Ukraine offers firepower upgrade for BMP-2

Ukrainian State Industries is offering an upgrade package that improves the firepower and lethality of the Russian BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicle (IFV).

The standard BMP-2 has a two-person turret armed with a 30 mm 2A42 cannon, 7.62 mm PKT co-axial machine gun and a roof-mounted launcher for the 9K113 Konkurs anti-tank guided weapon (ATGW) system.

The IFV has one 9M113 missile configured in a ready-to-launch position, with another three carried inside the vehicle. The main drawback of this arrangement is that the operator is exposed to small-arms fire and shell splinters while aiming and manually reloading the system, which cannot be rapidly accomplished.

The Ukrainian upgrade mounts a pod of four locally developed laser-guided missiles at the turret rear with the sighting system integrated on the left side of the mount. The pod and its sighting system have electric elevation with manual override from within the turret. New missiles can be loaded via a hatch in the rear troop compartment.

The laser-guided variant extends the maximum effective range by 1,000 m to 5,000 m, and is fitted with a tandem high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) warhead to defeat targets fitted with explosive reactive armour (ERA).

As the missile is laser-guided, it is claimed to be more difficult to jam than a conventional wire-guided ATGW. In a dedicated anti-tank role, a total of 40 missiles can be carried. 226 of 639 words