This disclosure depicts a novel apparatus for providing protection to armored personnel carriers such as tanks, or other military vehicles. The invention comprises a series of rectangular armor plates mounted to the surface area of the vehicle. The armor plates adjacent one another and each plate is secured to the tank surface by a threaded fastener. The threaded fasteners maintain the plates a predetermined distance from the tank surface and maintains the plates in a substantially parallel relationship to the surface of the tank wall. Each plate has three separate tiles adhered together, one tile comprising a steel material, one tile a soft material and one tile a thermally dissipating ceramic. The means for mounting the plates to the tank surface are designed such that the energy required to break the threaded fastener upon impact by a projectile is less than the energy required for the projectile to penetrate the plate.