Is a message, because today these bombers are being reconfigured into the full-blown anti-ship role and carry three Kh (X)-32 M=4.6 missiles and will carry (if not already) on their TU-22M3M version all nomenclature of modern anti-shipping missiles, including 3 Kinzhals and who knows how many Zircons. This means only one thing--patrols in the Mediterranean and "closing" all of this sea in case of NATO doing a stupid thing. Simple as that. Again, as Al Capone used to say: "one can get much further with a kind word and a gun than with a kind word alone." Why fix something that works? Exactly.
USSR/Russia were in business of over-the-horizon targeting and shooting for a long, very long time. Since 1960s, and most important Soviet anti-shipping missiles had combat ranges in hundreds of kilometers since then. Those who read my latest book know--I concentrate on this issue--how important it is to know coordinates of a target and the rate of their obsolescence for developing a firing solution (or a flight plan, if one wishes) for a salvo of missiles. For that, in 1970s USSR created MKRC Legenda, which, for some of its shortcomings did provide good recon and targeting on which a number over-the-horizon launches were executed with excellent precision. Here is how (specifically "degraded" for public release) radar picture of Legenda looked. In this case it is Gibraltar Strait.
You can see wakes of the vessels in the strait and, in case of required identification, ships of the size of aircraft carrier or cruiser could easily be identified and targeting data provided.
Yesterday, Vsglyad, uncharacteristically, provided a good write up by Alexander Shishkin (a ship-building engineer) about newest Russian system Liana and, in general, over-the-horizon targeting by latest Russian technology independent from space-based Liana. I suggest you acquaint yourself with this piece, which, for those who read my last book complements it extremely well in describing peculiarities of coverage and developing of firing solutions by different platform-centric means, ranging from radar to sonar.
I think, it is a good article which gives good insight into the issue of the over-the-horizon targeting which is crucial for modern naval (and not only) warfare and which is a part of the Real Revolution In Military Affairs. The ranges will only increase with time and they will completely redefine navies--this process is ongoing as I type this. Anyhow, enjoy.
One of our readers posted this interview of some Swedish Ph.D in something-something waxing technological about (Russian) weapon systems. And since this was posted, I think I owe some explanation of the abyss of technological incompetence and outright imbecility this Ph.D from Sweden exhibits.
I could last only about 8 minutes before I had to do this:
As you may have foreseen, any search on this Swedish military "luminary" produced an incredibly dry little about him, other than his working for some Swedish military-political "think-tank". And this:
Immediately few question arise from this short CV on this dude.
1. What his Ph.D thesis--he received his degree from King's College London--was about? After a brief review of King's College London courses related to warfare I discovered same ol' list of "study" courses which provide mostly zero educational value in actual warfare (and its history) and are remarkably along the same lines as courses in political pseudo-science, including same ol' "security studies" and other primarily "humanities"-driven courses which are specifically designed for people with zero STEM education and serious serious background in weapon systems and their tactics and operational dimension. Just to be completely clear on that--my degree reads like this: Navigator-engineer, a specialist in gyro-inertial navigational complexes of naval strategic missile systems. Based primarily around strategic missile submarines of pr. 667 B-BD (NATO: Delta I-II). This is not to mention the fact of receiving equivalent of B.S. in Military Sciences (a subject non-existent in the most Western world), not to mention the fact having second specialty as an officer of tactical command (platoon+) of naval infantry (marines). My graduate thesis was ASW based. Plus I graduated from some funny officer school, or, rather, school for officers. So, feel the "academic" difference.
2. As it turned out M.S.F.S. from Georgetown is nothing more than Master of Science (really?) in Foreign Service, which, of course, is yet another iteration of the political science, and teaches zero serious warfare-related skills. It is primarily designed for people with, you guessed it, mostly interest in generalities and not learning any practical skills as the record of whopping failures of the United States in the "international (or foreign) relations" demonstrates so profoundly.
