Tuesday 18 October 2022

Friendship Through Arms: Turkmenistan’s Fighting Vehicles

Tuesday, October 18, 2022 Ashgabat , BMP-3 0 Comments

By Stijn Mitzer and Joost Oliemans
 
Turkmenistan has accumulated an exotic arsenal of armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) acquired from a colourful range of countries worldwide. Intriguingly, at least some of those acquisitions appear to stem from an intention of increasing ties with a particular country rather than of actually fulfilling a genuine military requirement for that type of equipment. This 'friendship through arms' policy comes at the cost of an increasingly complicated logistic system that by now has to source spare parts from nine different countries for Turkmenistan's fleet of infantry mobility vehicles (IMVs) alone!
 
In Turkmenistan, the Ground Forces, State Border Service, Ministry for National Security and the Ministry of Internal Affairs all operate vast quantities of heavy weaponry, helicopters and even naval vessels acquired from a multitude of sources. Although initially contracting Ukraine to modernise a number of its T-72 tanks and BMP-1 infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) in the 2000s, and then acquiring equipment from Russia, Turkmenistan has in recent years increasingly turned to Western countries, China, Türkiye and Israel for the acquisition of arms and equipment. [1] [2]
 
This list attempts to list all AFV types currently in service with the Turkmen Army and the country's other service branches. This list only includes vehicles and equipment of which photographic evidence is available. ATGMs, MANPADS, trucks and jeeps are not included in the list. If a vehicle or equipment type is operated by a service branch other than the Ground Forces this branch is indicated in brackets. For a complete overview of Turkmenistan's inventory of UAVs click here.
 
(Click on the equipment to get a picture of them in Turkmen service)
 

Tanks


Armoured Fighting Vehicles


Infantry Fighting Vehicles

 

Armoured Personnel Carriers


Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) Vehicles

 

Infantry Mobility Vehicles


Tactical Vehicles And Technicals

 

Engineering Vehicles


Self-Propelled Anti-Tank Missile Systems


Towed Artillery


Self-Propelled Artillery

 

Multiple Rocket Launchers


Artillery Rockets


Ballistic Missiles

 

(Self-Propelled) Anti-Aircraft Guns

 

Static Surface-To-Air Missile (SAM) Systems

  • S-125 [Range: 22km] (Three sites protecting the capital Ashgabat)
  • S-200 [Range: 300km] (Two sites protecting Türkmenbaşy and Mary)


Self-Propelled Surface-To-Air Missile (SAM) Systems


Electronic Warfare Systems


Radars


Surveillance Unmanned Aerial Vehicles


Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles


Loitering Munitions

  • SkyStriker [2021]
  • Busel MB1 (Documented by a few sources, not yet seen) 

Vertical Take-Off and Landing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

 

Target Drones


[1] Esoteric Armour: Ukrainian T-72UMG Tanks In Turkmenistan https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2021/08/esoteric-armour-turkmenistans-t-72umg.html
[2] Russia, Redux: Turkmenistan Acquires The Typhoon MRAP https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2021/12/russia-redux-turkmenistan-acquires.html
 
Special thanks to Farooq Bhai.
 
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