The plane contains a special nose cone with a laser targeting system.
[3][4][5][2][6] The Sokol Eshelon project started in 2003 and was first made public in the annual report of contractor Khimpromavtomatika in 2005.
Details also emerged due to a court case between Almaz-Antey and Beriev over payments to a subcontractor.
This contract is supervised by the Ministry of Defence's 27th Military Representative Office.
[4][2] In 2009 the plane was involved in a test to illuminate Japanese satellite AJISAI which was at an orbital height of 1,500 km.