So, as you can see, it is very difficult to find anything concrete on this type of "scholars" other than very general and short credentials rundown and that is about it. Ah yes, he also goes by the title of Military Generalist--I have no freaking idea what this is. You can download the publication by this dude and other Swedish "researches" here. It is a remarkable report written by people who can barely operate with basic mathematics and physics and are so butt-hurt that I, after suffering through this dude's commentaries on how Air Defense works, decided to address it. Feel free to listen to a delirium this "scholar" pushes as a fact on some British journo, he repeats merely the idiocy which is in his (and others) publication I mention above. It is a mental rape of warfare, physics, mathematics and, in the end, common sense which is totally EXPECTED from the field of so called Anglo (and lapdogs) military analysis saturated with people with zero understanding of modern warfare. Here is one such example:
The S-400 air defence system is often claimed to have a 400-km range, but FOI’s technical experts estimate that the effective range against maneuvering targets at low altitude is much less, even down to 20 km for smaller targets hugging the terrain.21 Russian specialists have estimated the effective range of the S-400 against old and un-stealthy Tomahawk cruise missiles to be 24–36 km in mixed terrain.22 At low altitudes, the masking effect of terrain, trees and buildings can cause a diagram of the effective range to resemble a Rorschach-blot rather than a neat circle. The S-400 system also has limitations when dealing with a large number of targets that appear within a short space of time, such as a swarm of cruise missiles.23
Let me do some autopsy on this steaming pile of ignorance:
Obviously while citing Roger McDermot's very understandably butt-hurt (I may add) "version" of the events mostly through approximation of what Mikhail Khodarenok or whoever else stated re: April 18, 2018 attacks in Syria, they forgot to mention that ANY air-defense complex has its tactical-technical parameters specified for the types of targets which are classified by, as a rule, their height (altitude), velocity, maneuvering parameters and RCS openly, and in EW environment secretly (that is classified). I will omit here the fact, that same Mikhail Khodarenok, while having an impressive air-defense and General Staff credentials, retired from service in 2000 and, as it is inevitable, had his Form 1A (I used to hold one too) clearance removed. S-400 became operational in 2007 and since then has been "improved" constantly. But, I know that they do not teach basic physics and radar technology, especially as it applies to military, in institutions which this Swedish "scholar" graduated from and let me explain why it is a problem,
1. I quote: The
S-400 air defence system is often claimed to have a 400-km range, but
FOI’s technical experts estimate that the effective range against
maneuvering targets at low altitude is much less, even down to 20 km for
smaller targets hugging the terrain.
If I deploy S-400 in 30 meters from the 100 meter high wall, S-400 range will be about...30 meters in the wall's "sector". But our Swedish friends need to be given a little lesson in the radar work. We will use the simplest physics without going into such parameters as RLP, which is radio-permeability of the environment, refraction and other physical phenomena which define the use of....read attentively, it will matter later in this post, INTEGRATED AIR-DEFENSE system. So, the terrain matters--everyone understand this, but what about this attack on Russia in Baltic region, which Swedish "scholar" dreams about. Well, consider the most primitive example:
Even the brief review of trees' height in Baltic Sea area reveals that the forest canopy of the region is somewhere around 35 meters.
There are many trees which are even higher, some forests in Finland (you see, if Sweden decides to attack Russia) reach even 45 meters in height, while some Polish trees can reach the height of 50 meters. That means that safe elevation of the salvo of NATO's (or Sweden's?) cruise missiles needs to be around 70 give and take some meters. Most likely more. We may assume the area to be mostly flat, which it generally is. So, we have a cruise altitude at around 70 meters while antenna of S-400 (pay attention, I take here now only ridiculous scenario of a salvo against single S-400 divizion), will most likely encounter this 76N6 thingy which reaches 127 ft. (42 meters) high and leads us to this:
