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Russia said on Monday it had successfully tested a Tsirkon hypersonic cruise missile, a weapon President Vladimir Putin has touted as part of a new generation of missile systems without equal in the world.
[...] Russia's Defence Ministry said the Tsirkon missile was launched from the Admiral Groshkov frigate in the White Sea.
The Ministry said the missile flew at seven times the speed of sound and successfully hit a target more than 350 kilometres away on the coast of the Barents Sea.
[...] Mr Putin has said Tsirkon would be capable of flying at nine times the speed of sound and have a range of 1,000 kilometres.
[...] The Russian navy has conducted several previous test launches of the new missile, including one on Mr Putin's birthday in October, and officials said the tests were to be completed later this year.
Russia intends to arm its cruisers, frigates and submarines with the Tsirkon, one of several hypersonic missiles under development in Russia.
Previously:
Russia Successfully Tests New Hypersonic Tsirkon Missile.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by fakefuck39 on Wednesday July 21 2021, @01:14AM (9 children)
They tested a hypersonic missle! Almost ready to join the rest of the world in the 1990s - the year since when they have been repainting their 1970's tech and putting out amazing fake specs. Here in the year 2020, we've tested 6 of them, and 3 are ready for deployment.
Glad they're going to be joining this long list, at the end of it.
USA USA USA
MGM-140 ATACMS
MGM-52 Lance
China
WS-1
India
Shaurya
Prahar
Pakistan
Nasr/Hatf IX
Abdali
Hatf-I
Turkey
J-600T
>new generation of missile systems without equal in the world
and here he's correct. The current range of existing hypersonic missles is about 900km, while Russia claims it can go 1000km. Since Putin's rocket-propelled bathtub can reach about two extra suburbs further, there is in fact no other equal to it. Of course, since the test was 350km away, I take that 1000km with a meter-long trail of salt. Which is much longer than our yard-long trail of salt, and hence has no equal in saltiness.
(Score: 4, Funny) by c0lo on Wednesday July 21 2021, @01:20AM (1 child)
Check the speed of the others that you enumerated, it looks like they ruskies can claim to shave some millisecond from the pizza delivery too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Interesting) by fakefuck39 on Wednesday July 21 2021, @01:44AM
This flew at mach 7. All hypersonic missles are above mach5. The american AGM-183A goes to 1000miles (1600km) at mach 6.5, and less than 1000miles at mach 8. Note how Russia announced their range and speed separately - pick one. The latest one we're developing flies at mach 15 - mach 20, double the Russian missle's speed.
Given that the Russian missile has neither flown at their announced mach 9, nor flown their announced 1000km, they are literally making a weapon from 20 years ago and saying it has no equal. Classic Russia, with their painted empty tubes, marching down the kremlin ww2 parade. Which I attended as a small kid, since my grandmother was i the kgb. Russian tech is old rusty crap painted new, and a lot of talk. Heck, they even have to pay the French build their aircraft carriers.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 21 2021, @02:01AM (1 child)
Most of these are land-based artillery-style rockets rather than anti-ship or ship-launched cruise missiles. Not apples to apples.
The Chinese have an operational hypersonic missile, the WU-14, which is kind of halfway between an ICBM and a cruise missile. The US probably doesn't feel that it needs this type of weapon since it has SSGN submarines for the similar mission.
AFAIK there's not any unclassified, operational, American hypersonic weapon, except ICBMs. The closest American counterpart is the LRHW missile, which will be used by both the Army and Navy, which has been tested but is not expected to be operational for a few more years. There's also the AGM-183, which will be launched by Air Force bombers. It's not quite ready yet either. Of course this Russian test isn't ahead of where the Americans are, but it's comparable.
The thing is that any new type of weapon has the chance of making existing strategies obsolete, and the US has a lot more investment in aircraft carriers that are potentially vulnerable to these missiles. So even if Russia isn't ahead on this particular weapons tech, it's still a possible shift in naval power... unless effective countermeasures are developed, of course. Existing anti-missile defenses aren't quite good enough, but no rule says they can't be upgraded. And lasers and railguns are faster than any missile, assuming they ever get working.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 21 2021, @02:10AM
You can always overcome being slower by firing sooner. That why we need to fire preemptively in case they fire their slower weapons before us.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday July 21 2021, @06:23AM (3 children)
Ah, I see yer problem, the units were converted from oblique sazhens to berkovets and so a conversion error of about three crept in.
BTW did you know the metric system was actually invented by a little-known Russian genius Ivan Gopnik fifty years before everyone else knew about it? Russians invented a lot of stuff before everyone else, but no-one knows about it.
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Wednesday July 21 2021, @06:40AM (2 children)
While you're joking, maybe you'll actually want to learn something. Ваня Гопник would not have an actual last name like that. Ivan is the long version of Vanya, and a male last name, would be Gopnikov. Vanya can also be a woman's first name, and the last name would be Gopnikova. In neither case would the last name be Gopnik, because that would be grammatically incorrect. And it's a real last name. Here's someone with the first and last name you note.
https://twitter.com/gopnikov_ivan [twitter.com]
The difference is, the accent is on the "i", while the noun gopnik would have the accent on the "o." So while you think this is a clever joke, it only works if you completely bastardize the language. In addition, in the noun gopnik, the "o" is pronounced "o," while in the name Gopnikov, the o is pronounced "aa." So to anyone who actually knows the language, it just sounds retarded. Mostly because the two words sound nothing alike.
Here, let me make an English joke like yours and you tell me if it's funny:
Mike wanted to lead an expedition to the amazon. He could never do it, because lead was too heavy for him to lift.
Now let's have an actual funny joke with names, and on topic. You do need to speak French to get it though.
Gabriel Mouton invented the metric system. The rest of the world followed, except the US, because we're not a bunch of sheep.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday July 21 2021, @06:53AM (1 child)
Yeah, my Russian is pretty erratic, it was actually a reference to the DJ Blyatman song [youtube.com]. And the Mike joke is funny, it's a classic antijoke, like "What has six legs and goes out? John and his table".
Thanks for the tutorial :-).
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Wednesday July 21 2021, @07:15AM
You no vat Morty, the Mike joke is funny now that it's had thyme to marinate. In the Marina marinade. Marina Gopnikova. Like the cucumber she turned into a pickle when she couldn't find her a Gopnikov. Because gopniks aren't very clean people, so Marina don't wash the marina. That nappy dugout gets so nasty she grows marinated mushrooms - a classic Russian dish.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ptcp_xtQhbs [youtube.com]
I wonder if English-speaking Russians would get mike joke.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDFBTdToRmw [youtube.com]
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday July 21 2021, @01:00PM
Everyone lies about their missile specs. Just saying.
Also remember its just like air to air combat missiles, there's theoretical max range at a ballistic launch 45 degrees at a fixed target with a tail wind which means very little operationally, then there's the range it could hit something un maneuverable like a bomber or troop carrier or maybe a docked ship, then a much shorter range to hit something fast and maneuverable. Its not like there's a 900km spool of wire feeding out the back and at 900.0001 km it goes boom.
So "we can easily hit an oil tanker by 900km" means something but it doesn't mean a carrier is unconditionally safe at 901 km or an aegis missile cruiser is dead at 899 km.