An active protection system (APS) is a vehicle-mounted defence that detects an incoming rocket, missile or anti-tank round and destroys or deflects it before it reaches the armour. A radar or other sensor picks up the threat, a computer works out whether it will actually hit the vehicle, and an effector — an explosive interceptor, a jammer or a cloud of smoke — acts within a fraction of a second. APS is fitted mainly to main battle tanks and some infantry fighting vehicles as an added layer on top of conventional armour, not a replacement for it. Systems are usually grouped as “hard-kill,” which physically destroys the incoming threat, or “soft-kill,” which jams, blinds or masks the vehicle instead.
Photo: A Leopard 2 tank fitted with the Israeli-made Trophy active protection system, inaugurated by Israel and Germany in October 2024. Credit: Israel Ministry of Defense, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
How Does an Active Protection System Work?
Most hard-kill systems run the same four-step sequence. Radar panels mounted around the turret or hull give 360-degree coverage and pick up an approaching rocket-propelled grenade, anti-tank guided missile or recoilless round. An onboard computer calculates the object’s trajectory and filters out anything that will miss or that is not a real threat, such as a bird or small-arms fire, so the system does not fire on every loud noise nearby. If a hit is predicted, the system launches a small explosive countermeasure that detonates near the incoming round, destroying it or knocking it off course well clear of the vehicle. Rafael’s Trophy, the most widely fielded hard-kill APS, follows this sequence and is credited by its manufacturer with a roughly 90 percent intercept rate, a vendor claim rather than independently audited data. Soft-kill systems such as France’s Galix work differently: rather than intercepting the round itself, they fire smoke or infrared-obscuring munitions, or jam the laser or radio link a guided missile needs to find its target, so the weapon loses its aim point instead of being physically destroyed.
Hard-Kill vs Soft-Kill Active Protection
| Type | How it responds | Example systems |
|---|---|---|
| Hard-kill | Launches an explosive interceptor that physically destroys or deflects the incoming round | Trophy (Israel), AKKOR (Türkiye), Iron Fist (Israel/US) |
| Soft-kill | Jams guidance links or obscures the vehicle with smoke, decoys or infrared countermeasures | Galix (France), Shtora-1 (Russia) |
| Combined | Integrates both hard-kill and soft-kill functions in one suite, often inside a broader electronic-warfare package | AKKOR (Türkiye) |
Advantages of Active Protection Systems
An APS defeats threats that passive armour alone cannot stop economically. Modern anti-tank guided missiles and top-attack munitions can defeat even heavy composite or reactive armour, and adding enough steel or ceramic to stop them outright would make a vehicle too heavy to move. Intercepting the threat before impact also protects the crew from blast and spall even when the warhead itself might have been survivable, and a single hard-kill system can in principle defeat a wide range of threats — rockets, missiles and some tank rounds — without the vehicle needing a dedicated countermeasure for each one.
Limitations of Active Protection Systems
Hard-kill interceptors detonate close to the vehicle, which puts dismounted infantry and other soldiers nearby at risk from fragmentation, a concern that slowed some armies’ adoption. Most fielded systems are also tuned against a known set of guided and unguided threats and can struggle against very fast kinetic-energy tank rounds or saturation attacks from several directions at once. Soft-kill methods lose effectiveness against missiles that do not rely on the radio or laser links they are built to jam, and both types add weight, power demand and cost to a vehicle that already carries armour, a main gun and a crew.
Why Active Protection Systems Matter
Combat footage from Ukraine, Gaza and earlier conflicts in Syria and Yemen has shown cheap, widely available anti-tank guided missiles and loitering munitions destroying or disabling armoured vehicles that were not fitted with an APS, pushing several armies to accelerate programmes they had tested for years without fielding. For militaries across Africa and the Middle East operating older Soviet-era or early-generation Western tanks, an active protection system — hard-kill or soft-kill — is now one of the more cost-effective ways to extend a tank’s survivability against the drones and anti-tank missiles that increasingly feature in regional conflicts, without replacing the vehicle itself.
Examples in Africa
Algeria’s T-90SA main battle tanks are reported to carry Russia’s Shtora-1 soft-kill system, which jams the laser rangefinders and semi-automatic guidance used by missiles such as the TOW and disperses a smoke screen when a laser designator is detected (status: reported — a 2016 trade report citing an unnamed Russian defence-industry source said Russia delivered and fitted a batch of Shtora-1 systems to Algerian T-90SAs, and no Algerian or Russian government statement has since confirmed the exact fit) Army Recognition. Algeria operates the largest T-90 fleet in Africa, a point DefenceMENA has covered in the context of its wider dependence on Russian armour; see DefenceMENA’s report on Algeria’s defence-supplier dependence and the Algeria tag desk.
