Zmeevik New hypersonic AShBM

It will be designed to destroy large surface targets such as aircraft carriers.
MOSCOW, 12 July. /TASS/. Russia is developing a new "aircraft carrier killer" - a ballistic missile "Zmeevik" with hypersonic combat equipment in the interests of the Navy. This was reported to TASS by two sources close to the military department and the military-industrial complex.

"The Zmeevik ballistic missile with hypersonic combat equipment has been developed for quite a long time. It will be designed to destroy large surface targets, primarily aircraft carriers," one of them said.

Another source said that this missile could go into service with coastal missile units of the Navy. One of the interlocutors of the agency added that in terms of its characteristics, the Zmeevik resembles Chinese missiles of a similar class DF-21D and DF-26 with a flight range of up to 4 thousand km.

The Reutov NPO Mashinostroeniya (part of the Tactical Missiles Corporation) did not comment on this information to TASS.

This enterprise developed and manufactures Zircon hypersonic products (an anti-ship missile for surface ships and submarines), Avangard combat equipment for UR-100N UTTKh and Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missiles, Bastion coastal missile systems with supersonic missiles "Onyx" (export modification - "Yakhont").

In March, Anatoly Svintsov, deputy general director of NPO Mashinostroeniya, said that the enterprise also had a large backlog on the aviation version of the Zircon missile. According to him, "Zircon" was initially developed in both marine and aviation versions, and "the customer decided at the first stage to intensify work on the creation of a marine version of the rocket."

https://tass.ru/armiya-i-opk/15188365

Apparently russia is copying china by developing anti-ship ballistic missiles.
https://vpk.name/en/615464_the-source-reported-on-the-development-of-the-russian-federation-ballistic-missile-serpentine.html?new

They're probably be put into serbice after 15-20 years, making the russians over 30 years behind the chinese in this type of weapon. What happened? The geniuses here told me that anti-ship ballistic missiles are useless, and that russia already had them since the 70s.

The development will likely last 4 - 5 years max. Including testing.

Arrow wrote:

Hole wrote:The development will likely last 4 - 5 years max. Including testing.

Faster. Russia has already tested the RS-26 missile is ready. A lighter version of the HGV Avangard needs to be developed, which is also already underway. They are working on a smaller HGV for the RS-24. Another option may be a modified Cirkon that will be carried by the RS-26 as the third segment of the IRBM missile. The combination of the Cirkon hypersonic missile with the IRBM is an interesting option.

Testing will last a while, judging by other weapon systems put into service in the last decade. But the new missile will be "dual-use" = sea and land attack. The "Dark Eagle" looks rather mediocre compared to this one.

They're probably be put into serbice after 15-20 years, making the russians over 30 years behind the chinese in this type of weapon. What happened? The geniuses here told me that anti-ship ballistic missiles are useless, and that russia already had them since the 70s.

Don't remember anyone saying they were useless... that was all in your head.

The INF treaty and limits on IRBMs meant the Soviets had to stop work in that direction a long time ago, but their other systems make more sense for Russia anyway.

A 2.5 ton missile carried in ships and subs in standard UKSK launch tubes or on aircraft is more portable and useful than a silo launched or enormous truck launched IRBM.

You could not fit an IRBM on a Corvette if you want it to also carry anything else, but their corvettes could carry 8-16 Zircon like missiles if they want...

The Chinese ballistic missiles are like normal ballistic missiles and reach the ranges they do with normal standard rocket motors... nothing to get excited about and certainly nothing amazing... yet at the same time a good solution for China to defend itself from busy body countries like the US and Australia that sail to Chinese coasts and complain about the danger of China to the (their) world.

In comparison Zircon uses a scramjet motor which is efficient like a jet engine but powerful like a rocket motor... a turboprop engine is useless at speeds above the speed of sound, turbofans and turbo jets fail at about mach 2.8 for any period of time, a ramjet can go faster but not more than mach 5 or mach 6, whereas rocket motors and scramjet motors can go much faster... but because they scoop the air they use to burn their fuel as they move they don't need to carry as many chemicals and can be much much lighter and cheaper.

To put it into perspective an ICBM that weighs 100 tons... 86 tons of that will be fuel and oxidiser and 14 tons for structure and warheads and electronics and rocket motors.

