The Russian defense industry is developing a new combat helicopter for use in Airborne Assault Troops, known as VDV.

Source in the domestic defense industry said in an interview with TASS agency published on Wednesday that Russia is developing a new combat helicopter for the Airborne Force’s helicopter-mobile units.

“In the interests of the Airborne Troops’s helicopter-borne units of the new type, work has been stepped up to upgrade the existing [helicopters] and develop a principally new helicopter – the airborne combat vehicle,” the source said, adding that the new chopper would “conceptually develop the Mi-24-Mi-35M helicopters.”

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The new helicopter will eventually become the mainstay of a whole family of rotorcraft for the Airborne Troops, the source specified.

These will be special, transport, command and control, reconnaissance and electronic warfare helicopters. Pursuant to the requirements set by the military, “all the helicopters should act in a single information and command contour of the Airborne Troops,” the source added.

Before a new combat helicopter is developed, operational helicopters should be modernized for the Airborne Troops: “the Mi-24 to the level of the Mi-35M, the family of Mi-8/17 helicopters to the level of the Mi-8AMTSh-VN (the Mi-8 version developed taking into account the Syrian experience was showcased for the first time at the Army-2017 forum), heavy Mi-26T transport helicopters to the level of the Mi-26T2V,” the source said.

TASS does not have an official confirmation of this information yet.