S-350E Vityaz air defense missile is completed: Vietnam is a potential customer?

News from the Russian defense industry says the new generation S-350E Vityaz air defense missile system has been completed and is ready to be exported to foreign customers.

The S-350E Vityaz air defense missile system is displayed at the MAKS 2013 Exhibition in Russia.

Accordingly, from next year (2018), Russia will begin offering foreign customers the latest S-350E Vityaz air defense missile system.

This new missile will be lighter and cheaper than the long-range S-400 air defense missile but will have the full capabilities of the S-300 missile and be able to destroy targets at close range without the need for additional "guardians" such as Pantsir and Tor.

Complete testing by the end of this year

Experts believe that after Vityaz completes testing and is put into operation, it will knock medium-range Buk air defense missile systems out of the foreign market, the Russian newspaper Izvestia assessed.

At the ARMY-2017 Military-Technical Forum, Mr. Vyacheslav Dzirkaln, Deputy CEO of Almaz-Antey Design Bureau, introduced the export version of the S-350E Vityaz missile complex and affirmed that state-level testing will be completed by the end of this year after being approved by the Russian Government.

Currently, Almaz-Antey is evaluating the combat performance data of the complex when practicing firing at real targets in various situations and environments. The testing of three types of missiles of the S-350E Vityaz air defense missile system is also almost completed.

The S-350 complex inherits valuable experience gained in the process of designing the RM-SAM air defense missile complex for South Korea. In particular, Russian experts have been able to access and learn to apply advanced foreign technologies to manufacture hardware equipment blocks in the complex.

Each complete Vityaz system consists of 1 control vehicle, 1-2 50N6E multifunctional radar vehicles and 1 to 8 self-propelled launchers.

One of the biggest advantages of the S-350 system is that the number of ready-to-launch missiles on each launcher can be up to 12. Therefore, with a battalion equipped with a complete Vityaz complex consisting of 8 self-propelled launchers, the total ammunition load can be up to 96 missiles.

And with three different types of missiles including short-range, medium-range and long-range, Vityaz does not need close-range air defense systems to protect or coordinate operations because it is completely capable of independently dealing with many threats from the air.

At the same time, this complex can control 32 missiles (with the support of a second radar). The control vehicle of the S-350 Vityaz system only needs a crew of 3 people, all work is completely automatic.

The S-350E Vityaz air defense missile system is displayed at the MAKS 2013 exhibition in Russia. Photo: Armyrecognition.com

Will Vietnam be the first customer?

Expert Andrei Frolov - Editor-in-Chief of Arms Export magazine assessed in Izvestia that after the results of state-level tests of Vityaz are accepted and put into operation, they can become a "hot" item competing with the Buk missile family in the export market.

"Vityaz is a completely new complex, not an upgrade or modernization of any missile system that existed during the Soviet era. Thanks to that, the S-350E will outperform previous missile systems, including the recently completed Buk-M3. At the same time, they are significantly cheaper than the S-400, so they will certainly be very attractive to foreign customers," he said.

Expert Frolov believes that this new generation air defense missile system will likely be purchased by countries that have to guard against massive attacks by cruise missiles and drones, but have limited financial capabilities.

"Owning the S-350E Vityaz, customers will have a compact medium-long range air defense missile system with excellent anti-missile capabilities. This is very important for countries that want to build a multi-layered, powerful air defense network but do not have much money.

Potential customers include Vietnam, India, Algeria, Armenia and Middle Eastern countries - countries that do not have the financial capacity to buy the S-400 long-range air defense missile," Mr. Frolov commented.

Design work on the S-350 Vityaz complex began in 2007 when a need arose for a completely new air defense missile system for the Russian ground forces and navy. Vityaz was first presented to the public in 2013.

However, problems that arose during the design of the new missile have delayed the complex's commissioning until now, Izvestia said.

According to Thoidai