Service of the S-75 air defense system in the USSR, in Russia and in the former Soviet republics
It may seem strange, but the most combative in the family of "seventy-fives" were by no means the most advanced in terms of jamming immunity, accuracy and firing range of the SA-75M/MK "Dvina" SAM. This was due to the fact that the Soviet Union supplied Vietnam, the Middle East and India with systems operating in the 10-cm range, and the troops Defense The USSR was armed with more advanced SAM systems operating in the 6-cm range, the first of which was the S-75 Desna. Following the Desna, the S-75M Volkhov SAM system appeared, intended for "domestic consumption", and the S-75M Volga export modification, which differed mainly in its identification and combat control systems, was intended for deliveries to friendly countries.
As the hardware of the Volkhov improves and new, longer-range anti-aircraft systems appear, missiles The systems in service underwent several stages of modifications and modernization, during which improvements were introduced that were implemented in new modifications. Also, the improved S-75M/M3 Volga anti-aircraft missile systems were received by the Warsaw Pact countries and some developing countries that were allies of the USSR.
Service of the S-75 air defense system in the USSR and Russia
Starting from the second half of the 1960s, the complexes of the “seventy-fifth” family, first the S-75 Desna, and then the S-75M Volkhov, became the main air defense systems in the country’s air defense forces. In the opinion of the military, at that time the single-channel nature of the “seventy-five” was not such a big problem. In places where there was a high probability of a group breakthrough by potential enemy aircraft, the S-75 air defense systems were positioned so that they mutually overlapped each other’s affected areas.
It was the deployment of these complexes that made it possible to create air defense lines on the most likely flight routes of air attack weapons and high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft. By the mid-1960s, an anti-aircraft missile barrier of 55 S-75 missile defense systems was created, stretching over 1300 km from Volgograd to Orsk and Sary-Shagan.
Layout of S-75 air defense missile systems in the southern direction as of 1990
In the same direction, an additional line was created from Krasnovodsk to Ayaguz with a length of more than 2800 km. At the Riga-Kaliningrad-Kaunas line, 20 S-75 divisions were deployed, in the Vilnius-Lida-Kobrin direction there were 9 S-75 divisions, and 40 divisions were deployed along the Black Sea coast at the Poti-Kerch-Evpatoria-Odessa line. Moreover, a significant part of this barrier remained until the collapse of the USSR.
By the early 1970s, the USSR had built a fairly dense air defense system, which relied on an almost continuous radar field that controlled medium and high altitudes over almost the entire territory of the country. The interception of air targets was assigned to supersonic fighter-interceptors. Object and zonal air defense was provided by anti-aircraft missile brigades of mixed composition, which had low-altitude S-125 complexes, S-75 medium-range air defense systems and long-range S-200 - covering strategically important objects, as well as large administrative and industrial centers, from air strikes. Also, the anti-aircraft missile forces of the USSR Air Defense Forces had anti-aircraft missile regiments, usually armed with S-75 air defense systems. It is worth noting that it was the “seventy-five” that made up more than half of all deployed and stored facility complexes.
Layout of S-75 air defense missile systems in the European part of the USSR as of 1991
The organizational and staffing structure of the Air Defense Forces, which had developed by the mid-1980s, most fully corresponded to the tasks of the country's Air Defense Forces, the combined arms nature of the fight against the air enemy and the trends of its further development.
Of course, the air defense system, designed on the basis of technical solutions of the second half of the 1950s, was not the height of perfection and had significant shortcomings. The S-75 is rightly criticized for the fact that this complex was single-channel in target, had poor mobility and, due to the need to refuel missiles with liquid fuel components, was difficult to operate. However, it is worth understanding that the use of 1950s technology and liquid rockets was largely a forced decision. The Soviet radio-electronic industry could mass produce relatively simple equipment built on electric vacuum devices, and sufficiently effective solid fuel formulations suitable for use in medium-range missiles were created only in the 1970s.
Soon after the adoption of the S-75 air defense system, the question arose of replacing missiles fueled with toxic fuel and caustic, flammable oxidizers with direct-flow liquid missiles (similar to those used as part of the Krug military complex) or solid fuel missiles. Also based on combat experience gained in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, the military wanted to obtain a mobile multi-channel anti-aircraft system with high fire performance and the ability to fire at a target from any direction, regardless of the position of the launcher.
Research in this area and testing of prototypes have led to the realization that the endless modernization of the S-75 has no prospects, and it is more rational to create a new anti-aircraft system. As a result, in 1978, after comprehensive testing, the S-300PT mobile air defense system with the 5V55K (V-500K) radio command missile system entered service. Although this missile ensured the destruction of targets at a distance of up to 47 km, which was less in range than the S-75M3 with the B-759 missile defense system, the solid fuel missiles of the first “three hundred” did not require dangerous and complex refueling with liquid fuel and oxidizer, and this was a huge benefit step forward.
