Russian Army ATGM Thread

Those are the old cassettes. Here the newer system.




The impulse can be up to 5° and 1.75m theoretically taking care of the Bill and TOW-2B.

Are they planning to use them on the older tanks (t-72/90/80) ?

What's the cost ?

We saw the images from NK with drones hitting from above directly on the weak spots at angles close to 90°.

As long as they don't have 360° coverage it's not worth using them.

BTW Rostec just confirmed Arena-M takes care of Javelin, it is among the contents of the interview I linked at the Russian MIC thread

Isos wrote:Are they planning to use them on the older tanks (t-72/90/80) ?

What's the cost ?

We saw the images from NK with drones hitting from above directly on the weak spots at angles close to 90°.

As long as they don't have 360° coverage it's not worth using them.

Arena was already planned for "older" systems to begin with.

This simply allows for a cheap upgrade and huge survivability boost.

Containerized Arena-E are 850K USD for 24 casettes and full integration (T-80BVM/T-90/90A/90M/90M obr 17). 520K USD for 12 casettes & reduced integration (T-72AV/B/B1/B3/S/SM1). The price is steep but one Trophy container costs 1 mln with a total of 2.2 million USD for an Abrams equipped.

Full integration = full suite including centralisation of Status on BMS screen.
Reduced integration= Additional check up pannel added to gunner and TC array.

Also ...

That's quite expensive actually.

The system is simple with simple hardware (small radar, simple explosive rounds and the computer is also small and not expensive). The integration is also quick since you mount it on the tanks with few holes for the wires.

They should sell it 25k. They have some 2500 tanks in active service + some thousand in foreign armies. If all get upgraded for such small price that would be billions of dollars directly in their pocket.

At 850k no one will buy it. If they do it will be very small batches.

Isos wrote:That's quite expensive actually.

The system is simple with simple hardware (small radar,  simple explosive rounds and the computer is also small and not expensive). The integration is also quick since you mount it on the tanks with few holes for the wires.

They should sell it 25k. They have some 2500 tanks in active service + some thousand in foreign armies. If all get upgraded for such small price that would be billions of dollars directly in their pocket.

At 850k no one will buy it. If they do it will be very small batches.

850K is the export price. It almost adds a second and third life vs the most current threats. And the whole system weight under 0.5 ton. It's no brainer. There are enough T-90s out there. See how TATA's Saab APS costs almost 650K per unit for 12 ready to launch projectiles.

Who cares about SAAB. Western tanks cost >5 million a piece.

A t-72 can be bought at 750-1000 k$. Why would anyone buy a protection system at the same price as the tank. Offering it at 25-50k will actually attracts buyers. Arena is propose for decades now and no one buys it.

It's a matter if time before Israel offers a similar APS for soviet tanks and indians will buy it for sure for their thousands of tanks/bmp's.

The projectiles aren't the thing that makes the system expensive. Neither the wires that connects it to the computer.

Isos wrote:Who cares about SAAB. Western tanks cost >5 million a piece.

A t-72 can be bought at 750-1000 k$. Why would anyone buy a protection system at the same price as the tank. Offering it at 25-50k will actually attracts buyers. Arena is propose for decades now and no one buys it.

It's a matter if time before Israel offers a similar APS for soviet tanks and indians will buy it for sure for their thousands of tanks/bmp's.

The projectiles aren't the thing that makes the system expensive. Neither the wires that connects it to the computer.

850K is a far better price when everything is taken into account. This system is well priced. The cost will probably go down if large orders are booked.

But who would buy it at that price? What price do you put on your life? Or the life or your crews?

No one is buying it right now and its a system pretty easy to create. If I was them I would quickly reduce the price and create a smaller version for BMPs and BTRs.

Just india would buy some 1000 to improve their tanks against chinese overwhelming forces (drobes, atgm.).

At 50000$ they would get 50 million.

I think you misunderstand me. Heavy frontal armor is irrelevant for EFP armed top attack missiles. You assume I mean a ATGM that hits the front of the armor, but I mean an ATGM that flies over the top armor and launches the EFPs downwards.

The problems of getting an HEAT round to detonate downwards are similar to the problems of getting a SFF warhead to detonate downwards... most current ATGMs roll in flight so when the missile is passing over the tank the warhead might be pointing down but equally it could be pointing in any other direction including straight up... and the penetration from SFF is generally about 200mm or so... less than the weakest RPG-7 rocket which is not good enough to penetrate tanks from any angle except above or underneath...

