chassis for other military applications. The
decision was accordingly taken in 1966 to have
development work on new amphibious military
vehicle designs transferred from Moscow to
Bryansk.
In the mid-1960s, the Special Design Bureau
(SKB) at BAZ began work on a new and top
secret wheeled missile transporter and launch
vehicle (SPU in Russian) for the next generation
of operational tactical rockets (OTR) to replace
the previous generation of such systems
known as ‘Mars’ and ‘Luna’ in the Soviet Union
and generically as free rocket over ground(
FROG) by the US and NATO.
The new OTR missile system, designed to
replace the final production Luna-M (NATO:
FROG-7) on the wheeled BAZ-135 chassis
would ultimately enter service as the 9K79‘Tochka’ (Point), with the 9P129 SPU vehicle
being based on the newly developed 6x6 BAZ-
5921 chassis built at BAZ.
In parallel with developments for the new OTR
tactical rocket, work was undertaken at BAZ on
a related chassis for mounting the new mobile
short-range air defence system designated
Osa. The related BAZ-5921/5923 and the
5937/5939 series vehicles were both developed
to production stage in the late 1960s, and both
served with the Soviet Army from the 1970s
until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991
and with the Russian and former Soviet statearmies thereafter. The systems both remain
in service today in former Soviet states and in
several other countries.
The new launch vehicle chassis for the
forthcoming Osa SAM system was originally
developed at the SKB in Bryansk under
the overall direction of R A Rozov, with
development before 1968 being directly under
the supervision of D V Petrovsky and thereafter
under the direction of I L Urin.
The first prototype 6x6 amphibious vehicle
chassis that would later be used for the new
Osa air defence system was completed in
1969, subsequent to which it underwent
plant and military trial evaluation. The
prototypes were designated BAZ-937 for the
Samokhodnaya Puskovaya Ustanovka (SPU)
or self-propelled launch unit, BAZ-938 for thetechnical support vehicle and BAZ-939 for the
TZM transport-reload vehicle.
The prototypes featured an all-welded
hermetically sealed hull with a centrally
mounted single cab for the driver, the vehicle
being powered by a diesel engine developing
300hp. During trials of the original prototypes,
the Soviet official plant numbering system for
military vehicles was changed to a four-digit
designator, with the prefix 5 added to the
vehicle designations, which were henceforth
known respectively as the BAZ-5937, BAZ-5938
and BAZ-5939.Tony had to replace the semi-unitary floors with new
ones from Champ Spares and has restored details
such as the wooden boarding in the rear and felt-
lined rifle holdersThe public debut of the modified 9A33BM3 Osa-AKM
was on Moscow’s Red Square in November 19829A33BM3 SPU vehicles for the Osa-AKM SAM
system on parade, Moscow, May 9, 1995A 9A33BM3 SPU vehicle for the Osa-AKM SAM system
awaits the Moscow VE Day parade on May 9, 1995The later “Osa-AK” version of the Osa SAM system
featured 9A33BM2 SPU vehicle with six 9M33M2
rockets located in transport/launch containers. The
later 9A33BM3 SPU vehicle for the further modified
Osa-AKM was externally identical‘The new self-
propelled launch
vehicle was a wheeled
6x6 configuration
that was capable of
crossing the same
terrain as tanks’
Two 9A33B Osa SAM system SPU vehicles on the BAZ-5937 chassis, accompanied by a 9T217 TZM reload
vehicle on the closely related BAZ-5939 chassisThe BAZ-59222 was an experimental amphibious cargo variant of the BAZ-5921 chassis used for the 9K79
“Tochka” tactical rocket and closely related to the BAZ-5937 chassis used for the Osa SAM systems