2S4 Tyulpan and 2S7 Pion

The main problems with the 240mm mortar was lack of really accurate but also cheap ammo, and of course rate of fire and the size of the ammo reducing the amount that can be carried at a time.

The new electronic fuses with built in control surfaces (like a Paveway kit but for artillery rounds), that cost about $1,000 US each mean that for 1/60th the cost of a Hellfire missile they can hit a target with a shell that weighs about 130kgs that can land within 10m of the target day or night in any weather conditions.

These new fuse kits can be fitted to existing 152mm ammo, which means it replaces the old VG-67 and V-429-E fuse types. The 240mm bombs use 3VT25 fuses, but in its description the new fuse/guidance kit it was described as being compatible with 152mm and larger calibres so I assume it can use it too.

For an increased cost in fuses all of a sudden a 2S4 suddenly becomes a very powerful weapon.

I rather suspect that with the long barrel Koalition the 2S5 becomes redundant and will be withdrawn gradually, but it will be interesting to see what happens in the case of the 2S7 203mm gun.

The extra weight of the 203mm shell is significant in terms of 152mm = about 40kgs for the HE shell, whereas the 203mm is about 110kgs per shell... the difference is significant.

The question is what sort of programs to improve 203mm shells and guns has there been?

If there is a Koalition program for the 203mm shells as well that greatly increases range and accuracy then naval and land based models make sense.

152mm guns for Destroyers and 203mm guns for Cruisers?

I rather suspect however that they might rely on the increased range and accuracy of the 152mm to replace the 203mm weapons.

Is it worth keeping them for special heavy artillery units?

There aren't many targets that can shrug off a 40kg shell landing directly on top of them, and for larger targets there would be the 240mm Mortar.

My initial thoughts would be to put them in storage till they were needed, but it would probably make sense to either get rid of the whole calibre or give it an upgrade and keep it in service.

I would have thought for fixed use like coastal artillery at ports and coastal population centres that 203mm guns would be useful even if they didn't have particularly long range.

But then keeping the calibre would be a waste of effort... the Tornado rocket artillery plus existing tube artillery of mortars, gun mortars, and guns, the replacement of towed anti tank guns with kurganets and boomerang based "tank vehicles" should make the force more mobile and very powerful.

I agree, the real question though is how much room do they have in their reduced sized army for 120mm mortars AND 240mm mortars.

The Koalition makes a lot of sense because the design is unified with the Navy, so in addition to Army vehicles including mounted on armata for the heavy brigades and a truck mounted model used to replace the Bereg coastal artillery vehicles and likely used in medium wheeled units, it is a useful and efficient system that offers excellent range and accuracy for relatively low cost.

The 240mm mortar with guidance kits for its rounds make sense in smaller numbers... it would be very useful in mountains or urban areas where its near vertical trajectory on target is useful at hitting otherwise hidden targets and also against well dug in enemy forces that need rounds that will bury themselves in the dirt a few metres before exploding to take out bunkers and trenches.

For general use a combined 120mm rifled gun/mortar is more mobile, offers the same effective plunging fire and guided shells makes sense.

The question is do they want to keep the 203mm gun for specialist use or drop it to reduce logistics for the extra calibre.

As I have said... it might depend on the navy... if they want a heavier gun to deliver a larger payload then it makes sense to build a specialist land vehicle, perhaps an extended chassis model of Armata based on the version with the engine at the front that will be used for IFV with an extra 2-3 wheels perhaps and a large recoil spade.

They wouldn't need hundreds of vehicles, a few units for special use, just like the Navy would likely fit them to their Cruisers (ie upgraded Kirovs and perhaps upgraded Slavas). With Glonass guidance and a range of perhaps 50-60km and a shell that weighs 90-110kgs... the increased calibre could be useful for launching UAVs perhaps and other special ammo.

Of course if the Navy don't want such a gun then I suspect the 2S7 could be put in storage in case their capabilities are needed.

Hard to say regarding future plans.

I have not read anything about future plans for 203mm weapons in the Army or Navy... it would be interesting to see a new 203mm gun for the Navies Cruisers and for "special targets" for the Army.

The problem is that with a range of up to 80km with the new 152mm shells... and more importantly with guidance systems that are cheap and give it very good accuracy out to maximum range the need for heavier shells becomes less and less.

A 152mm shell is in the 40-50kg weight range, though the new long range shells will likely be lighter.

In comparison the 203mm shells would be in the 100-110kg range, or pretty much double the weight, with a much larger volume for features like guidance systems or special payloads.