2. See highlighted in yellow.
So, what's the deal with those "smaller targets hugging terrain" and less than 20 kilometers? Even when one considers horizon "interference adjustment" for SOME forests along the path. Of course, I omit here other factors, such as multilayered and easily reconfigured (by maneuver on wheels) fully integrated AD network which includes S1, Tor-M2 and Buk-M3 (S-350 Vityaz is coming soon too) and integrated with external targeting means such as over-the-horizon radar, AWACS such as A-50 and 100 and space-based assets, which allow same S-400 attack even low flying targets at the ranges well beyond the horizon by means of active radar homing missiles such as 9M96 which are specifically designed to kill small, high speed, maneuvering targets. NATO doesn't have high speed, maneuvering land-attack missiles. None exist--all of them are subsonic easily defeated missiles, yes, including Sweden's own (in cooperation with Germany) KEPD 350.
3. Obviously our Swedish friends missed this news too:
They could have at least bothered themselves with reading good ol' Soviet AD Combat Manuals. But it seems, these "analysts" are not well acquainted with the basics of AD tactics and combat schemes of deployment which seriously consider.
a) The terrain--limitations, as well as advantages. Elevations matter and increase autonomous (stand alone) detection range;
b) Expected threats and probable threat directions (sectors): cruise missiles, aircraft, ground threats;
c) Meteorological and electric state of the environment factors.
d) Maximization of coverage (overlap) of ground, air and space based means for proper detection, tracking and development of firing solutions with proper target designation between deployed AD means. As an example A-50U (not to speak of A-100) have a superb range (hundreds of kilometers) and clutter filtering specifically against low flying targets and are capable of providing targeting to all AD complexes such as S-300 or S-400.
And then, if you survive listening through the gibberish this "analyst" delivers to British journo, his pearl about Russian anti-shipping missiles is simply one of those WTF moments.
4. So, the dude obviously is so illiterate that he doesn't even know that since late 1970s-early 1980s Soviet (now Russian) targeting radar on ships had and still have (including for shore based complexes such as Bastion or Bal) OVER-THE-HORIZON channels which were realized in such systems as Mineral ME Radar, which can detect and develop firing solution over-the-horizon, way way over the horizon. That allows the use of Russian (and Chinese, I am sure Iranian too) anti-shipping missiles at the maximum range, including receiving of targeting data, which is either ephemerids (Lambda, Phi--Longitude, Altitude) or Azimuth (Bearing)--Range, plus maneuvering elements of targets from external sources (course, speed), such as Satellites (Liana), other ships, aircraft or what have you. He obviously never heard of refined final search (dorazvedka) by missiles with active heads. How the ellipses (2D for surface) and 3D for aerial targets are reduced and uncertainties are resolved--I think this is beyond the scope of this post and requires a very long and very mathematical elaborations. I will just add that it has everything to do with the weight of observations, which brings us to another pearl:
5. I quote: At
low altitudes, the masking effect of terrain, trees and buildings can
cause a diagram of the effective range to resemble a Rorschach-blot
rather than a neat circle.
Is this clown for real? He obviously never heard about resolution of uncertainties and data fusion within network which constantly exchanges and signal processes observation data from every RELEVANT node in it and those nodes are not just a single radar from S-400 but a complex of active radar, optronic, passive inputs from several, sometimes very many, sources. In the United States it has a designated term of CEC (Cooperative Engagement Capability)--an ability to collect, process and represent real time tactical and operational information as a combined PICTURE from multiple sources. This is how Ph.D in physics and long time generally respected naval analyst Norman Friedman defines it: Picture-Centric Warfare.
Mineral
So, in this case I have to ask (rhetorically) myself--if these "analysts" and "military generalist" consult Swedish MoD it is not surprising then that Swedish Navy constantly hunts Russian subs in Baltic and seems never to detect one, while being in the state of constant hysteria. It is not surprising then, that all these "analytical" materials all as one lack any serious numbers or at least competent elaborations on tactical and operational effects, because people who write them, with some very few exceptions, do not operate within a framework in which real military professionals operate. It is downright embarrassing to see a person who goes under the title of military "analyst" spreading a teenage fanboy BS as an "assessment" while having no grasp of basic physical principles realized in modern weapon systems--of course not, one must have serious background in it. So what gives then?
