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Ukraine - Milan

France provided Ukraine “a few dozen” Milan anti-tank guided missile (ATGM) used by infantry troops against tanks and armored vehicles. Taken from the stocks of the French army, the quantity seems, for the time being, to have remained modest – “a few tens”, between 28 February and 02 March 2022. France was not the only one to provide Milan missiles to Ukrainian soldiers. On February 28, 2022, Italy officially indicated that it had decided to deliver a modernized version of the Milan anti-tank guided missiles to Ukrainian armed forces. Paris also provided protective equipment, helmets and bulletproots vests.

MILAN (Missile d’Infanterie Léger Antichar,”milan” also being the French word for kite) is a Franco-German anti-tank guided missile. Design of the MILAN started in 1962; it was ready for trials in 1971, and was accepted for service in 1972. MILAN is a portable medium-range, anti-tank weapon manufactured by MBDA (previously Euromissile). The system entered service in 1972 and became a standard anti-tank weapon throughout NATO. Over 360,000 missiles and 10,000 launch units have been produced since 1972 and in service with the armed forces of more than 40 countries.

MILAN complex with guided anti-tank missiles for hitting ground targets. It consists of a launch tube-container with a rocket and a launcher (here there is a sight, an electronic unit, a control panel and power sources). It can be mounted on the ground or on light vehicles. The control system is semi-automatic with infrared missile tracking equipment. The installation is the second most popular among anti-tank missiles, after the TOW ATGM. Its missile flies at a speed of 200 m/s and can hit targets at a distance of 400 to 2000 m in a maximum of 24 seconds. Armor penetration — up to 1000 mm. This is enough to hit even the German Leopard-2, whose armor is about 850 mm.

By April 2022, the Ukraine Defense Forces were undergoing intensive training in mastering MILAN-2 anti-tank systems. The Milan anti-tank missile complex (Missile d'lnfanterie Leger Anti-Char - light anti-tank infantry missile) was adopted by the armies of France and Germany in 1972. Despite its respectable age, this anti-tank missile system is still considered one of the best second-generation Western man-portable missile systems for wire guidance. By the way, at one time it was the only type of portable infantry weapon capable of destroying Leopard-2 and Abrams tanks. The resistance of the frontal armor fragments of the Leopard-2 tank is equivalent to standard homogeneous armor of about 850 mm. While the armor penetration of the Milan-2 missileis at least 1000 mm (the first modification of the missile could hit tanks with armor about 800 mm thick). This is more than enough to reliably defeat both the main units and the crew inside the tank.

Therefore, it is not surprising that the Milan-2 ATGM has been in service with the ground armies of more than 40 countries since 1984. In particular, Australia, Belgium, Greece, Portugal, Singapore, Turkey, Uruguay, Croatia, Estonia. In addition, in the armies of France, Great Britain, India, Australia, Mexico and Germany, it is used in portable and self-propelled versions in infantry and armored troops.