Of the 86 tons of fuel and oxidiser 21.5 tons will be raw fuel, while 64.5 tons will be oxidiser that is carried to allow the fuel to burn even in space.

Replace those rocket motors (the rocket will have three stages with three sets of rocket motors with the main rockets the most powerful the get the whole rocket and all the stages airborne and moving, with the third stage rocket motors being much smaller because the other two stages have been dropped and most of the fuel burned) with a scramjet motor whose hollow empty core has solid rocket fuel to get the missile into the air and moving where the scramjet starts as a ramjet and accelerates and climbs to altitude and speed... the whole missile might be 25 tons but the point is that it wont need 21.5 tons of fuel to reach its target because much of that fuel was to lift the 100 tons oxidiser and the other rocket motors and missileetc... you might only need 10 tons of fuel and zero oxidiser... and the reduced weight will mean a less powerful rocket motor is needed to get the whole thing moving.

GarryB wrote:The Chinese ballistic missiles are like normal ballistic missiles and reach the ranges they do with normal standard rocket motors... nothing to get excited about and certainly nothing amazing... yet at the same time a good solution for China to defend itself from busy body countries like the US and Australia that sail to Chinese coasts and complain about the danger of China to the (their) world.

In comparison Zircon uses a scramjet motor which is efficient like a jet engine but powerful like a rocket motor... a turboprop engine is useless at speeds above the speed of sound,

Long before China developed their anti ship ballistic missile the U.S.S.R had developed the 4K 18 (R-27K) anti-ship ballistic missile. This, despite the fact that the U.S.S.R had the largest stockpile of cruise missiles, both long range and AShM.

TMA1 wrote:Limb that is the most ridiculous post I've seen in a long time. Ruskies had pioneered the development of FOBS which is essentially what these missiles will use. Thry arent even ballistic in any conventional sense as they will be moving in their flight path particularly at separation. This is just a quasi ballistic avangard with different homing methods.

You are reaching vann7 levels of posting.

Sorry, I forgot about the INF treaty. My words eere too harsh. However, users here were saying russia doesnt NEED them because they have kinzhal and zirkon, but now this news shows that the Russian naval command doesn't think so.

Nevertheless, having an antiship ballistic missile thats accurate enough requires an accurate dense satellite network to track carrier groups. Its unknown if the liana system is as dense as the defunct legenda or the current chinese satellite surveillance system.

Second, Im frustrated by the lack of integration of the avangard on even mobile ICBMs and SLBMs. Its claimed these missiles have too little throw weight to launch it. The Russians dont have a conventionally armed avangard either. This means that theres very little progress on the zmeevik concept. Who knows how long it will take to:
1.Develop and test an HGV small enough for an IRBM
2. Develop an HGV with the guidance system to target moving ships. Admittedly they can copy whatever the zirkon has, but in such high technology, every little modification takes at leasr
half a decade to iron out.

The nuclear triad of Russia is way ahead of the american one.

Don´t forget that Russia is paying the defence budget in Rubles, not Dollars. In reality this 60 - 70 Bill. $ are more like 300 - 400 Bill. in a western country.

The delays are the result of a strict (sometimes to strict) testing regime. If Russia puts a weapon system into service it works and can be used instantly.
Western weapons are put into service and years later the tank can actualy use his cannon or the plane can launch some missile. Shit, the F-35 can´t use his f...ing gun because
of problems with the software.

Long before China developed their anti ship ballistic missile the U.S.S.R had developed the 4K 18 (R-27K) anti-ship ballistic missile. This, despite the fact that the U.S.S.R had the largest stockpile of cruise missiles, both long range and AShM.

I know, and they might have used some scientists from Ukraine or Russia to help them develop their own weapons, but that is not to take away that they have created interesting and likely very effective weapons to counter US aggression in their region... without having to build dozens of aircraft carriers.

These ballistic weapons are interesting but is no substitute for real aircraft carriers which provide air support to surface ships operating away from land base support.

This suggests that China is planning to expand out to the rest of the world in terms of trade and their interests.

However, users here were saying russia doesnt NEED them because they have kinzhal and zirkon, but now this news shows that the Russian naval command doesn't think so.

They couldn't have them.