At the same time, the USSR Ministry of Defense was in no hurry to write off well-developed and fully combat-ready systems, which, in combination with other types of anti-aircraft systems, posed a serious threat to the air attack weapons of a potential enemy. It should also be understood that all Soviet first-generation site-based air defense systems had in their arsenal missile defense systems with “special” warheads, designed to repel massive air raids in a complex jamming environment, which largely reduced the requirements for guidance accuracy and noise immunity in a global conflict.
According to American estimates, in the early 1980s the country's Air Defense Forces had more than 500 S-75 air defense systems in positions and in storage. Although by the end of the 1980s a significant part of the S-75 was supplanted by the multi-channel anti-aircraft systems S-300PT/PS, by the time of the collapse of the USSR there were about 400 S-75 complexes of various modifications in combat and training units, as well as at reserve bases. The production of B-759 (5YA23) missiles for air defense systems on combat duty continued until the mid-1980s.
In the future, it was planned to completely replace the single-channel S-75M3 systems with multi-channel S-300P air defense systems in a ratio of 3 to 1. This ratio was considered acceptable, since the S-300P systems have better mobility and many times greater fire performance.
Although the S-300P is significantly more expensive than the S-75, the solid-fuel missiles used as part of the S-300P air defense system and located on combat duty in sealed transport and launch containers do not require maintenance for a significant time. Which ultimately simplifies preparation for combat use of the anti-aircraft system and reduces operating costs.
In addition, the 5V55R (V-500R) missile system with radio command guidance of the second type (with sight through the missile), which entered service in 1981, had a firing range of up to 75 km, and the firing range of the improved 5V55RM missile was increased to 90 km, which made it possible significantly exceed the performance of the B-759 missile defense system used as part of the S-75M3 air defense system.
After the collapse of the USSR, the Air Defense Forces underwent massive reductions, and it was the “seventy-fives” who were the first to go under the knife. In the first half of the 1990s, the number of all deployed first-generation systems greatly decreased, but the main blow fell on the S-75. This was due to the fact that the relatively small number of long-range S-200VM (the last complex of this type in our country was deactivated in 2012) were of great value and could effectively fire at targets at a range inaccessible to the S-300P air defense system, and the low-altitude S-125M/ M1s with solid rockets were not as complex or expensive to operate.
In our country, the last S-75s were removed from combat duty in 1996. Of course, by that time single-channel “seventy-fives” with liquid rockets largely did not meet modern requirements, and a significant part of them had expired. But the relatively fresh S-75M3, released in the late 1970s, equipped with a television-optical sighting device with an optical target tracking channel and “Double” equipment with remote SNR simulators, could protect the sky in secondary directions for at least another 10 years or complement more modern systems .
Some of the obsolete systems removed from their positions were not disposed of, but were sent for storage. However, the S-75M3 air defense systems “stored” at weakly guarded bases were quickly rendered unusable by hunters for electronics containing precious metals.
A certain number of S-75M3 air defense systems located in remote northern regions were “mothballed” right at their firing positions. It is clear that these complexes, which were not exported to the “mainland,” and were left without maintenance, quickly fell into disrepair. For example, such a fate befell the equipment of divisions deployed in the vicinity of the village of Belushya Guba, in the southwestern part of the Novaya Zemlya archipelago. Apparently, the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense in the 1990s considered that leaving the complexes in positions was less expensive than transporting them to the mainland.
One way or another, by the beginning of the 21st century, most of the previously existing S-75 air defense systems had fallen into a state unsuitable for further use and were cut into scrap metal. Some of the anti-aircraft missiles that previously served in the USSR Air Defense Forces had a happier fate; they were converted into target missiles: RM-75, Korshun, Sinitsa-23 and Strizh.
The warhead was removed from the converted missiles, special tracers were installed to enhance infrared radiation, the EPR was changed using a Luneberg lens, active jamming equipment and an automated system for recording the evaluation of firing results could be placed on board the missile.
Converting decommissioned missiles into supersonic targets that imitate enemy cruise and ballistic missiles makes it possible to reduce costs during test firing of air defense crews and increase the level of realism during exercises.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the Russian developer of air defense systems, NPO Almaz, tried to interest foreign customers in the modernized S-75-2 Volga-2A air defense missile system, created using unified digital hardware implemented using technical solutions implemented in the export S-300PMU1 air defense missile system. The main changes were made to the RSN-75V tracking and guidance station. It was stated that this option was the most appropriate in terms of cost-effectiveness. However, there were no orders from abroad for the modernization of the S-75M/M3.