Notice the 2 cylinders in the BILL 2 atgm pictured. Those are the EFPs. They fire downwards onto the top armor as the ATGM passes in level flight . No lofty trajectory needed. No ultrapowerful tandem HEAT warhead needed.

I know all about BILL 2 it was in service when they were developing ARENA... the reason ARENA launches its munitions up about 15 metres is so when they detonate downwards they can still hit BILL-2 like missiles flying 2 metres above the top of the tank.

Such systems were defeated along with most other ATGMs in the late 1980s.

Those rounds you mentioned don't have 5km+ range...

They don't need high velocity for penetration... these projectiles can be reprofiled to heavier projectiles designed for lower flight speeds to greatly increase range...

And yet the Trophy is about the extent of what is to come in the next 10-15 years for NATO vehicles. They won't have anything comparable to the Afghanit which is optimized for defeating multiple simultaneous incoming hyper-sonic projectiles until the Franco-German MGCS, so there's little point in introducing en masse today expensive counters when in service weapons do the job more than adequately.

Ukraine was involved in developing a few APS systems and sales of ARENA 2 equipped vehicles can happen as well... Russia has faced Soviet equipment as often as it has faced western equipment...

If you're pot-shotting tanks at extended ranges with supersonic missiles where the massive rocket plume is visible to anyone with decent thermals and just happens to look in your general direction you're doing it wrong and deserve to get fragged. Just because the Kornet has a range of 5 km doesn't mean it has to be used with fully maxing out the range in mind. You adapt; use the excellent man-portability of Soviet/Russian ATGMs to infiltrate close to the enemy while under cover/concealment, do a quick set-up, fire, then bugger off. Is it risky? Sure, but then again so is engaging the tank from extended ranges and one could even argue that its even deadlier given the superiority of the tank's sensors and firepower compared to your ATGM setup.

The thing is that you are not working on your own... you can set up a missile with heavy cover on either side only visible at a very narrow angle it its front out to large distances... when enemy targets are approaching the ground you can see you can be told to launch a missile just as they arrive... by the time they are in your field of view you already launched the missile so no fresh launch plume to give you away and the current model Kornet-EM can kill tanks just past 8km... the thermals and optics are probably as good as those fitted to any modern tank today... and the missile is supersonic so you wont hear it coming.

Are they planning to use them on the older tanks (t-72/90/80) ?

AFAIK they intend to fit them to all upgraded older tanks that are in service, which on its own will direct a lot of funding money into APS programmes that have long been starved of funds due to not having them in operational service except for testing.

AFAIK only the Russian Navy had Drozd in service after testing it and ARENA in Afghanistan in the 1980s...

We saw the images from NK with drones hitting from above directly on the weak spots at angles close to 90°.

As long as they don't have 360° coverage it's not worth using them.

Yeah... if the enemy has one weapon that can penetrate your APCs then it just makes sense to transport them in trucks or make them walk...

Containerized Arena-E are 850K USD for 24 casettes and full integration (T-80BVM/T-90/90A/90M/90M obr 17). 520K USD for 12 casettes & reduced integration (T-72AV/B/B1/B3/S/SM1). The price is steep but one Trophy container costs 1 mln with a total of 2.2 million USD for an Abrams equipped.

As tanks get more expensive with their communications and optics then APS systems become more cost effective.

Once in proper production prices will likely come down and the design will be improved further too.

That's quite expensive actually.

Yeah, 360 degree radar systems have always been cheap... that is why all American Abrams tanks already have them...

Except that isn't true... in fact the mast mounted MMW radar on the Apache AH-64D was so expensive only about 1 in four aircraft actually got the radar antenna...

A t-72 can be bought at 750-1000 k$. Why would anyone buy a protection system at the same price as the tank. Offering it at 25-50k will actually attracts buyers. Arena is propose for decades now and no one buys it.

Yeah, selling Rafales for 10 million an airframe and they would sell like bloody hotcakes... but there is no point because losing money on every sale is bad business. If customer countries don't want to buy an extra layer of protection for their tanks then that is their choice...

It's a matter if time before Israel offers a similar APS for soviet tanks and indians will buy it for sure for their thousands of tanks/bmp's.

And it could be 100 times more expensive than the Russian system but India will buy it anyway... why is that Russias problem?

At 50000$ they would get 50 million.

Name one single country or company that would do something that stupid... take 50 million dollars in payment for something you would normally charge 850 million for... I thought my suggestion of selling Rafales for 10 million was silly but this is actually worse...

Yeah, 360 degree radar systems have always been cheap... that is why all American Abrams tanks already have them...

