https://sputniknews.com/military/201705291054088774-russia-rocket-artillery-mlrs-tornado-s/
Russian rocket artillery will completely switch from the Smerch systems to the advanced Tornado-S systems in three years.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Russian rocket artillery brigades will be rearmed from the
Smerch systems to modernized
Tornado-S multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS) by 2020, Russian Missile Troops and Artillery commander Gen. Mikhail Matveyevsky said Monday.
"The rearmament of all missile brigades to modern
Iskander-M missile systems and rocket artillery brigades to large-caliber Tornado-S multiple launch rocket systems will be completed," Matveevsky said, describing plans until 2020.
According to Matveyevsky, the planned rearmament from large-caliber MLRS Smerch to upgraded MLRS Tornado-S starts in 2017.
Matveyevsky added that serial deliveries of Koalitsiya-SV self-propelled guns (SPG) to the Russian army would also begin by 2020.
The long-range 300-mm Tornado-S MLRS, manufactured by the Splav Research and Manufacturing Company, can fire at a range of 120 kilometers (75 miles) and strike an area of over 60 hectares (150 acres).
The 2S35 Koalitsiya-SV SPG with a 152.4 mm 2A88 gun was first unveiled at the Victory Day parade on May 9, 2015, in Moscow and is expected to supplement and then replace the 2S19 Msta self-propelled howitzers in the Russian Army.
The new complex will excel its predecessors by the firing range and will be armed with precision munitions and a new automated control and guidance system
"The rearmament of all missile brigades with the modern Iskander-M missile system and rocket artillery brigades with Tornado-S large-caliber multiple launch rocket systems will be completed," the general said, speaking about plans through 2020.
The planned rearmament with Tornado-S multiple launch rocket systems is beginning in 2017, he said.
Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yuri Borisov said earlier that the serial production of Tornado-S multiple launch rocket systems was planned to be launched in 2017. According to him, the new complex will excel its predecessors by the firing range and will be armed with precision munitions and a new automated control and guidance system.
More:
http://tass.com/defense/948241