Operation of the S-75 air defense system in the former Soviet republics
When dividing up the Soviet military inheritance, the former Soviet republics received about a hundred “seventy-five”, and most of them, as in Russia, were written off by the end of the 1990s.
The only known case of combat use of the S-75M3 air defense system in the post-Soviet space is the defeat of the Russian Su-27S fighter, which occurred over Abkhazia on March 19, 1993. The plane was shot down by a missile fired from Georgian territory and fell in the vicinity of the village of Odisha, 11 km northwest of Sukhumi. Pilot Major Votslav Aleksandrovich Shipko died.
In the second half of the 1980s, units of the 19th Separate Tbilisi Air Defense Army, part of the 14th Air Defense Corps, were stationed on Georgian territory. On February 1, 1988, in connection with organizational and staffing measures, the 14th Air Defense Corps was transformed into the 96th Air Defense Division, which included three anti-aircraft missile brigades stationed in Tbilisi, Poti and Etchmiadzin. These brigades were armed with the S-75M3 and S-125M/M air defense systems. Also, the skies over Georgia were protected by a separate anti-aircraft missile regiment, armed with the S-75M3 air defense system (located in Gudauta), and a separate anti-aircraft missile regiment in the Rustavi area, equipped with the S-200VM long-range air defense system.
Layout of the S-75 air defense system on the territory of Georgia during Soviet times
In the early 1990s, most of the equipment was exported to Russia, but the new authorities of “independent” Georgia, against the backdrop of interethnic conflicts flaring up in the republic, tried by all means to gain access to modern arms, including air defense systems. In 1992, Georgian armed forces seized by force one C-75M3 and two S-125M missiles, as well as several P-18 meter-range radars.
However, the Georgians were unable to maintain the S-75M3 in working condition for a long time. In 1996, two low-altitude S-125M air defense systems with solid-fuel anti-aircraft missiles remained in service, which did not require labor-intensive maintenance and refueling with liquid fuel and oxidizer.
In the 21st century, operational S-75M3 air defense systems remained in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.
Until 1988, the 15th Air Defense Corps was located on the territory of Azerbaijan, which in 1990 was transformed into the 97th Air Defense Division. The division included: the 82nd IAP at the Nasosnaya airfield on the MiG-25PDS, the 128th air defense brigade - headquarters in the village of Zira, the 129th air defense brigade - headquarters in the village of Sangachali, the 190 air defense brigade - headquarters in the city of Mingachevir, and two radio engineering brigades in Ayat and Mingachevir. The air defense units were armed with the S-75M3 medium-range air defense system, the S-125M/M1 low-altitude air defense system, and the S-200VM long-range air defense system.
Google Earth satellite image: position of Azerbaijani S-75M3 air defense missile system in the vicinity of Kerdeksani settlement, image taken in April 2016
Until 2012, there were five S-75M3 air defense systems in position in Azerbaijan: three in the vicinity of the city of Mingachevir, in the Yevlakh region, and two near Baku. The last S-75M3 division in the vicinity of the village of Kerdeksani northeast of Baku was removed from combat duty in mid-2016 after Azerbaijani crews fully mastered the Russian-made S-300PMU2 Favorit air defense system.
Until recently, there were several “seventy-five” in Kazakhstan. These complexes were maintained in operational condition due to the “cannibalism” of the S-75s, deployed as part of the “air defense belt” on the southern borders of the USSR, and subsequently mainly sent to storage bases. In addition, the Kazakh military had repair facilities and the infrastructure of missile ranges at its disposal.
Layout of liquidated air defense missile systems on the territory of Kazakhstan
During Soviet times, air defense in this direction was provided by the 37th Air Defense Corps (from the 12th Separate Air Defense Army) and the 56th Air Defense Corps (from the 14th Separate Air Defense Army). From the 37th Air Defense Corps, the following were stationed on the territory of Kazakhstan: the command of the 33rd Air Defense Division, the 87th Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade (Alma-Ata), the 145th Guards Orsha Red Banner, the Order of Suvorov Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, the 132nd Anti-Aircraft - missile brigade. From the 56th Air Defense Corps: 374th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment, 420th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment, 769th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment, 770th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment.
Taking into account the reserves stored in the steppe expanses, Kazakhstan received a huge amount of various weapons, spare parts and ammunition. The military legacy of the Soviet Army turned out to be very impressive, and nominally Kazakhstan became the third military power in the post-Soviet space after Russia and Ukraine.
