9th Missile Defense Division
Division Overview: 9th Missile Defense Division (m/u 75555)
The 9th Missile Defense Division is the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) formation responsible for the operational employment of the Moscow-area anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system. Open sources place its headquarters in Sofrino, Moscow Oblast, and subordinate it to the 1st Air and Missile Defense Army (special-purpose). The division’s mission set comprises continuous radar surveillance, ballistic threat evaluation, command-and-control of intercept engagements, and sustainment of dedicated ABM launch complexes. Many public listings identify Major General Sergey Grabchuk as the division commander; official confirmation of incumbency is not routinely published and may change over time.
Central Command-and-Control Nodes
The division’s command architecture is reported to include the 900th Missile Defense System Command Post (military unit 20007), which functions as the centralized node for battle management of the A-135 system, and the 102nd Separate Missile Defense Center (military unit 48701), a dedicated center that supports operational planning, training, testing, and analytical functions. Specific internal configurations and authorities of these nodes are not publicly disclosed; however, their roles are consistently described as integrating sensor data, executing decision logic for engagements, and issuing control to interceptor launch complexes.
Primary Radar Infrastructure: Don-2N (482nd Separate Radio-Technical Unit, m/u 03523)
The Don-2N is the principal engagement radar for the Moscow ABM system and is associated in open sources with the 482nd Separate Radio-Technical Unit (military unit 03523). Located in Moscow Oblast near Sofrino, the Don-2N is a large fixed, four-faced phased-array radar housed in a truncated pyramidal structure, providing continuous 360-degree coverage for precision tracking and interceptor guidance. It is credited with high sensitivity and accuracy (demonstrated publicly during joint calibration experiments in the 1990s that involved tracking small calibration objects in low Earth orbit), and serves as the fire-control backbone of the system by generating target tracks and guidance commands for short-range interceptors.
Legacy/Supplementary Radar: Dunay-3U (572nd Separate Radio-Technical Unit, m/u 03863)
Open sources link the 572nd Separate Radio-Technical Unit (military unit 03863) to the Dunay-3U radar, a legacy long-range radar developed for earlier generations of the Moscow ABM system. The Dunay-3U’s original ballistic missile warning and tracking roles were largely superseded by the Don-2N and by national early-warning assets. Public reporting indicates that Dunay-3U has been used in a reduced or re-tasked capacity for space domain awareness and measurement functions; its current operational status for ABM missions is not officially detailed and should be considered limited or auxiliary relative to Don-2N.
Interceptor Launch Complexes: A-135/53T6 Sites (m/u 51084, 51085, 51086, 51087, 51089)
The division employs five dedicated interceptor complexes that form the A-135 system’s launch ring around Moscow: the 49th (m/u 51084), 50th (m/u 51085), 16th (m/u 51086), 15th (m/u 51087), and 89th (m/u 51089) Missile Defense Complexes. These sites house silo-based, solid-fueled 53T6 endoatmospheric interceptors (often described in open literature as high-acceleration, very short time-to-target missiles). The 53T6 is widely reported to carry a nuclear warhead for terminal defense against incoming reentry vehicles; detailed warhead specifications remain classified. Public sources commonly cite approximate performance characteristics (very high acceleration, engagement within tens of kilometers in altitude, and ranges on the order of several tens to low hundreds of kilometers), but official technical data are not released. Earlier long-range 51T6 exoatmospheric interceptors, originally part of the post-ABM Treaty structure, were withdrawn from service by the mid-2000s.
Missile Technical Support and Storage: 1876th Technical Base (m/u 02014)
The 1876th Technical Base (military unit 02014) is publicly identified as the storage and technical support site for 53T6 interceptors of the A-135 system. Its functions, as described in open sources, include receipt, storage, maintenance, and preparation of missile rounds for deployment to the launch complexes. Nuclear warhead custody in Russia is the responsibility of the 12th Main Directorate of the Ministry of Defense; detailed handling procedures and site-specific arrangements are not publicly disclosed. The duplicate references to the 1876th Technical Base in the source list appear to describe the same facility.
Communications and Data Transport: 34th Communications Regiment (m/u 12517)
The 34th Communications Regiment (military unit 12517) provides the secure, redundant communications backbone connecting the division headquarters, command posts, radar units, and interceptor complexes. Its responsibilities likely include operation of hardened terrestrial circuits and protected radio-relay links, time-synchronization support, and network management for real-time track and engagement data. Specific equipment suites, routing architectures, and contingency modes are not publicly detailed, but the regiment’s role is consistently characterized as enabling resilient command, control, and data dissemination under contested conditions.
