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By having a gun on board, one can conduct military kinds of experiments. Exploring armoring approaches for spacecraft, warning systems for the personnel, orbital ballistic studies for the multi-body attacker-projectile-target systems. The actual presence of weaponry in space has an immediate impact on the design of certain classes of spacecrafts.

The Zvezda module of the Russian ISS sector is the direct descendant of Almaz (Salyut) space stations. The Almaz stations had the Nudelman-Rikhter gun onboard. Is an NR gun installed on Zvezda?

If yes, have any experiments been conducted with it?

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    $\begingroup$ I don't see how this is primarily opinion based. Either the module is attached or it isn't... $\endgroup$
    – user106
    Jul 17, 2013 at 18:26
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    $\begingroup$ Why do you think this question is off-topic? Would it be an off-topic if I asked about a fuel tank or a robotic arm? Which paragraph does this question violate? $\endgroup$
    – user54
    Jul 17, 2013 at 19:07
  • $\begingroup$ The issue is that it isnt about space exploration. If you went to a land exploration website (if there was one) and asked if a car had a specific engine it wouldnt be on topic just because land exploration used cars. Similarly, questions about parts of a station arent related to space exploration, just because it is in space $\endgroup$
    – user106
    Jul 17, 2013 at 19:36
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    $\begingroup$ There are military aspects of space exploration. Having a gun on board one can conduct a military kind of experiments. Exploring armoring approaches for the space crafts, warning systems for the personnel, orbital ballistic studies for the multi-body attacker-projectile-target systems. The actual presence of weaponry has an immediate impact on the design of certain classes of spacecrafts. I can add the above paragraph to the question if it is to help it being un-hold. $\endgroup$
    – user54
    Jul 17, 2013 at 20:54
  • $\begingroup$ i suggest taing it to chat or meta, im not sure if weaponry testing is classified as ontopic or even exploration, perhaps bring it to the communities attention to get a consensus $\endgroup$
    – user106
    Jul 17, 2013 at 21:37

2 Answers 2

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Almaz was the military version of the Salyut. At that time while military meant reconnaissance "only"; Salyut 2, 3 and 5 are referred to as Almaz. Some sources say that the Almaz editions were equipped with guns while the civil editions of Salyut were not.

It is safe to assume that with the ISS being a rather civil and international cooperation, its Russian segments were based on the civil edition of the Salyut.

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According to this source (in Russian), out of seven successful Salyut stations (amongst which were the three military Almaz stations) the modified NR-23 cannon was installed only on Salyut-3 (aka Almaz-2):

The only prototype of such an installation was mounted at the Almaz-2 station, also known as Salyut-3.

The above statement indirectly assumes that MIR Core Module and ISS Zvezda Module, being derivatives of Salyut/Almaz stations, did not have the gun mounted.

Also the gun was designed to be mounted rigidly to the Almaz-2 station (see this answer, which required to move/turn the entire station in order to aim the cannon, so it would be reasonable to assume that the need to change the whole ISS attitude for these experiments would cause "a bit" of inconvenience.

Aiming at a target was performed with the help of the sight and an automatic system. According to this webpage (in Russian), the optical aiming system looked like this: enter image description here

If there's no such a system installed in Zvezda, the odds are that the cannon is not installed either.

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