I would like to see joint development on a new 203mm gun even if it just makes it as a weapon for the navies cruisers with a range of 100-120km, or perhaps the reduced range of 40km with super heavy 150kg shells.

In terms of performance a 203mm shell would have impressive HEAT power and with a MMW radar seeker in the nose with two full sized HEAT charges one in front of the other the armour penetration would be enormous and would likely make a very effective round to undermine runways and concrete bunkers.

In fact in this modern period of low collateral damage with an accurate guidance system and a solid metal body it could be used to target the engine of small boats... coming down almost vertically a 90kg lump of steel would punch clean through most boats top to bottom and disable pretty much any engine it happened to fall through, with no explosion.

It seems to me that they could continue development of both systems and keep them in reserve for mountain fighting or fighting in situations that their unique capabilities make them useful for.

the new coalition will have a range of 70km with long range rounds and about 55km for standard rounds with dual laser and satellite guidance. 3m CEP for SALH and 10m for satellite guidance with the latter likely to improve over time.

Certainly if they go for a 203mm naval gun there could be a future for the 2S7 and much of the developments in payload technology and guidance could also be applied to the 2S4... both are niche weapons of enormous potential but unlikely to be mass produced and in every artillery unit of the future.

That said, they are still very potent weapons that will become more useful with modern guided shells because the much higher hit probability means fewer rounds need be carried which is good because with the large calibres fewer rounds will be carried. the extra power and potency of the shells makes them more useful against harder targets too.

They would be interesting export items too though with new base vehicles for commonality and improved performance...

Perhaps an extended chassis Boomerang with 10 wheels with a 240mm mortar or 203mm main gun... the latter using technology from the Coalition to extend the firing range to double the way the existing system has extended the range of the MSTA... Some sort of rotary magazine with say 6 ready to fire rounds and then scoot to another firing position...

but I feel like that now that we have GLONASS plus laser correction, big guns could seriously make a come back if there's enough interest.

I don't think it would be interesting for foreign powers to develop from scratch, but as Russia already has the technology, I think it is a useful capability that is worth keeping.

I seriously want to see modernized Tulip 240mm with a longer barrel and with Koaltion's advancements applied, and I think the best vehicle to mount on would be the MZKT-79221, the same as the Topol-M/RS-24 Yars. Some may debate whats the practicality of such a modernization outside of bunker busting, well I could see it having strategic nuclear shell carrying capability, a possible alternative to theater/short range ballistic missiles, due to INF treaty restraints.

They already have Iskander and Tochka... both of which easily outrange any possible version of Tulip.

the attempt to make a long range Paris gun will end the same way the Paris gun ended... that is a dead end... there is no point in trying to make a gun good at something a missile is already good at.

If the INF treaty becomes a problem.. . just withdraw from it.

imo these are pretty much niche weapons, useful in siege type situations. In mobile war, airpower would be much better. A 240mm mortar can only lob about a hundred kilos of warhead, an aircraft can lift a couple of tons.

I agree... Russia wants mobile forces and to fight mobile wars but sometimes you don't get to choose the wars you fight or how you can fight them. For a conflict like Afghanistan having a powerful vehicle with up to 20km range with a powerful guided shell is very useful... the 2S4 is actually quite mobile and able to operate well in mountains and forests etc.

The Tulip can set up in a position and pound a bunker or cave structure for weeks... rain or shine... snow or fog 24/7... 130kgs of HE is plenty to keep you awake at night and day and night and day...

Like what was pointed out about the INF treaty artillery shells would be exempt and are also cheaper than missle systems and dont have the risk of being shot out of the air.

No version of Tulip or Pion would reach 500km... forget about that... even if they did it is cheaper to do it with a 600kg payload using Iskander-M.

Artillery shells can be shot down... TOR is designed specifically for that, but the low cost of a shell means you can trade shell for missile and he is going to run out first.

College boy u state that airpower is a better option. Airpower costs more to operate, and are not always available, and also have the risk of being shot down, and if destroyed more costly to replace.

Exactly... you need to plan carefully an air attack and need lots of assets in the air to defend the systems you launch... plus all these aircraft will operate hundreds of kms from the front line so it might take an hour or more to arrive.

Tulip can be there and fire within seconds and you can guide their shells onto the target either with your own target marker or with a high flying UAV with a laser target marker.

Tulip wont be called off in bad weather or because the Air Force has higher priority targets... Tulip is an Army weapon you brought with you and you control so few communication issues can be expected.

Considering the 300mm Smerch batteries have the E90 UAV I suspect the Tulip battery could have a smaller shorter ranged UAV to find targets and monitor things and determine if follow up attacks are needed.