However now that the INF treaty is gone IRBM as well as IRCM (intermediate range cruise missiles) can be back on the table and for targets in the Middle East and Europe and Asia an IRCM or IRBM is smaller and lighter and cheaper than an ICBM or ICCM.

There are no limits on numbers for theatre based nuclear weapons like intermediate range weapons so START treaties don't apply, so they can build lots of IRBMs for use against Asian and European and Middle Eastern threats, and keep all their ICBMs for the US and Canada.

And it is clear that in amongst those IRBMs will be dedicated anti ship weapons too... likely in the 3-4 thousand km range. The conventional warheads designed to kill carriers will be rather large compared with nuclear warheads fitted in the standard missiles which makes them even more powerful.

Such small missiles (relatively speaking) should easily fit on standard train carriages making them very mobile and easy to shift from one part of the country to another at a moments notice... or to put on ships or carry in transport aircraft...

Nevertheless, having an antiship ballistic missile thats accurate enough requires an accurate dense satellite network to track carrier groups. Its unknown if the liana system is as dense as the defunct legenda or the current chinese satellite surveillance system.

Not true at all... carrier groups are enormous and don't move very fast compared with a hypersonic missile.

If you get a coordinate of a carrier that is 4,000km away from your missile launcher, and you have the direction it is sailing and the speed it is sailing at, you really don't need any other information even if two seconds later the captain of the carrier calls all stop and all reverse full speed.

If the carrier was sailing at speed... say 30Knts which is 30 nautical miles per hour it would take 5 minutes to stop and start moving backwards... a mach 10 IRBM would take the missile about 23 minutes to reach where the ship was going to be... the missile would be coming down from an altitude of 40-50km and from that altitude if you draw a circle around the place the ship was for the distance it could possibly travel at 30 Knots in 23 minutes you get a very small circle and an aircraft carrier is a very large piece of metal surrounded by lots of large bits of metal called cruisers and destroyers... coming down from altitude the large flat deck of a carrier is going to stand out starkly.

If the range is less than 4,000km or the speed is higher than mach 10... both of which is likely the job gets easier...

Second, Im frustrated by the lack of integration of the avangard on even mobile ICBMs and SLBMs. Its claimed these missiles have too little throw weight to launch it. The Russians dont have a conventionally armed avangard either. This means that theres very little progress on the zmeevik concept. Who knows how long it will take to:

I would think the best use for Avangard is to launch it on their biggest missile via the south pole... bypassing their radars and sensors... and attacking their radar and ABM systems from the south... once they are destroyed any missile will be effective at reaching its target.

1.Develop and test an HGV small enough for an IRBM
2. Develop an HGV with the guidance system to target moving ships. Admittedly they can copy whatever the zirkon has, but in such high technology, every little modification takes at leasr
half a decade to iron out.

What is the urgency to create something that would require an SSBN to carry?

Every new ship they are making and old ship they are upgrading will be able to carry Zircon which is smaller and lighter and cheaper and while it is also shorter ranged it can be carried in volumes to wipe out the entire western navy.

Developing a new system that could only be carried by an SSBN makes very little sense as they would be better used to destroy land targets.

As I mentioned, the speed of ships is so slow and the speed of missiles is so fast... an ICBM is much faster and would travel thousands of km in less than 20 minutes... and the distance a carrier could move is not a circle unless it could hit the brakes and turn 180 degrees and instantly accelerated to 30 knots going the other way... which is totally impossible.... an ICBM with a dozen warheads could allocate one or two warheads for a spot in middle of the ocean, and with three or four other ICBMs doing the same you could drop three or four nukes into the water near the carrier group.

Naval nukes you see in photos are normally tiny... one or two kilotons... and they are vastly more deadly than ground or air burst nukes because they super heat the salt water to thousands of degrees... a super heated steam that would boil a human like a chicken in seconds... and the warheads from ICBMs are 150-300Kts usually so they would be immense overkill most of the time.

Standard SLBMs could be used against carrier groups too.

It is incredible, but it causes delays and gaps at times and it is a pretty slow process of modernizing everything and putting into full production thr latest kit.

And there is no wisdom in spending money creating a capability they already have, but now the INF treaty is gone then IRBMs and IRCMs make sense so the work on hypersonic attack payloads starts to make more sense for tactical and theatre targets... cheaper than ICBM versions, and more usable.

