Tu-95MS Bear

Russia’s swept-wing intercontinental turboprop bomber — a 1950s-design platform that survived the Cold War to become the primary launch-vehicle for Kh-101/Kh-102 cruise missiles, and now an irreplaceable asset eroded by Ukrainian long-range strikes.

Overview

The Tupolev Tu-95MS (NATO reporting name Bear-H) is the only turboprop-powered strategic bomber ever produced in large numbers and the sole remaining turboprop combat aircraft in operational service. Its four Kuznetsov NK-12 engines — still the most powerful turboprops fielded — drive contra-rotating propellers that give the aircraft intercontinental range, a cruise speed of about 710 km/h and a maximum speed of 925 km/h. Designed to carry the Soviet Union’s first nuclear-tipped cruise missiles, the Tu-95MS today is the workhorse of Russia’s long-range aviation command, standing off from deep within Russian territory to release Kh-101 conventional and Kh-102 nuclear cruise missiles against targets in Ukraine and, earlier, in Syria.

Development

Andrei Tupolev’s bureau created the Tu-95 as the USSR’s answer to the American B-52, and the prototype first flew on 12 November 1952 before the type entered Soviet Long-Range Aviation service in 1956.Wikipedia Production of all variants ran from 1952 to 1993, yielding more than 500 airframes; the specific Tu-95MS (Bear-H) models that form today’s combat fleet were built in the 1980s as Kh-55 cruise-missile carriers and continued off the line until the early 1990s. A modernisation programme — Tu-95MSM — began trials at Taganrog in 2020, adding the Novella-NV1.021 phased-array radar, SOI-021 digital displays, a Meteor-NM2 defensive suite and uprated NK-12MPM engines with AV-60T propellers, in an effort to keep the Bear viable until roughly 2040.The Aviationist

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