The answer is simple--Sweden is a radically Russophobic nation, to a hysterical pitch Russophobia. Partially it can be explained by Russia winning the Great Northern War thus removing Sweden from the position of Northern (not just Scandinavian) European superpowerdom. Part of it is a memory of embarrassing primarily for the USSR but also for Swedish Navy flop with Swedish Komsomolets in 1981 which fueled flames of Swedish anti-Russian paranoia. Part of it is Sweden turning into cuckold nation long ago and becoming the rape capital of Europe and fighting hard to become #1 in the world, while sticking to the suicidal and humiliating policies domestically. While Swedish women are being raped, sorry, culturally enriched, by hordes of "refugees" Swedes are being intimidated by their "free" media with those crude, Slavic subhumans to the East who are sleeping and dreaming about conquering free Sweden and finally stealing those tremendously important and coveted secrets of Ikea. They cannot conceive that Russians just do not give a damn about Sweden, or about Europe in general anymore and that Russia is long ago is in full defensive posture. In fact, Sweden must face the fact that the times of ABBA are over, and that while Volvo is a good car, Gripen still flies with licensed to Volvo US GE F404 engine. Sweden, of course, leads the world in discovering new genders. So, this, I believe, projected against the background of a general Western intellectual collapse what drives such "researchers" and "scholars" to go out and self-medicate with utter BS designed for consumption of a public which increasingly finds itself already in or ignores rigid shackles of totalitarianism and the death of the free thought and meritocracy in the West. And who can best serve as an exhibit A of this Orwellian reality--Sweden immediately comes to mind. And here you are.
I stumbled on that through Yahoo News yesterday. As you may know I do not read The National Interest--it is a tabloid dumpster for fanboys and its military sections are 99% a masturbation to shiny military toys by people who have no clue. The OTHER 1%, however, is represented by such people of scale as Colonels Daniel Davies, Douglas Macgregor or Professor James Holmes. So, I saw James Holmes' name at Yahoo and I went for it. Holmes opened with a broadside:
I never, obviously, served in US Navy and I know of its internal kitchen from open sources only, such as memoirs and other texts. But I always remember Elmo Zumwalt quoting Rickover that:"The United States Navy got used to traveling first class."(c) In Rick's words "first class" meant large and very large surface combatants and nuclear propulsion. That's the institutional culture--US Navy likes only nuclear-driven subs. And it kinda makes sense once one considers the fact that the United States is an imperial power and she likes to sail anywhere, everywhere to "project" herself. Nuclear powered subs are perfectly suited for this strategic and operational posture since they provide for long-duration, thus translating into very long distances, clandestine operations against enemies, which all, as we know, dream of denying America her freedoms. Yet, James Holmes calls for SSKs. Hm. Holmes speaks in the broadside yet again and pronounces this "M" word, which many in the US are reluctant to say when speaking about actual war (Holmes wants to fight both China and Russia):
...the
nuclear mafia within the silent service—the dominant faction among
submariners, it must be said—will produce statistics beyond counting to
prove that nuclear-powered craft are superior to their conventional
brethren. And they will be right—by every measure except what matters.
Namely, winning. The SSK is the right tool for the job provided it’s
deployed at the right place on the map in the right manner to achieve
maximum effect.
