The Armenian Armed Forces have successfully test fired an OTR-21 Tochka Tactical Ballistic Missile System. The missile hit its designated target from 65 kilometers, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan published on Facebook.

The Armenian Armed Forces have successfully test fired an OTR-21 Tochka Tactical Ballistic Missile System (Picture source: ArmenPress)

The Zinuzh (Military Power) program of the Public Television has prepared a special coverage of the test fire and will air it on December 1, 21:45 local time. The preview of the program is already available on the YouTube channel of the television program.

The OTR-21 Tochka is a Soviet-era tactical ballistic missile. Its GRAU designation is 9K79; its NATO reporting name is SS-21 Scarab. It uses an inertial guidance system. The OTR-21 was designed to be deployed along with other land combat units on the battlefield. While the 9K52 Luna-M is large and relatively inaccurate, the OTR-21 is much smaller. The missile itself can be used for precise strikes on enemy tactical targets, such as control posts, bridges, storage facilities, troop concentrations and airfields. The fragmentation warhead can be replaced with a nuclear, biological or chemical warhead. The solid propellant makes the missile easy to maintain and deploy. In the Soviet era, the OTR-21 units were usually managed in a brigade structure. There were 18 launchers in a brigade; each launcher wass provided with 2 or 3 missiles. The OTR-21 forward deployment to East Germany began in 1981, replacing the earlier Luna-M series of unguided artillery rockets.

The 9P129 transport vehicle is completely amphibious, with a maximum road speed of 60 km/h (37 mph) and 8 km/h (5.0 mph) in water. It is NBC-protected. The system has been in development since 1968. Three variants were developed, simply designated A, B and C.