19.12.2019.
Minister Vulin: Defence industry of Serbia equips the state-of-the art helicopters with armament
Helicopter H-145M is the stat-of-the-art helicopter in its class, and the Serbian Armed Forces and Serbian Defence Industry took the opportunity to equip such, most modern helicopter in the world with the assets of domestic armament and domestic production – Minister of Defence Aleksandar Vulin pointed out, who, today, in the Centre for testing of arms and military equipment “Nikinci” attended firing from helicopter H-145M in the framework of the final phase of verification and integration of domestically produced arms into the “Airbus” helicopter.
- It is only something that you produce yourself, and only something that you yourself using your intelligence know to make, repair and use, that is essentially yours and you do not have to ask anyone about anything. The Serbian Armed Forces and the state of Serbia are militarily neutral. It is precisely why we have to rely on our own forces, we have to procure from abroad what we need, but we also need to upgrade and advance it – Minister Vulin stated.The Serbian Armed Forces will very soon, as early as from the beginning of the next year, have helicopters H-145M armed with domestically produced assets, which will according to Minister Vulin mean mastering another capability which the armed forces have not have until now.
Acting Assistant Minister of Defence for Material Resources Nenad Miloradović reminded that a record was broken that year in terms of the number of new weapon systems introduced to the Serbian Armed Forces, and that the cooperation with the “Aribus” company was important not only for the Air Force, but for the entire system which deals with development, integration and testing of armament systems.
- Helicopter H-145M is equipped with one of the state-of-the-art assault-navigation systems. While talking to the colleagues from the “Airbus”, who are conducting tests here, we have learnt that our weapons, both machine gun gondola, and missile launcher, are at the level of the most superb in the world in that class that they have tested so far – Miloradović stated.
Colonel Zvonko Marić from Planning and Development Department of the General Staff of the Serbian Armed Forces said that the “Airbus” helicopters, with which the Serbian Armed Forces were equipped, were intended for combat usage and search and rescue activities.- In accordance with the contract with the “Airbus” company, the obligation of the German side is to produce the helicopter, to integrate all the equipment which is part of helicopter, as well as the assault-navigation system. Our commitment is to produce armament – Colonel Marić reminded and explained that helicopter H-145M would bear domestically produced weapons of 12,7mm with machine gun gondola and launcher that would serve for launching non-guided 80mm missiles, which were also domestically produced.
Lieutenant Colonel Miroslav Zečević from Planning and Development Department of the General Staff of the Serbian Armed Forces underlined that the firing that had been conducted on that day on the training area “Nikinci” marked the beginning of the final phase of integration of Serbian weapon into the “Airbus” helicopter.
- Today we witnessed launching of S-8KOM missile from honey-combed launcher. The firing was successful, and after this phase a detailed analysis of performance will ensue which is going to be followed by integration of the weapons into the remaining helicopters of this type that we have procured – Lieutenant Colonel Zečević underscored.
Live firing from helicopter H-145M was attended by Head of Planning and Development Department of the General Staff of the Serbian Armed Forces Brigadier General Milan Popović and Director of Technical Test Centre Colonel Slobodan Ilić.
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