Tu-4. Long range heavy bomber. Developed in the USSR in 1947 on the US B-29 bomber. First Russian nuclear carrier. 6200 km flight range with 558 km/h
The Tupolev Tu-4 (Russian: Туполев Ту-4; NATO reporting name: Bull) is a piston-engined Soviet strategic bomber that served the Soviet Air Force from the late 1940s to mid-1960s. It was an unlicensed, reverse-engineered copy of the American Boeing B-29 Superfortress.
Toward the end of World War II, the Soviet Union saw the need for a strategic bombing capability similar to that of the United States Army Air Forces. The Soviet VVS air arm had the locally designed Petlyakov Pe-8 four-engined “heavy” in service at the start of the war, but only 93 had been built by the end of the war and the type had become obsolete.
The U.S. regularly conducted bombing raids on Japan, from distant Pacific forward bases using B-29 Superfortresses. Joseph Stalin ordered the development of a comparable bomber.
