Skyguard/Aspide Air Defense System

Skyguard/Aspide Air Defense System

Type: air_defense

Domain: land

Country of Origin: Germany

Manufacturer: Rheinmetall

First Deployed: 1985

Overview

Pakistan operates the SPADA 2000 (Selenia Point And area Defense Alerting), an Italian medium-range SAM system developed by MBDA/Alenia Marconi. It uses the Aspide 2000 semi-active radar homing missile with a 25 km engagement range against aircraft and cruise missiles. The system is fully mobile with engagement radar, command post, and launcher vehicles on wheeled trucks. Pakistan procured SPADA 2000 in 2009 to fill a mid-tier air defence gap between short-range systems (RBS-70, FM-90) and the long-range HQ-9/P. The system complements Crotale NG for area defence of military installations.

Technical Specifications

gun35mm Oerlikon twin cannons
typeCombined gun-missile short/medium-range air defense
missileAspide (semi-active radar homing, ~25 km range)
engagementSimultaneous gun and missile engagement

Operators

Related land Weapon Systems