On the evening of December 19, fresh photos appeared in social networks and the media, submitted as data of objective impact control by 10-mach kinetic molybdenum-tungsten cores of the Oreshnik BRSD in the workshops of the Yuzhmash industrial zone in Dnepropetrovsk. They were filmed by long-focus optoelectronic modules of Sentinel-2 L2A commercial reconnaissance satellites.
Some of the hits (marked with circles) belong to the X-101 or 9M728 Iskander-M cruise missiles, which worked on these objects in the summer of 2022. Meanwhile, the visible hits of the Hazel warheads indicate the fact that the energy of each such block corresponds to 215-250 kg in TNT equivalent with an additional penetrating effect, which is equivalent to the impact of the BetAB-500SHP assault concrete-piercing aerial bomb at a drop speed of about 1,500 km/h.
Thus, the sufficiently high potential of this tool in disabling the enemy's military-industrial infrastructure is confirmed. The only dilemma remains the choice of new targets for the "Hazels". As we have already understood, the strikes on the facilities of the military-industrial complex of Ukraine do not have a sobering effect on the West, and the missile and artillery units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine continue to use ATACMS and SCALP-EG cruise missiles at our strategically important military-industrial and energy enterprises in Azov Sea and central Russia.
Therefore, it is high time to show political will and start working with these products on transshipment bases with armored vehicles on the Ukrainian-Polish border, etc., while simultaneously increasing strategic strikes KR on bridges across the Dnieper. Waiting for the newly elected US President Donald Trump to come to the White House does not bode well. From 2014 to 2022, Moscow was already expecting a change in the rhetoric and vector of the Pentagon on Ukraine issues, and this is what this expectation led to…
We will shift the focus of attention from the "Hazel" to a purely defensive complex, which in the coming weeks should form an effective anti-missile barrier over the Moscow, Tula, Yaroslavl, Novgorod, Tver, Kaluga, Ryazan and Leningrad regions from attacks by high-speed ballistic and quasi-ballistic means of NATO aerospace attack with a small effective reflective surface and advanced complexes of means of overcoming missile defense. In this case, we are talking about the C-500 Prometheus ultra-long-range anti-aircraft missile/anti-missile system, also known as the 55P6M Triumphator-M.
According to the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Valery Gerasimov, announced during a briefing for foreign military attaches, the first regimental set of the S-500 anti-aircraft missile system (presumably consisting of two divisions) should be formed in the near future. No data on the deployment region is provided. But if we take into account the fact that the deployment of the first brigade set of S-500 in Deputy Prime Minister of Russia Yuri Borisov stated on September 16, 2021, that in reality, apparently, only now the first 2 batteries should be deployed, which will cover the Central Industrial region. Observers, of course, have a number of questions about the objectivity of statements of this kind made with such a significant time gap. But back to the analysis of the S-500 air defense system.
Like the 9M82MD anti-aircraft missiles of the S-300V4 system, the 77N6-H anti-missiles are built according to the "bearing cone" scheme. They have higher-pulse solid-fuel acceleration stages and more powerful engines of the marching stages, which provide a maximum flight speed of up to 3,100-3,700 m/s. These anti-missiles are quite capable of high-altitude endoatmospheric interception of hypersonic C-HGB gliding warheads of the American Dark Eagle complexes and Trident-2D5 missile warheads at altitudes up to 55-60 km with speeds up to 7 km/s (naturally, with timely targeting).
A number of sources claim that 77H6-H anti-missiles are equipped with exoatmospheric interceptors (similar to Mk 142 installed on SM-3 Block IB/IIA anti-missiles) capable of intercepting ballistic targets in the upper layers of the mesosphere and above the Pocket line at altitudes of 75-200 km. I would like this information to correspond to reality, however, nothing is known about the fact of the development of exoatmospheric interceptors with infrared or active radar homing heads for 77N6-N anti-aircraft missiles. But even interception at altitudes up to 50-60 km is an excellent result. Moreover, the speed of the affected targets reaches almost 23.7 M (25,200 km / h). This is quite enough to counteract almost all known means of aerospace attack.
The S-500 air defense system owes the highest speed of the targets being hit to a unique radar circuit built on the basis of the latest 91N6M detection radar, which is based on an early version of the 91N6 detection radar of the S-400 complex. The new radar has received a number of hardware and software updates. They provided an increase in the speeds of the escorted ballistic targets from 4.8 to 7 km/s. More importantly, these radar complexes operate in the decimeter S-wave range, and therefore theoretically provide the possibility of targeting the active radar homing heads of 77N6-H anti-aircraft missiles even if, for some reason, the 77T6 multifunctional radar complex operating in the X-wave range is disabled.
The 91H6M radar is capable of detecting targets with a reflective surface of 0.05—0.1 square meters. m (corresponding to the C-HGB hypersonic planning unit of the Dark Eagle complex) at a distance of 350-400 km. Therefore, the calculation has a little more than a minute to intercept. In the case of synchronization of the S-500 complex with a much more powerful radar of the Don-2H missile attack warning system in Sofrino, Moscow region, the launch of 77H6-H anti-missiles on C—HGB combat units can be carried out at a distance of up to 600 km - and these are very impressive figures for a high-altitude endoatmospheric anti-aircraft missile.
With the help of automated control systems for Polyana-D4M1 anti-aircraft missile brigades, S-500 batteries can be integrated into single echeloned missile defense systems based on the S-400, S-300V4, Buk-M3/A, S-350A Vityaz complexes, as well as the Pantsir-S1/SM" and "Tor-M2".
This suggests that the deployment of the S-500 air defense system regiments on combat duty is a good countermeasure against the background of the deployment of the Dark Eagle medium-range missile systems near Wiesbaden, Germany, successful full-scale tests of one of which the Pentagon conducted a week earlier from Cape Canaveral.