Ah, that's warmer. And should I have been American exceptionalist, which, of course, I am not, I would have taken this Holmes' argument to heart, especially since Holmes, almost verbatim, repeats Stansfield Turner's operational truism brilliantly formulated by him in 1976 in his interview to Christian Science Monitor, titled Who has The Best Navy. I will help you to recall that:
Pay attention to Turner's succinct observation about the number of keels. He delivers it in the clearest way possible: It is the capacity to do what might be decisive in some particular situation. And the first issue with that, if to imagine some scenario of the battle, say, for Senkakus in which hypothetical American-built (or bought) SSKs will take part is this: what kind of weapons will they carry? Holmes describes his scenario in next terms:
Combining
submarines with marine geography amplifies their efficacy at sea
denial. Array diesel boats along, say, Asia’s first island chain in
concert with unmanned combat vehicles, sea mines, surface patrol craft,
warplanes, and missile-armed ground troops and you’ve erected a
formidable barrier to passage between the China seas and Western
Pacific. That’s a barrier that Beijing will think twice about flouting.
You don’t need an SSN to stand picket duty, and in fact using it thus
amounts to overkill. Nuclear attack boats have sea-control missions to
perform on the open ocean. Used imaginatively, inexpensive diesel subs
can reinforce conventional deterrence and free up precious SSNs for more
important things, all without busting the shipbuilding budget. That’s
the reciprocal of producing über-pricey SSBNs to reinforce nuclear
deterrence. How’s that for cosmic balance?
Well, it is all fine and dandy (on the paper), but even the brief look at the map (First Island Chain) reveals something significant:
You know what it is? Right--ranges, aka distances. First Island Chain is entirely within the range of a variety of Chinese deadly anti-shipping weapon systems which, in case of real war, God forbids, have a complete capability to shut down approaches to this very Island Chain and deny hypothetical US Navy SSKs what they would need desperately--forces supporting their operations. You may have guessed it already, such forces are US Navy's Carrier Battle Groups and their airwings. No support from them, any SSK operating at those ranges becomes a prey for ASW patrol aviation and surface groups which follow. This is, of course, not to mention the tempo of China buying those pesky S-400s and SU-35s from Russia.
What are, then, the probabilities of hypothetical salvos of subsonic anti-shipping missiles launched from hypothetical US SSKs against PLAN's surface groups to provide a number of leakers is for a separate discussion but I doubt those to be effective against modern naval AD systems. While I totally understand where James Holmes is coming from and I know his bad feelings towards PLAN and namely Admiral Lou, I, honestly, do not see, from what little I know about US Navy, how the habit of "traveling first class" could be kicked, especially in the times of massive stock buybacks and strict bottom lines for CEOs and shareholders. After all, I think, Congress is also on it. But I repeat myself.
My quarrel with otherwise grimly (almost) realistic piece on US Sea-lift, symptomatically titled You Are On Your Own, is not even in the absurdity of NATO "fighting" Russia in Europe even under the assumption of fully secured Atlantic SLOCs--US military professionals (not some political D.C. generals) they know the conventional warfare score in Russia's vicinity and no amount of boasting and bluster can hide a simple fact that any configuration of NATO forces around Russia will be decimated conventionally. This is not to mention the obvious fact that Russia has no intentions whatsoever to attack Europe, so the scenario can only be discussed within the framework of NATO attacking Russia. My quarrel is with this:
The lessons from World War II are on the minds of many in the U.S. military’s high command when it comes to logistics.
And what those lessons might be, may I ask? What, building Mulberry? I don't know what those people think but even the strictest of EMCON is not going to make much difference in case of NATO's (well, mostly Anglo-American) war against Russia, since no one as of yet knows how to deal with Liana, specifically designed for targeting and what to do with the ranges of modern anti-shipping missiles which are now in many hundreds and even thousands of kilometers. So, I may ask, and how does this relate to tactical and operation reality of the naval combat of the 21st century?
In an Oct. 5 presentation at the Atlantic Council, Foggo pulled up an
image of the immense landing and sustainment force on the beaches of
northern France in 1945 to demonstrate what was made possible by
containing German submarine activity in the Atlantic.
“Operation Overlord. Look at all that stuff,” he said, pointing at the
picture. "That would not have happened if we had not won the Second
Battle of the Atlantic. That battle raged during the first few years of
the war and the Germans almost brought us to our knees using the Wolf
Pack tactics.”