The ground component of the air defense forces of Kazakhstan in the first two decades of the 21st century was a very interesting structure in terms of equipment and weapons. Kazakhstan was one of the few post-Soviet republics that had first-generation anti-aircraft missile systems with liquid rockets in service. However, maintaining the air defense system, whose age reached 30-40 years, in service was a purely necessary measure. In Kazakhstan, which has a significant territory, unlike Russia, it was not possible to independently develop and build modern anti-aircraft systems, and there was no money to purchase new ones.
In 2015, three S-75M3 air defense systems were on combat duty in the Kazakh expanses. The position of one complex was located west of Karaganda, the second - southeast of Serebryansk, the third - not far from the settlement of Shakhan. Several more “seventy-fifth” complexes were in storage.
Google Earth satellite image: ZRKS-75M3 position west of Karaganda, image taken in April 2022
The position in the vicinity of the settlement of Shakhan was eliminated seven years ago, near Karaganda the S-75M3 was replaced by the S-2023PS in 300. Judging by satellite images near Serebryansk, the “seventy-five” was still on combat duty a year ago.
Google Earth satellite image: ZRKS-75M3 position near Serebryansk, image taken in June 2023
On May 29, 1992, by decree of the President of Kyrgyzstan Askar Akaev, formations and units of the Soviet Army stationed on the territory of the republic were taken under national jurisdiction. Kyrgyzstan received equipment and weapons from the 8th Guards Motorized Rifle Division, the 30th Separate Motorized Rifle Regiment, and the 145th Guards Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, which was part of the 33rd Air Defense Division. In 2006, a new type of armed forces was created in Kyrgyzstan, which included the Air Force and Air Defense Forces - air defense forces. By that time, the republic no longer had its own fighters in flight condition, and of the capable air defense systems there were two S-75M3 and five S-125M available. To maintain these rare complexes in working order, Russia donated spare parts, liquid fuel components and missiles. As of 2016, one S-75M3 and two S-125M missiles remained in service.
About once every two years, the Kyrgyz military with their anti-aircraft systems took part in joint exercises of the CSTO armed forces and the CIS Air Defense Forces, and travel to Russian or Kazakh training grounds for control and training shooting.
The Kyrgyz Volkhov, involved in the exercises of the joint air defense forces in the Astrakhan region and Kazakhstan, invariably evoked nostalgia among Russian military personnel who saw these complexes in secular times.
Kyrgyz anti-aircraft crews, unlike their colleagues in a number of other Central Asian countries, were actually on combat duty. The S-75M3 air defense system launchers contained the required number of missiles, and there were spare missiles nearby in the caponiers on the TZM. This can be explained by the fact that Kyrgyzstan is a member of the CSTO and Russia spends considerable money on maintaining the Kyrgyz armed forces in working order.
Google Earth satellite image: position of the S-75M3 air defense system on the outskirts of Bishkek, the image was taken in December 2021
Combat duty of the S-75M3 division, deployed on the eastern outskirts of Bishkek, lasted until the beginning of 2022. Launchers without missiles remained in position until the end of 2023. At the beginning of 2024, all equipment was removed from here.
In 1991, Uzbekistan received at least eight S-75M3s from the 12th Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, which was part of the 12th Separate Air Defense Army with headquarters in Tashkent.
Google Earth satellite image: position of the Uzbek S-75M3 air defense system, image taken in October 2002
Most of the seventy-fives in Uzbekistan were removed from combat duty in the 1990s, but one S-75M3 position, located southwest of Tashkent, remained until 2006.
The group of air defense forces left to Turkmenistan after the collapse of the USSR was, in terms of quantity of weapons, much larger than what Uzbekistan received, not to mention Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. The air defense belt, created in the 1960s to protect the southern borders of the USSR, ran through this Central Asian republic. Before the revolution in Iran, this direction was considered one of the most likely for American bombers to break through into the central regions of the USSR. In the 1980s, about three dozen S-75s were on combat duty in Turkmenistan.
Layout of the S-75 air defense system on the territory of Turkmenistan
After the collapse of the USSR, Turkmenistan received the equipment and weapons of the 17th Air Defense Division with two anti-aircraft missile brigades, a radio engineering brigade and a radio engineering regiment. As for the “seventy-fives,” for the most part these were not new air defense systems, but those brought to the level of the S-75M3 by modernizing early versions, the age of which had exceeded two decades, and to maintain them in working condition required heroic efforts of the calculations.
In the 21st century, the number of operational systems has sharply decreased. In 2007, the skies of Turkmenistan were defended by the Turkmenbashi anti-aircraft missile brigade and two anti-aircraft missile regiments, which were formally armed with a dozen S-75M3, S-125M and S-200VM air defense systems. Currently, all complexes that contained rockets with liquid propellant engines have been removed from service and partially replaced by Chinese-made anti-aircraft systems.
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