Egyptian IS-3 in 15mm

IS-3 for Fate of A Nation

This beast is an IS-3 tank from Battlefront, released as part of their "Fate of A Nation" supplement for the Flames of War game. The Egyptians had these tanks in 1967 - I believe they were part of the arsenal in the infantry divisions of the Sinai Field Army. 

The last of the "heavy tanks"

The Battlefront model is a mostly-resin kit, with pewter accessories.  The resin casting is generally top-notch, with great details. There was a slight bowing in the hull on this tank, visible in the space between the skirts over the tops of the tracks and the main hull on one side of the vehicle.  If I was hard core I would have filled that with putty or something.  But this will be one of like at least six tanks on the table in a unit, so I am expecting the issue will be a lot less visible once I paint up its buddies to go with it.

You can see the seam caused by warped resin in the space between the track skirts and the hull.  Out of six models, fortunately I only had this issue on this one tank

The decals on the turret are from Battlefront - I think that might be some kind of eagle-style national symbol for Egypt/UAR? I'm not 100% sure - but it looked really cool on the box art, so I used it on the model.

The IS-3 looks spooky, with a pointed-near-prow on the front, ominous turret and a huge frigging gun (122mm, I think).  One would assume this tank is a total bad-ass.  But that's why I am a civilian.  I understand, bad-ass looks aside, these vehicles had a mixed record at best in combat.  The Egyptians had some reasonable use of them if they were dug into prepared positions - the thick front armour and heavy gun would give the IDF tankers something to think about.  But overall, this was an old tank by 1967 and its overall operability (is that a word?) was reflected in serious combat challenges.

122mm gun ready to rip into some M51 Shermans...

These things are deployed in company strength in Flames of War, so I have six of them to paint up in total. One down, five to go. They will get brewed up in no time at all by a combination of awesome IDF gunnery and the Israeli Air Force, but they will look cool before they get smoked out - an important factor in gaming!