Weapons

Putin’s New Missiles Are Having Decidedly Mixed Success

We've heard plenty of bombastic claims about new Russian weaponry in the past few years. But U.S. intelligence believes that the development of new arms—many of them nuclear-capable—is experiencing decidedly mixed success.

According to MSNBC, the Avangard and Kinzhal hypersonic weapons could be operational by 2020, but the Buresvestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile won’t be ready for at least a decade. These weapons were announced in May 2018 as part of a package to modernize Russian tactical and strategic nuclear forces.

Avangard (seen above) is a so-called boost-glide hypersonic weapon system. Traditional ballistic missiles carry their nuclear warhead payloads into space, which then streak back down through the atmosphere onto their targets. Under the boost-glide concept, the missile stops short of delivering its payload into space, instead aiming the warhead into a depressed trajectory. The boost glide weapon then glides through the atmosphere on a relatively flat trajectory, avoiding U.S. missile defenses such as the Ground Based Interceptor.