FALKATUS

The ‘Falkatus’ made on the Kamaz 4911 competition special two-axle chassis is used as a Russian infantry fighting vehicle.

- Bhushan Mhapralkar

Better known as ‘Karatel’, the Russian infantry fighting vehicle ‘Falkatus’ was developed for the FSB CSN. Built on the Kamaz 4911 competition special chassis, the vehicle has been developed by Moscow-based ZAO ‘Fort Tekhnologiya’ for the Russian Defense Ministry. With few different pilot models of ‘Falkatus’ made on the Kamaz 4911 competition special two-axle chassis, the interesting part about the vehicle is how the experience and excellent results of the Dakar specials with which the members of the Kamaz Master Team have been declassifying the world competition in all the races in which they participate for more than a decade was leveraged. In fact, the slight difference between ‘Karatel’ and the ‘Falkatus’ is claimed to be a decade worth of development where the former was an early project on ZIL chassis and never built with armour whereas the later is armoured. Used by FSB for anti-terrorist operations, the full combat weight of ‘Falkatus’ is 12 tonnes.