Now they propose the Fourth Battle of Atlantic. Well, will Russia try to interdict Atlantic SLOCs in case of aggression against herself? You can bet your ass she will, but that will have very little to do with "Wolf Packs" and their "tactics". In fact, submarines will play only limited role in that. Today, any target, especially large merchant ships, is detectable and targeting information is provided in real time to weapon systems instantly. Not even strictest EMCON will prevent passive over-the-horizon means detecting and developing targeting for the opposing (well, Russian) forces. And then, of course, apart from modern C4ISR complex come all those funny high-supersonic or hyper-sonic missiles. That is where all those WW II "lessons" become absolutely irrelevant since ranges and velocities of modern cruise missiles is an entirely different combat paradigm which makes operational experiences of the past simply obsolete and inapplicable.
Indeed, it is possible to play with simplest Salvo Equations numbers when one begins to consider that most anti-shipping cruise and aero-ballistic missiles are launched beyond the ranges of carrier aviation, granted that carriers and their battle groups survive. In the end, it all comes down to how many bombers (and fighter bombers, such as SU-34) and their fighter escorts will Russia be able to provide. Something tells me that the number will be substantial, especially with mobile S-400s being redeployed closer to Russia's borders thus providing additional security for air-deployment from airbases in Russia. I guess simple middle-school compass and decent map will do in giving an idea that approaching Western Europe for any vessel will be an ordeal with very high probability of a tragic outcome. Any "flank" port facilities in Mediterranean and Baltic Sea become a complete exclusion zones, thus leaving only West-most extremities of French and Dutch port facilities tentatively (well, mostly theoretically) available for any kind of supply of this hypothetical US force which will be deployed in Europe to fight those aggressive Russkies. So, in this case, the title of the article is correct. One is also forced to appreciate Russian base at Khmeimim and the role it may (will) play in shutting down approaches to France and Portugal. Just as a reminder, the distance between Akrotiri AB and...well, let's put it this way--it is not going to last long. The question in this case which matters most is--because conventional campaign in Europe against Russia is unwinnable, when will the US in this scenario decide to use nuclear weapons as the last resort? We may only guess...
An interesting development today. Evidently, Russia and China signed the contract for a delivery of Russian-made anti-shipping missiles to China. It is a rather significant development. At this time it is not known which missiles will be delivered to China and, most importantly, in what "configuration": export, less capable version, or for internal, much more capable, Russian use. If to consider the fact that Russia started deliveries of SU-35 in their original (that is what rumors say so far), "Russian" configuration,
Here is the first "Chinese" SU-35 with Russian transfer team.
then it is totally reasonable to assume that it is probable that Russian anti-ship missiles (complexes) will be of a "domestic" configuration. In this case we may conclude that if those missiles are of a Kalibr family or P-800 Onyx, their ranges will be up to 600 kilometers (around 320 nautical miles), not twice shorter as it is the case with export versions. This, if my assumptions are correct (I could be wrong, of course--time will tell), will have a major effect on how China may approach her interests in the South China Sea and defense of her littoral--a proverbial A2/AD. In this case China will be able to achieve almost a full "coverage", an overlapped missile obstacle course, along most of her First Island Chain.
This will make the life of the US Navy surface ships rather exciting if someone in D.C. (and even with new US Administration it is not precluded) makes a decision to "project power" against Chinese interests. I omit here the legal and moral aspect of Chinese claims--I am not well versed in the legal details of this whole situation--but it is very clear that missile technologies play and will continue to play an increasingly large role in formation of naval strategies. In the end, a naval truism "a ship's a fool to fight a fort" is as relevant as ever, especially if one considers "a fort" having a capable Air Force.
In related news, the sky is blue and the water is wet. What else? Ah, the cold is cold and when it is hot--it is hot.
I am not a Russian internet "military" fanboy, who wastes his time away "fighting" all kinds of uber-patriotic ignoramuses from Anglo-sphere on all kinds of discussion boards. Take a pick at a "repository" of military "competence", as an example, at The National Interest, and I don't mean just discussion boards, if you want to understand what I am talking about. What they "produce" in the magazine proper should give people some peek into the reality of the Warholian media world we live in.
