Tupolev Tu-95 Tu-95MS

The Tu-95MS descends not from the original Tu-95 but from the Tu-142 airframe, from which it differs in many details: it drops the maritime aircraft's 178 cm forward fuselage plug and keeps the shorter fin and horizontal, undrooped refuelling probe of the bomber versions. The nose resembles that of the Bear-C and Bear-G but carries a deeper, shorter radome, with cable ducts running back along both sides of the fuselage. The tail turret is a new design with a single twin-barrelled GSh-23L cannon in place of the pair of NR-23s of earlier models. After tests that began in September 1979, series production started in 1981, reopening the Bear line and reversing the decline of the fleet: it was the first newly built strike version since the 1960s and became the launch platform for the long-range Kh-55 cruise missile, carried on a rotary launcher in the weapons bay. The Tu-95MS6 carries six Kh-55, Kh-55SM or Kh-555 rounds on the internal drum; the Tu-95MS16 adds four underwing pylons for a maximum of sixteen. In 2003 the fleet was made compatible with the Kh-555, and from 2015 it has been upgraded for the Kh-101/102 — eight missiles under four double pylons on top of the six carried internally — starting with the Tu-95MS Saratov rolled out at Taganrog. The next step, the Tu-95MSM, brings the Novella-NV1.021 radar, the SOI-021 display system, the Meteor-NM2 defensive complex and NK-12MPM engines with AV-60T propellers, and first flew on 22 August 2020. The type saw combat for the first time on 17 November 2016, launching Kh-101 missiles over Syria.