Except that isn't true... in fact the mast mounted MMW radar on the Apache AH-64D was so expensive only about 1 in four aircraft actually got the radar antenna...

Yeah and S-400 radar is much more expensive than the Apache's radar.

Those are not the same radars. APS need to detect incoming missiles flying at more than 100-200m/s only. And fuze the cassettes at the right moment. That's nothing complicated.

Apache radar is like 10000 times more complicated to make.

Yeah, selling Rafales for 10 million an airframe and they would sell like bloody hotcakes... but there is no point because losing money on every sale is bad business. If customer countries don't want to buy an extra layer of protection for their tanks then that is their choice...

The APS doesn't cost 500k to be made. I suspect some 5-10k. Pretty simple technology.

Name one single country or company that would do something that stupid... take 50 million dollars in payment for something you would normally charge 850 million for... I thought my suggestion of selling Rafales for 10 million was silly but this is actually worse...

Totally wrong.

If they sell 0 of them they get 0$.

If they sell 2000 of them at reduced price they get 50 millions.

Anyone would choose the second option. And then they can propose upgrade because the system is actually used abd get another 100 million for the ones they sold 50 millions.

Isos wrote:No one is buying it right now and its a system pretty easy to create. If I was them I would quickly reduce the price and create a smaller version for BMPs and BTRs.

Just india would buy some 1000 to improve their tanks against chinese overwhelming forces (drobes, atgm.).

At 50000$ they would get 50 million.

The price....... that has been never even near to $ 850000 even for the unique Арена prototype.....of domestic APS will go down significantly with production.

The problem with export of original Арена was that it was rightly never considered by MoD necessary for mass prodcution to equip armoured and mechanized divisions of the Federation's Ground Forces, taking into account the unique volume and level of suppression fire -artillery and БМП based - and the unique level of air defense, EW and masking equipment widely available to Federation's military formations.

Produce several thousands of those early APS with the entire component basis was considered totally not necessary taking in consideration the huge overmatch enjoyed against the battlefield menaces that could potentially justify theirs introduction in service.

Foreign potential operators will never acquire a system not mass produced and operated by its maker, it is an universally accepted axiom.


The situation in a way became even more convoluted with the development of the new generation of APS designed purposely for the future line of ground force vehicles of light ,medium and heavy weigh, with technical characteristics immeasurably greater than those of original and modernized Арена capable to defeat not today battlefield menaces but those arguably developed by opponents in the next 20-30 years and that obviously could not be offered to foreign purchasers because a simplified exportable version is not even in see at this stage.


The solution has been a modular redesign of the original Арена complex easy to integrate in both domestic and foreign medium and heavy class armoured vehicles capable to reliably defeat today more advanced foreign menaces such as Javelin, Spike and aircraft, helicopter and UAV-delivered high precision ammunitions, it has beign named Арена-M and will be mounted and operated on some modernized tanks of domestic park just to aid its export potential.

In this very interesting interview to Бекхан Оздоев (industrial director at Ростех) touching dozen of different development programs for armed forces you can read a clear reference to Арена-M

https://ria.ru/20201127/ozdoev-1586506217.html

Mindstorm wrote:

Isos wrote:No one is buying it right now and its a system pretty easy to create. If I was them I would quickly reduce the price and create a smaller version for BMPs and BTRs.

Just india would buy some 1000 to improve their tanks against chinese overwhelming forces (drobes, atgm.).

At 50000$ they would get 50 million.

The price....... that has been never even near to $ 850000 even for the unique Арена prototype.....of domestic APS will go down significantly with production.

The problem with export of original Арена was that it was rightly never considered by MoD necessary for mass prodcution to equip armoured and mechanized divisions of the Federation's Ground Forces, taking into account the unique volume and level of suppression fire -artillery and БМП based - and the unique level of air defense, EW and masking equipment widely available to Federation's military formations.

Produce several thousands of those early APS with the entire component basis was considered totally not necessary taking in consideration the huge overmatch enjoyed against the battlefield menaces that could potentially justify theirs introduction in service.

Foreign potential operators will never acquire a system not mass produced and operated by its maker, it is an universally accepted axiom.


The situation in a way became even more convoluted with the development of the new generation of APS designed purposely for the future line of ground force vehicles of light ,medium and heavy weigh, with technical characteristics immeasurably greater than those of original and modernized Арена capable to defeat not today battlefield menaces but those arguably developed by opponents in the next 20-30 years and that obviously could not be offered to foreign purchasers because a simplified exportable version is not even in see at this stage.


