South Front
The PS-70 radar. (Carl M Sjöstrand/the Swedish Armed Forces)
Sweden has supplied Kiev forces with a number of Saab Giraffe radars, several Ukrainian news sources revealed on April 20.
The Giraffe, designated by the Swedish military as PS-70, is a G/H-band short-range air defense radar with command and control capability.
It is still unclear how many radars of this type were supplied to Ukraine, or when exactly the transfer took place. Stockholm keeps most of its military aid to Kiev forces a secret.
The Giraffe employs a folding antenna mast that extends to a height of 13 meters when deployed and can be integrated with an Interrogated friend or foe identification capability. The base version has a range of 40 kilometers with an altitude of 10 kilometers.
The radar can provide target data to the Swedish-made RBS 70 man-portable air-defense system, which was spotted with Kiev forces for the first time earlier this year.
Despite its previous alleged neutral state, Sweden was among the first countries to supply weapons to Kiev forces after the beginning of the Russian special military operation in Ukraine last year. Stockholm provided hundreds of anti-aircraft and air-tank missiles, and is currently preparing to send howitzers, infantry fighting vehicles and main battle tanks.
In the last few months, Kiev made many calls to its allies to improve its air defenses which lost most of their original capabilities and are nearing depletion. The radars and air defense systems provided by Sweden will not likely change much due to their limited range.
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