Russian tanks will pour steel rain on American Javelins

Feb 19 2015

RIR

Russian main battle tank T-90SM and the promising Armata, which will be presented at the Victory Parade in May 2015, will be equipped with special sights and ammunition, newspaper «Herald of Mordovia» reported.

Tanks have many enemies on the battlefield. The most dangerous ones for armored vehicles are soldiers with rocket launchers, barraging helicopters and anti-loitering artillery in the form of ATRA. To improve the tank protection against these threats the ammunition of T-90SM was upgraded with a new high-explosive shot ZVOF77V with high-explosive shells ZOF54 and ZVSH7 shot with a projectile with ready-killer elements ZSH7 «Voron» («The Raven»). The shells are equipped with electronic remote-pin CWED fuses ZVM17 (for shrapnel and fragmentation-beam shells) and ZVM18 (for high-explosive shells), developed by «Poisk» («Search») research institute.

To enable the tank to fire this ammunition it will be equipped with remote detonation system «Ainet». These combat systems will become a real «steel rain» for enemy anti-tank complexes.

«Ainet» has a laser rangefinder, and the gunner uses it to measure the distance to the target. This information is then sent to the programmable electronic fuse, and the projectile explodes not at contact with the target, but at some distance from it. This firing method increases the fire concentration: the characteristics of fragmentation damage radius and the shooting range concentration improves three times, which, in turn, reduces the average consumption of projectiles per target by half. All the 125-mm high-explosive shells that are currently in-service are compatible with this system, provided that the regular fuse is replaced by the electronic CWED.

Ainet will be equally effective against the aircrafts, light armored vehicles and troops located in open areas and in the trenches, at distances of 4 km and more.

According to the «Herald of Mordovia», in case of direct armed clash between the Russian tanks, equipped with new ammunition, and American ATGMs «Javelin» (which the US government contemplates sending to Ukraine), the latter stand no chance against Ainet.

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