The escalation of war in Ukraine to a period of full scale hostilities in February 2022 quickly saw ballistic and cruise missile strike capabilities gain central importance to the war efforts of both Moscow and Kiev, with Russian Iskander-M missile systems gaining particular prominence for the wide range of roles in which they have been used.
From early 2024 the Russian Armed Forces have been able to launch ballistic missile strikes at significantly higher rates, primarily due to both the procurement of significant quantities of KN-23 ballistic systems from North Korea, and successes in expanding production of the Iskander-M’s 9K720 missiles domestically. Lacking sufficient Iskander-M missiles in the preceding 22 months of hostilities, however, the Russian Armed Forces were able to compensate by bringing recently retired Soviet OTR-21 Tochka-U ballistic missile systems back into service.
The Tochka system was previously deployed by the Soviet Armed Forces as a shorter ranged counterpart to the Scud and Oka missiles, with the retirement of the Scud due to its age, and the Oka due to pressure from the United States, leaving it as Russia’s only tactical ballistic missile class in service until the Iskander-M began to enter service in the 2006.