When naval artillery is mounted on... armored vehicles

The 57mm Bofors or 76mm Oto Melara naval guns are powerful weapons capable of handling many missions.

The 76mm Oto Melara naval gun is a very common weapon system on small and medium sized warships in the world. In addition to the function of destroying sea and ground targets, this gun also proves to be very useful when fighting against enemy air attack vehicles.

Realizing the potential of the 76mm gun, Oto Melara developed a multi-purpose self-propelled gun called Draco based on his famous naval weapon, which was essentially the act of bringing gunboats ashore.

Italian Draco multi-role self-propelled gun.

Draco was developed for use as a system to intercept rockets, mortars, artillery shells (C-RAM), as well as ground air defense and other combat operations. The weapon system is mounted on an 8 x 8 wheeled armored vehicle chassis.

The role of the system is to be deployed in important areas such as airports, strategic bases... to conduct patrols against threats from rockets, mortars, artillery, as well as to support infantry in ground combat, air defense or coastal protection operations.

The Draco system is capable of direct fire at ranges from 500 - 3,000 m, 5,000 m for air targets, 15 km for indirect fire against fixed ground targets and up to 20 km for surface targets.

The 76mm main gun has a rate of fire of 80 - 120 rounds/minute, a two-axis stabilization system for high accuracy. In particular, it can also deploy extremely powerful DART guided ammunition.

The fire control system combines a target search radar with an electro-optical surveillance system and a panoramic sight for active and passive target tracking, giving the Draco a high degree of automation.

Begleitpanzer 57 AIFSV armored fire support vehicle

Before Draco, the idea of ​​bringing gunboats ashore was implemented by two companies, Thyssen-Henschel of Germany and Bofors of Sweden, in the 1970s with the Begleitpanzer 57 AIFSV armored fire support vehicle.

The Begleitpanzer 57 prototype was built on the chassis of a prototype of the Marder IFV, on which a very special weapon was mounted, its main gun being an improved version of the 57 mm Bofors L/70 Mk 1 naval gun.

The gun is loaded automatically and can fire a variety of 57 x 438 mm ammunition. The theoretical rate of fire is 200 rounds/minute with a muzzle velocity of 1,020 m/s when firing HE ammunition. In addition, the gun can also fire AP armor-piercing ammunition or 3P programmable ammunition.

Begleitpanzer 57 has the ability to fire flexibly at many angles (from -8 degrees to +45 degrees), combined with an advanced fire control system and smart artillery shells, it can destroy a variety of targets from low to high, even low-flying aircraft.

The main gun of the Begleitpanzer 57 was powerful enough to penetrate any light armored vehicle, even some MBT models released at the same time could not withstand the firepower of this 57mm gun. The ammunition of the Begleitpanzer 57 was estimated at 100 rounds, with 48 rounds available in the loader.

The Begleitpanzer 57 is essentially a Russian BMPT-style tank support fighting vehicle, unfortunately at the time of its inception the concept of this special weapon had not yet been formed, leading to its failure to be accepted for mass production.

According to BaoDatviet