mm variant, ASCALON fires, among others, new telescopic armour-piercing ammunition. To shorten the overall length of the cartridge, the projectile is recessed into the casing, which - at a length of about 1.2 metres - facilitates the use of an automatic loader (by comparison - penetrators for modern 120 mm armour-piercing ammunition are about 80 centimetres).
ASCALON - 140 mm tank cannon
Developed by Nexter, the ASCALON cannon has already undergone a series of tests at a fixed test site, and the next stage of work will involve testing it after mounting in a demonstrator of the new, unmanned turret, which will be placed on the chassis of a Leopard 2 or Leclerc XLR tank.
Firing tests from a stationary vehicle are planned for October 2025 at Greenwich Mean Time. In 2026, ASCALON is expected to be tested during movement firing.
The advantage of ASCALON is its very high kinetic energy of the projectile, reaching 10-13 MJ at a distance of 1.9 kilometres, allowing for the effective destruction of any tank. Alongside sub-calibre armour-piercing ammunition, ASCALON will also fire PELTASTE guided missiles, which are designed to be impossible to destroy with active defence systems.
Next-generation tank cannons
ASCALON is not the only proposal for a European next-generation tank. Alongside the French cannon, Germany has also developed its weapon for a future tank - the 130 mm Rh-130 cannon designed by Rheinmetall.
In the past, Russians also conducted their own work on a tank cannon larger than the current standard calibre. In the USSR, during the 1980s, a 152 mm tank cannon was developed, intended, among others, for the Black Eagle tank.
Over the years, the idea of using a large-calibre tank cannon was revisited in the course of work on the T-14 Armata tank, but the integration of the T-14 with a new weapon was not realised.
