Russia's Kh-101 Raduga Missile Succeeded In Syria Failed In Invasion Of Ukraine, Though Able To Avoid Radar And Accuracy Is High Enough

JAKARTA - Military experts assess the Russian Air Force's long-range cruise missiles as unreliable, during the invasion campaign against Ukraine launched on February 24.

The weapons, believed to be the Raduga Kh-101 (RS-AS-23A Kodiak), failed at too high a rate when it came to hitting enemy targets in Ukraine, said Douglas Barrie, a senior researcher for military aerospace at the international Institute for Strategic. Studies think tank London.

Such a high failure rate could be due to a number of factors, including problems with launch capability or the weapon failing to detonate after hitting the target, he said.

Russian-made weapons carrying conventional warheads are designed to defeat air defense systems, by flying at low altitudes to evade radar systems.

The missile has a range of up to 2,800 kilometers. At launch it weighs between 2,300 and 2,400 kilograms and is fired without a booster, using the aircraft's momentum upon release to provide initial velocity.

Experts believe the accuracy is quite high, due to the navigation of the Glonass electronic satellite which is equivalent to GPS in Russian, as well as the guidance of the TV terminal used in deploying it.

However, US intelligence suggests it has not performed well for Russia in Ukraine.

Barrie said the intelligence report, presented at a US Department of Defense briefing, gave further weight to the widely held assessment that Russia's war against its neighbor was not going as planned.

"Russia's invasion of Ukraine appears to have been poorly planned and executed, with the expectation that the campaign will only last two to three days," he wrote in a blog on Friday.

"As it has progressed, or stalled, it has also exposed failures in some of Moscow's most capable air launch systems, deficiencies that the Russian military is seeking to address," he continued.

"The Kh-101 was successfully used during Russia's intervention in the Syrian civil war to strike enemy targets, it is now the main conventional armed long-range ground attack cruise missile in the air force inventory."

"However, it is being used in much greater numbers in the war Russia is currently waging in Ukraine, with a clear failure rate, if true, to be of significant concern to Moscow."

In a US Department of Defense briefing on March 21, the unnamed official discussed Russia's inventory of guided weapons.

"They (Russia) still have most of their stock available to them, but they have spent quite a lot, especially on sensitive cruise missiles, air-launched cruise missiles, and they have also suffered a number of insignificant ammunition failures," it wrote. they.

Officials did not provide evidence to support their assessment. Citing American intelligence, the three sources said the US estimated Russia's failure rate to vary from day to day, depending on the type of missile launched. Sometimes it can exceed 50 percent. Meanwhile, two of them said it was as high as 60 percent.

"Given that Ukraine appears to have a large number of ground-based air defense missile systems and air surveillance radars in operation, and in effective use," Barrie said.