Russia’s Uran-9 unmanned combat ground vehicle in May 2021. If all goes according to plan – rare enough in any military procurement programme – this tank will begin full-scale production this year, too late for this phase of the war in Ukraine. As if technical problems were not enough, the company making the Armata is in financial trouble. Credible Russian reports indicate that the programme is suffering problems with production and complexity and “is a hostage to the many new technologies in it”. The trouble from the Russian army perspective is that there are very few of these tanks available. It is a significant advance over all previous Russian tanks, which were and are adaptations of old Soviet designs. Western analysts have been poring with some degree of trepidation over this system since 2015 when the tank first appeared. Most prominent among them was the T-14 Armata.
The weaponry looked good on the parade ground – but how well are Russia’s high-tech weapons performing on the battlefield?Īs always in Russia’s Victory day parade, tanks and armoured vehicles took centre stage. Every year, the May 9 Victory Day parade in Moscow showcases the latest in Russian weapons systems – and this year’s, of course, had special meaning.
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