Serbian Armed Forces show "SLOBODA 2019"

The Serbian Armed Forces show "SLOBODA 2019" was held on October 19, 2019 at the "Colonel-Pilot Milenko Pavlovic" Airport in Batajnica, commemorating the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Belgrade in World War II.

"SLOBODA 2019" was attended by the President of the Republic of Serbia and the Supreme Commander of the Serbian Armed Forces, Aleksandar Vucic, the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medevedev, Serbian Member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Milorad Dodik, President of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, Maja Gojkovic, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia, Ana Brnabic, Minister of Defense of the Republic of Serbia Aleksandar Vulin, Ministers in the Government of the Republic of Serbia, Chief of General Staff of the Serbian Armed Forces, General Milan Mojsilovic, representatives of the Ministry of Defense and the Serbian Army, MOI, Security Intelligence Agency, management of Jugoimport-SDPR JP, representatives of the diplomatic and military corps, religious communities, many guests and citizens of the Republic of Serbia.

More than 2,400 members of the Serbian Armed Forces, 100 combat and non-combat vehicles and systems and about 25 aircraft participated in the show.

The first part of the program was dedicated to the demonstration of capabilities of the Serbian Armed Forces units in counter-terrorist operations, combat search and rescue as well as the air fire support to the Army units and protection of forces.

The demonstration at the Batajnica airport continued with a solemn defile of infantry, motorized and aviation echelons.

Spectators had the opportunity to see the performance of aviation echelon of the Air Force and Air Defense units. They could also see Mi-35 helicopters from the Russian Federation, then helicopters "H-145M", "Mi-8" and "M-17", as well as helicopters "Gazela" and "Gamma".

The infantry and aviation echelons were followed by the motorized echelon featuring vehicles and war equipment used by the units of the Serbian Armed Forces and equipment under the Project "1500+", which are developed and manufactured by the Serbian Defense Industry.
Among eight sub-echelons, BRDM-2MS, an armored reconnaissance vehicle equipped with modern thermal imaging and sighting devices and the fire control system which facilitates shooting from a moving vehicle, participated in the defile.

This was followed by sub-echelons of police combat vehicles "VPB M-86", a sub-echelon of special multipurpose motor vehicles "Hummer", sub-echelon of multipurpose 8x8 combat armored vehicles "Lazar-3", mixed sub-echelon of combat and off-road vehicles containing multipurpose armored vehicles 4x4 "Milosh" and the ATVs "Zastava".

As a part of a mixed sub-echelon of unmanned ground and aerial platforms, there were remotely controlled unmanned vehicle "Little Milos" (Mali Miloš), unmanned aerial vehicle "Sparrow" as well as combat, reconnaissance and jamming drones.

The next sub-echelon consisted of self-propelled 155mm NORA B52 M15 self-propelled howitzers, which are in use by the units of the Serbian Armed Forces and 155mm self-propelled artillery weapon "Alexander" (fully automated with a high level of autonomy), and there were universal mobile artillery computer station ("UPARS") and a modified man-portable surface-to-air missile system "Igla".

Within the demonstration of the sub-echelon of new and modernized rocket artillery systems, the viewers could see the BOV KIV artillery vehicle, modernized "Oganj digitalni", self-propelled multiple launcher "Šumadija", self-propelled multi-tube rocket system "Tamnava" intended for fire support of the Army units, PASARS system and "Giraffe" radar system.

The display at Batajnica airport was visited by more than 15,000 citizens.