I have an advanced graduate degree in what, in layman's lingo, could be called a degree in sinking NATO navies. Well that, plus qualifications (long ago expired) for naval infantry (marines) command. All came with the territory in Soviet Naval academies and yes, I know how it feels when T-64 rolls over, with you ready to shit your pants while in between the tracks of this rolling armored beast. So, yes, being today a consummate armchair strategist, and being quite content, in fact, enjoying this position (beats being shot at by both bogeys and....friendlies--someday I will tell the story), I, however, cringe each time when I hear (read, see) any kind of western shock regarding the fact of Russian Armed Forces deploying some weapon system. Unlike fanboys, however, I don't wave the respective flags of paper military uber superpowers, which are figments of imagination and, when speaking about Russian/Soviet Armed Forces, am always ready to and DO talk about their flaws, problems (which are plenty) and shortcomings. So, here it is--instead of incorporating this into my "Military Power" series of posts I have to deal with it separately.
Why "West" is always shocked? Because it is generally incompetent when dealing with USSR/Russia and is good only in "perception management", that is telling own fabricated stories about some parallel reality. It was always like this, it is just only recently that it went into the super acute phase. Indeed, and how those russkies, exlaim in desperation all those journos, sociologists and political "scientists", continue, time after time, to produce not just very advanced weapons but, what is even more important, military capability? How do they do it? For people like that, who, apart from appalling ignorance, suffer also from cultural and racial revulsion towards Russia, it is, indeed, difficult to comprehend the fact that what Russians know about war both on a genetic and cognitive levels is on order of magnitude larger than what combined "West" can offer. In simpler words: history made Russians produce fully combat-oriented advanced weapon systems. This reality definitely contradicts the picture (or narrative) of those ever drunk, dumb barbaric Russians, who still live in dugouts while suppressing everything "progressive". Indeed, it is so fashionable to proclaim oneself a "winner" in arms race that some things simply escape the mind.
I want to start with very late 1950s of the last century. No, I don't mean Sputnik and educational shock to the western establishment. I want to look at what is known in the West as Echo-II SSGNs, while in Soviet Union and Russia it is still known as "screaming cows", for a horrendous noise levels of these nuclear submarines. I will omit the issue of noise, not for once mitigated by excellent professionalism of the COs and crews of these submarines, but will concentrate on the missile, communications and guidance complex of these subs.
It was a combination of radar Argument and comm complex Kasatka, among others, which allowed this ungainly sub to be able to launch her cruise missiles (from older Pyatyorka to, later, P-6) in salvo with target selection and separation in it. This was first. Those subs, also known correctly as kamikaze and suiciders (well, you are bound to be when launching surfaced) were capable to receive targeting information from satellites and TU-95RTs (Bear D), later, updated system received the name of Uspekh. The trick of this whole system was in the fact that Bear D was translating real time radar picture of the area or, rather, targets to the consoles of the weapons operators on the sub, who, using electronic pencil (in reality--gun) selected targets on the screen of their displays. This targeting method was used when the ranges of launch were larger than sub's radar range. I will omit here a reliability issue of this salvo, but, while risky (hence kamikaze title), they were possible and, actually, were done not for once. This is not 2016, boys and girls, we are talking here about 1950s and 1960s--the times of non-solid state electronics. Yet, what I just described to you, today is known as elements of the Net Centric Warfare.
