Russia’s defence materiel export organization Rosoboronexport has teamed with the undersea research organisation Gidropribor to launch a program promoting the latest naval weaponry to the navies of South East Asia. The aim of this weaponry is to preserve the power balance in the region and maintain peace among the local nations.

“A wide range of missions carried out by the navies of maritime powers necessitates equipping them with various types of naval hardware and special equipment. The foreign navies include 225 Russian-built ships. Of them, more than 100 surface ships and submarines carry naval underwater weapons. Rosoboronexport is offering its partners unique solutions to equip and upgrade the armament of these ships,” said Alexander Mikheev, Director General of Rosoboronexport.

Naval underwater weapons are in service with all the world’s major navies. However, only a few countries - including Russia - are capable of designing and manufacturing these weapons independently, due to the high complexity and cost of these efforts. A number of weapons produced by JSC Sea Underwater Weapons – known as the Gidropribor Concern – are offered by Rosoboronexport and are unrivalled in the world.

International customers are offered a wide range of naval hardware and special equipment. Among them are torpedoes, mines, mine countermeasures and underwater anti-sabotage weapons, as well as ship self-defence against underwater weapons.

In the domain of torpedo weapons, the TE-2 universal electric remote-control homing torpedo is available. It is designed to destroy submarines, surface ships and fixed targets. In addition, a number of newly developed torpedoes, including 533 mm torpedoes and 324 mm small torpedoes, have great prospects for the world market.

The MDM-1 and MDM-2 sea floor mines are designed to create a mine threat and destroy surface ships and submarines in surface and submerged conditions, especially when used in minefields. The Shelf naval mine offered has no counterparts in the world. It can be deployed from aircraft, submarines, and surface ships. The Shelf mine has a hydroacoustic passive/active detection and targeting system, which is protected from triggering when exposed to natural disturbances and influence sweeps. Once deployed, the mine can detect any submarines and surface ships regardless of the level of their noise and speed. Its unique design makes it difficult for the target to use countermeasures and conduct evasive action.

Naval mines are not rigidly linked to a particular ship project. Countries whose naval doctrine provides for mine laying are interested in their acquisition. Rosoboronexport expects attention to Russianmade naval mines from a wide range of countries in Africa, South-East Asia and Latin America.

As regards mine countermeasures and ship self-defense against underwater weapons, Rosoboronexport offers the following products: Mayak-2014 sonar systems, MG-74ME self-propelled sonar countermeasure devices, small-sized self-propelled torpedo defense devices, the SHAT-U broadband acoustic sweep as well as the GKT-3M deepwater contact sweep, which is unmatched in the world market. A flexible configuration of the sweep enables its use in single shipborne, heliborne, paired near-bottom and network versions.

In addition, diver delivery vehicles that can be used from the world’s most popular Russian-built Projects 877 and 636 submarines – as well as Piranha class midget submarines – are considered by Rosoboronexport to be promising for the global market.

“We also expect considerable interest in Russia’s naval underwater weapons from countries developing their own shipbuilding industry, but having no prior capability to develop and produce naval weapons. In addition, a number of countries are seeking the know how necessary to establish the production of these weapons by their national industrial base. Rosoboronexport is ready to work in these areas,” added Alexander Mikheev.