GarryB wrote:I know, and they might have used some scientists from Ukraine or Russia to help them develop their own weapons, but that is not to take away that they have created interesting and likely very effective weapons to counter US aggression in their region... without having to build dozens of aircraft carriers.

Why design an anti ship ballistic missile like the R-27K when the USSR already had hundreds of cruise missiles?

So let me get this straight, the U.S navy is busy upgrading its ABM defense capabilities in intercepting ballistic missiles while getting ready to test and put the AN/SPY-6 in service(which is 100 times stronger in detecting stealth targets than their current ship radars) with SM-6 missiles which are pretty maneuverable. And the Russian navy is thinking about using such missiles that the U.S. Navy has been honing in defending from? Why not stick to subs using Zircons or scramjets?

They better have an explanation of how this missile bypasses modern air defenses in hitting its targets other than it flies fast.

The ballistic part will be used to bring the highly maneuverable hypersonic part up into the air. Like the UR-100 for the Avangard. From there the thing will move like Tsirkon. We don´t know the range yet but if will be longer then the ground-launched version of Tsirkon. Another layer of defence against ships and a good offensive weapon against ground targets in most of Europe.

New hypersonic weapons are coming up constantly in Russia. To think that there will be no lighter version of Avangard for Yars or a version for Bulawa after the UR-100 and Sarmat have been equipped with it is just stupid. The development of Avangard was started nearly 20 years ago. The russian MIC propably started the development of new versions after the concept of Avangard proofed itself, this means in the next 2 to 5 years new versions will appear. Most likely under different names.

A conventional version is unlikely, because your enemy will always think that you use the nuclear one and react accordingly.

Why design an anti ship ballistic missile like the R-27K when the USSR already had hundreds of cruise missiles?

The R-27 was an early SSBN, it was called SS-N-6 Serb by the west and was deployed on old obsolete Yankee I class SSBNs... obviously when first deployed they were not obsolete and a serious danger to the west by by the late 1970s they had been superseeded and were no longer very impressive because newer SLBMs with much greater range able to sit in Soviet waters could attack targets in the US with greater accuracy over much greater distances.

The R-27K was an idea to use existing missiles and their reduced flight range compared to other types in use as a dedicated anti carrier weapon... as an SLBM the launch platform would have to operate off the coast of the US either in the Pacific or Atlantic, or in the north sea or arctic ocean or northern atlantic to target Europe, but as an anti carrier weapon it could accompany Soviet surface ship groups and hunt US carrier groups... with a missile range of 4,000km to 6,000km it doens't need to get very close to the target to engage it.

It would be the equivalent of using the R-7... the first ICBM as an IRBM over shorter ranges like targets in Europe with a larger number of smaller warheads to hit multiple targets.

They stopped the programme in 1988 with the INF treaty because the missile is essentially an IRBM and if mounted on a truck or rail car would violate the INF treaty.

Basically it was an alternative use for a now obsolete strategic missile.

Sort of like taking retired TOPOL truck mounted missiles and redeploying them to target western carriers instead of scrapping them.

They couldn't do that either because of the INF treaty, but now they can do what they please.

Russia is spooked by aegis and aegis ashore I think.

Spooked is a strong word.

They saw the AEGIS ASHORE system as being a clear violation of the INF treaty... just as them making a land based UKSK system with 3,000km range Calibres and 5,000km range Calibre-Ms and of course 800km range Onyx and 1,500km range Zircon missiles would be a direct violation of the INF treaty too.

That is what I am thinking. Frankly I figured the Russians did not need this extra method. They already have poseidon and kinzhal and zircon and sarmat and others. So I am a little stumped on this too.

The ABM systems the US is building around the place can launch nuclear armed cruise missiles but as an ABM system are optimised to engage high flying ballistic missiles with predictable flight paths like standard ICBMs and SLBMs.

Russian counters to the US ABM system was warheads that don't fly predictable and therefore interceptable flight paths as well as nuclear power super long range low flying cruise missiles, and underwater nuclear powered equivalents of the thunderbird in the form of Poseidon... plus of course shorter ranged hypersonic manouvering weapons like Zircon and this new weapon would be something the ABM systems would struggle to intercept and could be used as a first strike system to take down American ABM bases before the main force of weapons are launched... along with the other systems the ABM cannot intercept like low flying thunderbird missiles and underwater posiedon weapons.

