Sokol Eshelon

Sokol-Eshelon (Russian: Сокол-Эшелон, lit. 'Falcon-Echelon') is a Soviet/Russian laser weapon–based anti-satellite system. It is an airborne laser based on a Beriev A-60 aircraft. In 2012 it was reported that the project is back under development and is intended for the Russian Aerospace Defence Forces and later the Russian Aerospace Forces once completed.

Sokol-Eshelon
Type	Laser weapon
Place of origin	Soviet Union/Russia
Production history
Designer	Almaz-Antey/Beriev/Khimpromavtomatika[1][2]
Specifications
Effective firing range	1,500 kilometres (930 mi)+ [3]

A-60

Main article: Beriev A-60

The Beriev A-60 aircraft is a laser research plane produced by Beriev based on their Il-76 transport. Development seems to have started in 1981 with the laser installed in 1983. A second plane was built in 1991. The plane contains a special nose cone with a laser targeting system.^{[3][4][5][2][6]}

Sokol-Eshelon

The Sokol Eshelon project started in 2003 and was first made public in the annual report of contractor Khimpromavtomatika in 2005. Other mentions include Almaz-Antey's annual report in 2006 and in a report by Radiofizika in 2009 where they mentioned their development of radar for the plane. Details also emerged due to a court case between Almaz-Antey and Beriev over payments to a subcontractor. The contract between the two parties was connected to a contract no. 5933 Almaz-Antey holds with military unit 21055. This contract is supervised by the Ministry of Defence's 27th Military Representative Office. The project seems to be known under the codename Duelyant (Russian: Дуэлянт, lit. 'Duelist').^[4][2]

In 2009 the plane was involved in a test to illuminate Japanese satellite AJISAI which was at an orbital height of 1,500 km. The test involved seeing if a reflection of the laser off the satellite could be picked up, and was not intended to damage the satellite.^[3][7]

The laser has been given the codename 1LK222. The purpose of the laser is to blind the sensors of enemy satellites rather than destroy them.^[1][7][8]

See also

Related development:

• Beriev A-60
• Ilyushin Il-76

Comparable systems:

• Boeing NC-135
• Boeing YAL-1