Kinnear, James Soviet BRDM-1 & BRDM-2 Armoured Cars & Variants

A volume from the Europe @ War series. When the BRDM-1 armoured vehicle was put into service in 1959, it was a unique, specially developed reconnaissance vehicle with all-wheel drive. The BRDM-1 met the typical requirements for an armoured vehicle in terms of armament and armour appropriate for its intended use, but was a particularly versatile, technically advanced vehicle that was fully amphibious, propelled in water by a hydrojet propulsion system and equipped with track-driven auxiliary wheels to facilitate exiting rivers and traversing rough terrain. The BRDM-1 quickly became the standard reconnaissance vehicle of the Soviet Army, with the chassis also being used to mount a new generation of anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs), enabling the relatively light BRDM-1 to engage and destroy main battle tanks well beyond the typical range of tank guns. The development of these ATGM systems progressed so rapidly that the BRDM became the mounting platform for subsequent generations of anti-tank missile systems. The original BRDM-1 was eventually replaced by the reconfigured BRDM-2, which was equipped with a turret-mounted 14.5 mm KPVT machine gun and a rear engine. In addition to standard and special modifications for radiation and chemical reconnaissance, the BRDM-2 was also used as the base chassis for several ATGM anti-tank missile systems and an air defence missile vehicle. In addition to their use in the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, the BRDM-1 and BRDM-2 were exported extensively and used in combat by numerous foreign operators, with the BRDM-1 and later the BRDM-2 being among the most widely used armoured vehicles of the Soviet era. In the post-Soviet era, the BRDM-2 was modernised by several countries, including the Russian Federation, Belarus and Ukraine, extending the latter vehicle's service life to the present day, almost 70 years after the original BRDM entered service with the Soviet Army. This book was written and illustrated based on original Russian and Ukrainian sources.