Description

The development of SA-2, the original name Dvina, began in 1952-1953 and was administered by the Ministry of Aircraft Production (MAP), with the overall management carried out by the Lavochkin OKB (Special Design Office). The engine development is believed to have been undertaken by the Soviet rocket engine designer Alexei Isayev at Khimki. The missile was to be a great improvement over the SA-1 Guild in that it was to be more mobile, had an increased maximum altitude capable of reaching the newer generation of American bombers, and took advantage of then new developments in early warning radar. The first tests of the Dvina were made about 1954 near Lake Balkash, Central Asia. It was soon seen that the Dvina was far superior to the SA-1 Guild which was developed about the same time and quickly replaced it. Deployment was ready about 1957 and it first appeared in public in a parade in Red Square on November 7, 1957, towed by ZIL-157 trucks. It was then that the missile also received its NATO code name of SA-2. Full scale deployments of the missile began in Moscow, Baku, and Leningrad by 1958, and its first foreign deployment took place in East Germany, near Berlin, by the summer of 1959.The guidance system uses an automatic radio command of the missile to the target's line of sight. The SA-2 system consisted of the missile, a computer unit, a radar called the Fan Song which detected the target and transmitted the data to the missile then converted the signals into the right launch commands such as launch angle, and the power generator on the ZIL-157 truck.