With the Tulip 240mm, it's modernization should include:

1.) Going from a low pressure mortar barrel to a high pressure howitzer barrel with Koalition advancements with the hopes of having a range of 150-300km .

2.) New modern shells with a high pressure propellant GLONASS/laser correction and nuclear warheads.

3.) A new rotary ammunition loading system with 6 ready to fire shells attached to the Tulip.

4.) If possible a retractable barrel that's compressed while driving but extends before firing.

5.) MZKT-79221 trucks as a new truck platform with an additional logistics support truck carrying 50 additional nuclear shells with a automatic loading mechanism that extends and quickly loads shells on to the Tulip's rotary container.


...I think the best use would be to combine in tandem with I2skander-M's, where the Iskanders would be used in the SEAD/DEAD role to knockout air defense and the Tulip would rain nuclear shells on fortified military bases.

I think a lot of your suggestions will just make it a bigger Coalition... which is fine for Pion, but not so for Tulip.

taking them one at a time:

With the Tulip 240mm, it's modernization should include:

1.) Going from a low pressure mortar barrel to a high pressure howitzer barrel with Koalition advancements with the hopes of having a range of 150-300km .

Even with that level of performance the Iskander is also an Army system with better than that performance (ie 600kg payload to 400km+ with excellent accuracy and enemy ABM evadibility).

Tulip will be a niche weapon used in mountains or against particularly heavy targets like heavy stone buildings where its shell weight and trajectory make it more effective than 152mm rounds.

2.) New modern shells with a high pressure propellant GLONASS/laser correction and nuclear warheads.

Tulip would certainly benefit from these new features to extend range to perhaps 20-25km with 130-140kg projectiles.

3.) A new rotary ammunition loading system with 6 ready to fire shells attached to the Tulip.

Rate of fire is not really a problem for this system... I would probably leave it as is. High rate of fire is not as important as power and weight of shell and accuracy.

4.) If possible a retractable barrel that's compressed while driving but extends before firing.

I would think having it at the very rear of the vehicle folding forward would remain good enough... especially with a newer longer wheeled vehicle for better mobility or a new tracked vehicle like Boomerang or Kurganets. Armata is probably unnecessarily heavy for the role.

5.) MZKT-79221 trucks as a new truck platform with an additional logistics support truck carrying 50 additional nuclear shells with a automatic loading mechanism that extends and quickly loads shells on to the Tulip's rotary container.

Such a configuration would not offer any great advance over Tochka or Iskander... certainly a support vehicle would be useful and some sort of autoloader... perhaps using a belt feed might be handy, but for Tulip shell weight and accuracy are going to be the key points... not rate of fire.

...I think the best use would be to combine in tandem with Iskander-M's, where the Iskanders would be used in the SEAD/DEAD role to knockout air defense and the Tulip would rain nuclear shells on fortified military bases.

I would hope the Russians replace tactical nuclear weapons with precision guided conventional weapons as they are more effective and can be exported to allies.

The Soviet ship launched cruise missile had a CEP of 250m. That is fine for a nuke as it will destroy most targets 250m away from the detonation point, but it meant land attack cruise missiles could only use nuclear weapons because they were not accurate enough to use conventional weapons.

In other words to take out an enemy base HQ they had to use a nuke.

Now that their cruise missiles can hit targets as small as an individual vehicle with a CEP of 5m or less then conventional HE can now be used where before only a nuke could be considered.


It is the same now with GLONASS guided weapons... accuracy is increased to the point where conventional attack can be considered as an alternative where previously only nuclear warheads could ensure the job is done.

Pion could be given all the improvements Coalition has gone through and it might be kept in reserve for counter battery fire or attacks on specific targets in specific regions. It could have excellent range and the ability to continuously fire day and night and be a very effective system.

Tulip on the other hand might only be needed against specific heavy targets or for fighting in the mountains or forests where its trajectory and payload make it very useful.

Either way neither will be in service in huge numbers.

Small numbers would make them cheap to upgrade and maintain in storage.

The Tulip also has some unexplored potential... a 130kg 240mm calibre delivery system could be used to deliver jamming equipment or fly in your own mobile IED that can be 'delivered' in real time.

the Pion on the other hand could directly benefit from work on 203mm calibres with the Navy... so far little patrol boats have 57mm guns (with huge potential for CIWS use with laser guided shells), while corvettes have 100mm guns and Frigates have 130mm guns, which means you should be fitting 152mm guns to your Destroyers and either fit the same gun to your cruisers or apply the same performance extending technology and add 203mm guns for your cruisers/capital ships.