Examples in the Middle East
The United Arab Emirates Armed Forces operate French-built Leclerc main battle tanks fitted with Lacroix’s Galix system, a manually triggered soft-kill package that fires smoke and infrared-obscuring munitions from launchers mounted on the turret (status: in service). At IDEX 2025, Lacroix said it was pitching the UAE an automated successor, S-KAPS, which adds an infrared sensor and optional acoustic and radio-frequency sensors to give the Leclercs a counter-drone capability alongside the existing anti-missile role (status: proposed upgrade, not yet contracted) Janes. See DefenceMENA’s analysis of the UAE’s defence industry and the UAE tag desk.
Turkish Example
ASELSAN’s AKKOR is a domestically developed hard-kill and soft-kill active protection suite that gives 360-degree coverage against rockets, shaped-charge rounds and guided anti-tank missiles, including top-attack munitions, using perimeter radars, laser-warning sensors and both explosive and smoke-based countermeasures. ASELSAN’s own 2024 annual report confirmed that the AKKOR 10 variant formally entered Turkish Armed Forces inventory on the ALTAY main battle tank, with integration work under way to fit modernised Leopard 2A4 tanks as well (status: in service on ALTAY, in progress on Leopard 2A4) Army Recognition. See DefenceMENA’s own profile of ASELSAN’s products and global presence and the Türkiye tag desk.
Commonly Confused Terms
An active protection system is sometimes confused with passive armour upgrades such as explosive reactive armour (ERA), which adds a layer that disrupts a shaped-charge jet on impact rather than intercepting a threat beforehand — APS acts before the round arrives, ERA only once it has already struck. It is also distinct from a vehicle’s electronic warfare suite in the broad sense, though soft-kill APS borrows jamming techniques from that field, and from a point-defence air defence or counter-UAS system, which protects a fixed site or wide airspace rather than a single vehicle, even though some newer APS packages are adding a counter-drone function of their own.
Definition: A vehicle-mounted system that detects an incoming rocket, missile or anti-armour round and destroys, deflects or decoys it before impact.
Category: Land Warfare
Typical platforms: Main battle tanks, some infantry fighting vehicles
Related terms: Electronic warfare, ECM, air defence, counter-UAS, explosive reactive armour
Frequently Asked Questions
What is an active protection system?
An active protection system (APS) is a vehicle-mounted defence that detects an incoming rocket, missile or anti-armour round and destroys, deflects or decoys it before it reaches the vehicle.
How does an active protection system work?
A radar or other sensor detects an incoming threat, a computer confirms it will hit the vehicle, and the system either launches an explosive interceptor (hard-kill) or fires smoke, decoys or a jamming signal (soft-kill) to stop or divert it.
What is the difference between hard-kill and soft-kill active protection?
Hard-kill systems physically destroy or deflect the incoming round with an explosive countermeasure. Soft-kill systems instead jam the weapon’s guidance or hide the vehicle behind smoke or infrared countermeasures, without striking the round itself.
Which tanks use active protection systems?
Israel’s Merkava, the US Abrams and Germany’s Leopard 2 (in Trophy-equipped export versions) use hard-kill systems, Türkiye’s ALTAY uses the domestically built AKKOR, and many Western and Russian-origin tanks, including France’s Leclerc and Russia’s T-90, carry soft-kill systems such as Galix or Shtora-1.
Can an active protection system stop every threat?
No. Most systems are tuned against known rocket and missile threats and can struggle against high-speed kinetic tank rounds or simultaneous attacks from several directions, and hard-kill interceptors carry some risk to nearby dismounted troops.
Sources
- U.S. Army — Army announces improved test results in lightweight active protection systems
- Shephard Media — IDEX 2017: Intelligent features for Galix (Lacroix)
- Janes — IDEX 2025: Lacroix says S-KAPS counter-UAV capability good for Emirati Leclercs
- Army Recognition — Türkiye adopts AKKOR 10 system for ALTAY and Leopard 2A4 tanks
- Army Recognition — Algerian T-90 tanks receive Shtora-1 jammer
- Defense News — Trophy vehicle defense system gets top-attack upgrade
- RUSI — Reconciling Active Protection Systems with the SDSR
Related in the DefenceMENA Glossary
See also electronic warfare, which supplies much of the jamming technology behind soft-kill protection, air defence and counter-UAS, the related disciplines that protect sites and airspace rather than a single vehicle. Browse the Defence Glossary hub for related terms as they are published.
Related DefenceMENA coverage: Algeria’s defence-supplier dependence, how independent the UAE’s defence industry really is and ASELSAN’s products and global presence, plus the Algeria, UAE and Türkiye tag desks.