The solution has been a modular redesign of the original Арена complex easy to integrate in both domestic and foreign medium and heavy class armoured vehicles capable to reliably defeat today more advanced foreign menaces such as Javelin, Spike and aircraft, helicopter and UAV-delivered high precision ammunitions, it has beign named Арена-M and will be mounted and operated on some modernized tanks of domestic park just to aid its export potential.

In this very interesting interview to Бекхан Оздоев (industrial director at Ростех) touching dozen of different development programs for armed forces you can read a clear reference to Арена-M

https://ria.ru/20201127/ozdoev-1586506217.html

The Algerian Army got handed a full modernization offer of their T-90S for USD 1 mln per tank. 825K USD were for APS and integration of APS to BMS. This was 2018.
India has an MOU for the LEDS 150 for 648K USD (current exchange rate .84 2016 average rate 0.88).
You guys forget that GDLS had a 9.9 Million contract to INSTALL the 193 million USD Trophy systems on 1 single ABCT (87 vehicles). Complete price being 203 million USD for 87*2 containers, spares and critical components = 2.32 million usd per full Trophy system.

As I keep saying, an APS is extremely costly because in the current state of the AFV protection is guarantees 90% of survavibility to the most common threats (SRATW/ATGM). The cost price should be around the 100K, but the reason for the hike is that Arena needs to break even with its sank costs.

Yeah and S-400 radar is much more expensive than the Apache's radar.

Those are not the same radars. APS need to detect incoming missiles flying at more than 100-200m/s only. And fuze the cassettes at the right moment. That's nothing complicated.

The radars used in ARENA and DROZD and Afghanit are not simple PIRs that detect an IR signature inside a building and set off a burglar alarm.

The MMW radar of these APS system has to detect the target and track it to determine its trajectory to see if it will hit the vehicle the system is mounted on or if it will fly over top. It then has to calculate an interception option from the available munitions and launch the correct munition at exactly the critical time to intercept it...

That means precise tracking performance... covering 360 degrees around the tank...

Apache radar is like 10000 times more complicated to make.

Not really... but it does scan a much larger volume of air space, though nothing like the volume the S-400 scans of course.

The APS doesn't cost 500k to be made. I suspect some 5-10k. Pretty simple technology.

Of course... simple cheap technology... that is why every tank already has it because it is simple and cheap.... BTW why does the US use an Israeli system instead of an American system if they are so cheap and simple... and what are the British and French and German systems called... the ones they have in operational service?

If they were 5K then they would already have them in widespread operational service... they don't.

If they sell 0 of them they get 0$.

If they sell zero but don't make any either then they make zero but it also costs them zero.... so they break even.

If they sell 2000 of them at reduced price they get 50 millions.

If each set they sell is 50K, and they sell 2000 of them that means they get 100 million dollars... but if they cost 100K a set to make and install then they get 100 million dollars but it cost them 200 million dollars to make so they are out 100 million dollars. How are they going to pay back the bank loans they used to set up production if they get 100 million dollars income from 200 million dollars worth of hard ware and services...

And that is just assuming it only costs 100K a unit price to set up serial production and get production running.

Over time with orders the cost would of course go down and design improvements will make it much better system... simpler and more effective agaisnt a wider range of targets but you need to have it in production for that to happen normally.

As I keep saying, an APS is extremely costly because in the current state of the AFV protection is guarantees 90% of survavibility to the most common threats (SRATW/ATGM). The cost price should be around the 100K, but the reason for the hike is that Arena needs to break even with its sank costs.

The sad thing is that they will realise how much they need it when they go into combat without it and by then it will be too late... rushing it into production and into service means little training and experience with the systems might lead to it not being that effective to start off with, and it will be rather more expensive too.

Look at the difference in reputation from the first conflict in Chechnia and the second one... tactics and equipment made the difference... ERA works much better when it is loaded with the explosives it needs to work and rolling tanks into prepared cities against an enemy that has had the same training on the same equipment you are using is suicide in any army.

GarryB wrote:

Yeah and S-400 radar is much more expensive than the Apache's radar.

Those are not the same radars. APS need to detect incoming missiles flying at more than 100-200m/s only. And fuze the cassettes at the right moment. That's nothing complicated.

The radars used in ARENA and DROZD and Afghanit are not simple PIRs that detect an IR signature inside a building and set off a burglar alarm.

The MMW radar of these APS system has to detect the target and track it to determine its trajectory to see if it will hit the vehicle the system is mounted on or if it will fly over top. It then has to calculate an interception option from the available munitions and launch the correct munition at exactly the critical time to intercept it...