So let me get this straight, the U.S navy is busy upgrading its ABM defense capabilities in intercepting ballistic missiles while getting ready to test and put the AN/SPY-6 in service(which is 100 times stronger in detecting stealth targets than their current ship radars) with SM-6 missiles which are pretty maneuverable. And the Russian navy is thinking about using such missiles that the U.S. Navy has been honing in defending from? Why not stick to subs using Zircons or scramjets?

No, you are confusing two different things... the US is upgrading its ABM systems to intercept ballistic missiles, while the Russians are developing new hypersonic weapons to destroy US carrier groups... they will also have Zircons on subs and ships and they will also have thunderbird nuclear powered cruise missiles of near unlimited range that will fly very low everywhere and of course Poseidon weapons for anti carrier and strategic use against enemy ports.

These hypersonic weapons are in addition to other existing weapons and will likely be mostly shore based on trucks or mounted in SLBM missile tubes instead of SLBMs.

Their next gen attack sub might have 32 UKSK launchers and perhaps 4 to 6 SLBM missile tubes for anti ship and land attack hypersonic weapons.

Had missed this until now, pretty big news

Obviously an answer to Dark Eagle, a worthy successor to the Pioneer plus finally replicating the DF-26/21 role missing until now due to INF. Importantly and if the hints to its range are to be considered, USN will not be able to operate even in West Europe or their approaches, making their presence in the whole of Eurasia and Arctic non viable, as well as severely restricting their operations in Northern Atlantic (i.e. to restrict Northern Fleet subs to access the Atlantic Ocean), threatening US convoys etc etc. Quite powerful addition...

If the West wants to keep escalating, Russia will happily oblique, with the difference that they already have the S-300V4 and S-500 inside a fully functional IADS, with the S-550 in the making, should more kinematics become necessary, while US has no viable AD against Russian hypersonic weapons now or in the making

thegopnik wrote:So let me get this straight, the U.S navy is busy upgrading its ABM defense capabilities in intercepting ballistic missiles while getting ready to test and put the AN/SPY-6 in service(which is 100 times stronger in detecting stealth targets than their current ship radars) with SM-6 missiles which are pretty maneuverable. And the Russian navy is thinking about using such missiles that the U.S. Navy has been honing in defending from? Why not stick to subs using Zircons or scramjets?

They better have an explanation of how this missile bypasses modern air defenses in hitting its targets other than it flies fast.

But stealth fanbois claim that it makes flying objects invisible. Either detection systems can be used to detect stealth objects or they can't. Clearly physics tells us that
there is no such thing as true stealth. Any physical object is absorbing and emitting EM regardless of its composition. By definition it has to be made up of the elements
found in the periodic table.

Hypersonic solutions are really the only way to get attack advantage. Stealth is rubbish for attacking 3rd world countries without the detection and
response systems.

The US is claiming it is about to deploy hypersonic systems. Total BS. They have been pulling the same initial launch fail excuse for two years.
What is failing is the hypersonic stage and reflects the severe degradation of the scientific and engineering base in the US. Running some fluid
dynamics simulations on a computer does not give you the ability to design and build a hypersonic missile (or scramjet, ramjet, etc.).

Rocket designers have mistresses to feed too. Much harder to justify the payola on a circumcised RS-26, has to be a clean sheet.

kvs wrote:The US is claiming it is about to deploy hypersonic systems.   Total BS.   They have been pulling the same initial launch fail excuse for two years.
What is failing is the hypersonic stage and reflects the severe degradation of the scientific and engineering base in the US.    Running some fluid
dynamics simulations on a computer does not give you the ability to design and build a hypersonic missile (or scramjet, ramjet, etc.).    

As far as I know ARRW is a simple aeroballistic rocket propelled missile, a slow Kinzhal of sorts, not a scramjet design. Maybe I am wrong, but that is what I remember.

BTW this new missile is also very interesting as a way of threatening US basing in ME and Central Asia. Kinzhals are already available, but depending on the MiG-31K for carriage and launch, they are much more limited for really long range strike in terms of surprise effect and salvo size than a land based missile. Probably the average speed in the hypersonic stretch of the flight will be also substantially higher.