If you can increase range performance by 2.5 times (27km to 70km) like they did with the MSTA/Coalition then the same performance increase plus experiments with EM catapults should allow the 48km range of Pion to be extended to perhaps 100km... which might even be useful to mount on a "gun ship" along with various rocket artillery and other cheap bombardment equipment... perhaps a large EM catapult the length of the ship custom designed to deliver aerial bombs... The Soviets already developed high speed heat resistant FAB-1500 bombs for use by Mig-25RBs and MiG-31RBs.

of course phased out since they are obsolete for modern era battlefield

But that is the point... they are no more obsolete than any other existing piece of artillery out there yet their size in the case of Tulip and range in the case of Pion offer special abilities standard and new systems simply don't offer.

In mountains mortars are very effective... a diving top attack munition that weighs 130kg could be made fire and forget and be fitted with decoys and jammers to evade APS systems as well as offer one hell of a powerful anti cave structure weapon or for use in urban areas a round that can be designed to penetrate a specific number of floors of a building before detonating.

Imagine the performance of a 130kg FAE warhead with laser and GLONASS guidance.

Why fire for effect with a 120mm calibre weapon with 6 rounds in an automatic magazine that fire rapidly to allow shoot and scoot, when a 240mm calibre weapon could fire a single cluster round with 12 bomblets each of 10kgs with the dispensor using Laser guidance or GLONASS to get it on target with the bomblets released 30-50 metres above the target area in one shot.

GarryB wrote:But that is the point... they are no more obsolete than any other existing piece of artillery out there yet their size in the case of Tulip and range in the case of Pion offer special abilities standard and new systems simply don't offer.

In mountains mortars are very effective... a diving top attack munition that weighs 130kg could be made fire and forget and be fitted with decoys and jammers to evade APS systems as well as offer one hell of a powerful anti cave structure weapon or for use in urban areas a round that can be designed to penetrate a specific number of floors of a building before detonating.

Imagine the performance of a 130kg FAE warhead with laser and GLONASS guidance.

Why fire for effect with a 120mm calibre weapon with 6 rounds in an automatic magazine that fire rapidly to allow shoot and scoot, when a 240mm calibre weapon could fire a single cluster round with 12 bomblets each of 10kgs with the dispensor using Laser guidance or GLONASS to get it on target with the bomblets released 30-50 metres above the target area in one shot.

all these types as well as 2s3/2s1 should be replaced by more 2s19 msta units

all these types as well as 2s3/2s1 should be replaced by more 2s19 msta units

No point in making more MSTAs when Coalition is on the way.

2S1 and 2S2s are on the way out, though a lot of 2S1s are being upgraded with their 122mm guns being replaced with 120mm rifled gun/howitzers/mortars.

This would improve performance and range and remove the 122mm artillery shell from the inventory.

Using the 120mm gun/mortar for direct and indirect HE fire they could also eliminate the 100mm rifled gun of the BMP-3 too.

d_taddei2 wrote:Armed Forces of Ukraine actively restore self-propelled artillery 2S7 Pion. Current repair overhaul with elements of individual components (recoil device, hydraulic system, loading mechanism) 203-mm self-propelled guns must implement State Enterprise "Shepetovsky Repair Plant" and remzavod in Rivne.

2S7 Pion - a self-propelled howitzer, designed to suppress the rear, the destruction of critical facilities and offensive nuclear weapons in tactical depth at a distance of 47 km. SAU Peony notable for the fact that can fire nuclear warheads.

http://news.liga.net/video/politics/3999522-ukraina_vozvrashchaet_na_vooruzhenie_moshchneyshie_sau_pion_video.htm

i wouldnt fire a nuclear warhead in such a close distance to me

George1 wrote:
i wouldnt fire a nuclear warhead in such a close distance to me

The Pion fired 1kT mini nukes, operational tactical nukes at 40km distance from your Pion it is similiar to launching 1MT at a target 1000km away. It is safe, it would take days or weeks to get anykind of radioactivity at your position and it would be very low (non dangerous).

Tactical nukes depending if you can see the mushroom or not, they are not really that dangerous to you. Tactical nukes are only used against primary military or very important infrastructure of relative small size. Meaning if you are not living next to a military base you are most probably safe from intial blast and have usually enough time to evacuate. Tactical nukes are a "non" danger for civilians. Unlike "regular warfare" such weapons are used with very high priority to actually hit their targets, not some cowboy soldier that wants to shoot and cheer for killing just anything like we have seen so many times.

Strategic weapons are the danger, however at the same time non danger because no one will use them, MAD still exists.