That means precise tracking performance... covering 360 degrees around the tank...

Apache radar is like 10000 times more complicated to make.

Not really... but it does scan a much larger volume of air space, though nothing like the volume the S-400 scans of course.

The APS doesn't cost 500k to be made. I suspect some 5-10k. Pretty simple technology.

Of course... simple cheap technology... that is why every tank already has it because it is simple and cheap.... BTW why does the US use an Israeli system instead of an American system if they are so cheap and simple... and what are the British and French and German systems called... the ones they have in operational service?

If they were 5K then they would already have them in widespread operational service... they don't.

If they sell 0 of them they get 0$.

If they sell zero but don't make any either then they make zero but it also costs them zero.... so they break even.

If they sell 2000 of them at reduced price they get 50 millions.

If each set they sell is 50K, and they sell 2000 of them that means they get 100 million dollars... but if they cost 100K a set to make and install then they get 100 million dollars but it cost them 200 million dollars to make so they are out 100 million dollars. How are they going to pay back the bank loans they used to set up production if they get 100 million dollars income from 200 million dollars worth of hard ware and services...

And that is just assuming it only costs 100K a unit price to set up serial production and get production running.

Over time with orders the cost would of course go down and design improvements will make it much better system... simpler and more effective agaisnt a wider range of targets but you need to have it in production for that to happen normally.

As I keep saying, an APS is extremely costly because in the current state of the AFV protection is guarantees 90% of survavibility to the most common threats (SRATW/ATGM). The cost price should be around the 100K, but the reason for the hike is that Arena needs to break even with its sank costs.

The sad thing is that they will realise how much they need it when they go into combat without it and by then it will be too late... rushing it into production and into service means little training and experience with the systems might lead to it not being that effective to start off with, and it will be rather more expensive too.

Look at the difference in reputation from the first conflict in Chechnia and the second one... tactics and equipment made the difference... ERA works much better when it is loaded with the explosives it needs to work and rolling tanks into prepared cities  against an enemy that has had the same training on the same equipment you are using is suicide in any army.

A lot of people ignore the real costs of specific systems here.

Sometimes I myself forget that while these systems get a lot of publicity from all sorts of sources, the only APS systems the Russians have put in service were Drozd systems tested in Afghanistan in the 1980s and accepted by the Russian naval infantry on their T-55s...

All the development and advertising since then comes out of the companys pocket and sales of other things are paying for that...

At least now they are introducing their new vehicle families they are being produced with real working APS systems integrated into the whole system so that will inject funds into perfecting designs and making them more soldier friendly too.

The best gear in the world is of no use if it is not applied you the tanks you actually use.

So future work is top attack....

Developers of the Konkurs-M anti-tank complex received the "Golden Idea" award FSMTC

https://tass.ru/armiya-i-opk/10276091

GarryB wrote:

So future work is top attack....

This is a very interesting system and I did not know it even existed!! The only place they are being used is in Libya. Have there been any reports? I wonder why they were not taken to Syria.

It's meant to assist tanks in big operation.

In Syria thry don't need it. Simple atgm launchers can do the job.

They are introducing suicide drones in mass. I doubt Merkava can face them from the top.

yes now that you mention it I understand its role better. Its not very well protected so its really designed to be placed at a strategic location (probably protected by a Pantsir) and take out enemy tanks from beyond the range of the their main guns backing up the assault by MBTs or protecting a base or line against an armoured assault. FORMIDABLE. The Israelis cobbled something similar together but not remotely as good. (although more heavily armoured)

Ideally it would be best used in terrible weather conditions like snow storms or brown outs (dust storms) because its guidance and tracking allows targets to be engaged in zero visibility.

It would be best operated in my opinion with Shturm and Ataka missiles which are command guided and could be fired at much less well protected targets and there should be plenty of Soviet stocks of those missiles for third world combat where targets don't need the penetration performance of the Khrisantema... but for Russian forces potentially facing the latest HATO tanks it is what they need.

Certainly a top attack model could have a smaller lighter warhead and therefore have longer range and higher speed... a bit like the lighter smaller SAMs for use against drones for the Pantsir and TOR-M3.

yes now that you mention it I understand its role better. Its not very well protected so its really designed to be placed at a strategic location

The Krisantema replaces the Shturm-S which is also based on the MTLB chassis. Both operate with Motor Rifle divisions to support infantry heavy divisions for use against enemy armour in defensive roles... as opposed to Tank Divisions which have extra tanks in offensive roles.