GLOBAL DEFENSE's video: Soviet Union s Top-Secret Space Cannon the R-23M

Soviet Union's Top-Secret Space Cannon the R-23M A quarter-century after the Cold War came to a close, the only cannon that actually fired in space has finally come to light. Installed on the Almaz space station in the 1970s, the R-23M Kartech was derived from a powerful aircraft weapon, Aron Rikhter designed the original 23 millimeter cannon for the Tupolev Tu 22 Blinder supersonic bomber. That gun is relatively well known, but its space-based cousin has largely remained in obscurity. in a Russian television show, the world caught a grainy glimpse of the space gun. From the dawn of the Space Age, the prospect of American spacecraft approaching and inspecting Soviet military satellites which, according to the Kremlin’s propaganda, were not even supposed to exist terrified the secrecy-obsessed Soviet military. The fear of attack on spacecraft was real, with both sides of the Iron Curtain developing anti-satellite weapons. It seemed perfectly logical in the 1960s that the military and piloted spacecraft would need self-defense weapons. # Space Cannon War # russianarmy # ussr