Information Processing and Auxiliary Nodes: 164th Information Processing Point (m/u 52361)
The 164th Information Processing Point (military unit 52361) is identified in open sources as a data processing unit associated with the division’s sensor and command networks. It has been reported that this unit was reformed from the 27th Separate Radio-Technical Unit after a fire destroyed that unit’s command post; this claim has been circulated in secondary reporting but is not corroborated by official releases. Absent authoritative documentation, only the general characterization is reliable: it is an information-processing node intended to ingest, filter, and distribute sensor and status data to command elements.
Mission, Coverage, and Engagement Concept
The division’s mission is point and area defense of the Moscow region against limited ballistic missile attacks. The engagement concept uses national early-warning assets for initial detection and cueing, with the Don-2N providing precision tracking and engagement control in the terminal phase. Interceptor launches are ordered by the central command post following automated and human-in-the-loop decision protocols, with guidance updates provided throughout the interceptor flight. The five launch complexes distribute coverage azimuthally around Moscow to create an overlapping defended footprint. Specific defended area dimensions, interceptor inventories at each complex, and alert postures are not published.
Legal and Treaty Context
The 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty limited each party to a single ABM site with up to 100 interceptors; the USSR chose to defend Moscow, initially with the A-35 system and later with the A-135. The A-135 was declared operational in the 1990s (generally cited as 1995). The United States withdrew from the ABM Treaty in 2002, after which the treaty’s numerical limits no longer applied. Russia has continued to maintain and modernize the Moscow ABM system under national policy; current force levels and detailed modernization schedules are not publicly disclosed.
Modernization and Testing Activities
Russian Ministry of Defense announcements have reported multiple test launches of a modernized interceptor associated with the A-135 system from the Sary-Shagan test range in Kazakhstan during 2017–2022; open sources commonly refer to this missile as the 53T6M. In parallel, Russia has tested the Nudol system (often labeled A-235 in public discourse). On 15 November 2021, a Nudol test destroyed the defunct satellite Cosmos-1408 in low Earth orbit, an event acknowledged internationally; official Russian releases did not specify force assignment of Nudol to the Moscow ABM mission, and detailed programmatic linkages remain undisclosed. Taken together, these activities indicate ongoing modernization of the Moscow missile defense architecture.
Integration with National Early Warning and Space Domain Awareness
The division’s engagement process depends on cueing and confirmation from national missile early-warning sensors, including the ground-based radar network (e.g., the Voronezh family) and space-based early warning satellites under the EKS/Kupol program, the outputs of which are fused in national centers before being provided to the Moscow ABM command chain. The Don-2N and associated processing nodes refine these cues for terminal defense. Legacy sensors such as Dunay-3U have been described as contributing to space surveillance and calibration tasks. Exact dataflows and processing algorithms are not publicly detailed.
Geographic Disposition and Infrastructure Resilience
Publicly accessible imagery and reporting place the division’s headquarters and the Don-2N radar in the Sofrino area of Moscow Oblast, with the five interceptor complexes arranged in a ring around the capital to provide overlapping coverage sectors. The command posts and communications regiment enable hardened, redundant connectivity to sustain operations under stress. Physical hardening of radar and launch infrastructure is evident, consistent with the system’s role; however, the precise degree of protection, backup power arrangements, and damage-control measures are not disclosed in official sources.
Known Unknowns and Confidence Notes
The unit designations provided—9th Missile Defense Division (m/u 75555), 900th Command Post (m/u 20007), 102nd Separate Missile Defense Center (m/u 48701), 482nd SRTU/Don-2N (m/u 03523), 572nd SRTU/Dunay-3U (m/u 03863), 15th/16th/49th/50th/89th Missile Defense Complexes (m/u 51087/51086/51084/51085/51089), 34th Communications Regiment (m/u 12517), 1876th Technical Base (m/u 02014), and 164th Information Processing Point (m/u 52361)—align with recurrent open-source attributions. Specific locations, detailed manning, inventories, readiness levels, configuration of nuclear components, and internal command relationships are not officially published and remain classified; where such details appear in public reporting, they should be treated as unverified unless corroborated by authoritative sources.