This whole system of targeting and launch, at that time, was nothing short of revolutionary, even when considering reliability and other, purely tactical and operational, issues--the joyful moment for any ASW or Patrol Aviation is the moment of flaming datum, and Echoes were the ones. But it was this whole vacuum tubes-driven shebang which attracted a very serious attention from Killian Committee as early as mid-1950s, with their report to Eisenhower of missile, both ballistic and cruise, age dawning. Echoes were one of the horsemen of apocalypse, since were capable to deliver both conventional and nuclear payload against both sea and ground targets. And it was thanks in large degree to those Echoes that US Navy eventually developed and then put its Harpoons at own P-3 Orion patrol planes. Ah, those russkies, with all their mischief, always seem to turn out some toys which make the peaceful and democratic "West" to be on its toes. For nation, which opened the door to space and by 1950s boasted arguably the best educational system in the world, all that seemed quite natural. Fresh from the colossal physical and mental trauma of the WW II, it took a lot of ingenuity and plain simple sheer engineering brilliance to come up, time after time, with at least adequate (forget superior--narrative doesn't allow it) response to just about anything what the "West" was throwing at those inferior russkies. And it is this narrative, which completely ignored number of the crucial facts of Russian military development which remain her constants:
1. Guided long-range cruise and anti-shipping missile IS the national weapon of Russia/USSR. From 1950s on, at first USSR, and now Russia produced unrivaled spectrum of guided missile weapons, which is, of course, a first sign of a very advanced R&D and industry, including....drum roll....electronics and software engineering. From old P-6/35 missiles of 1950s design, through terrifying RK-55 Granat (aka S10 for subs, projects 671RTMK and 971. NATO--Victor III and Akula classes) with range exceeding by far that of the Tomahawk missiles, to modern day stealthy Kalibrs and X-101 withreported (most likely downplayed, for security reasons) range of 5000+ kilometers, to upcoming hyper-sonic weapons, Russia always was and still remains a global leader in missile technology. I don't know under what 1990s "stone", loaded with images of drunk Yeltsin, crooked "reformers" destroying own (???) country and hordes of dissidents, all these western "experts" still live, but didn't they try to study real history? We all know the answer. They didn't. Everything what is going on today with Russian/Soviet Precision Guided missile (and other) weapons is NOT some accidental GRU "stealing" some magical western, greatly overrated, technologies but the result of decades of serious and continuous R&D, development and implementation of the range of the requirements, developing and applying tactical and operational concepts for these weapons.
2. USSR/Russia always lagged behind "West" in radio-electronics, this is a scientific fact. But here is the puzzle, how crucial was this lag in, namely, military field? Here is an interesting fact from 1970s. Actually, the Soviet Union was one of the major providers of microchips for the bulk of electronic watches produced globally. Yes, including ones produced in the "West". Small fact but a very important one, none the less. Just as an example, the steady improvement of the acoustic (both noise reduction and sonar capability) by Soviet submarines in 1980s can be very easily correlated (traced back) to the fact of vast improvement of the quality of Soviet consumer electronics. Yes, yes, I know, all this popular BS about Walker case, who "supposedly" opened eyes for Russians about noisiness of their subs. Sure, how could those stupid russkies know of their own short-comings without "West's" turncoats. What is amazing is that this BS is being peddled in the "West" for decades now,disregarding a simple scientific fact of Soviet Union having a number of the acoustic institutes WAY BEFORE Walker started to spy for USSR. In fact, one of the activities of Soviet external intelligence both by GRU and KGB was a delivery of "Western"-made innocuous consumer acoustic systems as early as 1950s specifically for the study of their acoustic properties. With them came vinyl records of a lot of popular music. That is how rock'n'roll made it (among other routes) into the USSR. How do I know this? Let's say I know this for a fact. This is just one such example. Yet, by 1988, this is what US Navy had to say about this whole thing.
Indeed, the arrogance of those Russians simply has no bounds. Why did they decide to produce arguably the best submarines in the world is simply inexplicable. But more than that, for some reason Soviet Union developed a massive ECM capability and, in general, was never far behind this whole C4ISR business. For older generation this item is well-known.
This piece of equipment known as Rostov-101 (102 etc.) was truly first Soviet 1st class reel-to-reel deck with superb characteristics. The start of production was in 1975. But the popularity of this excellent machine (I wish I had one) was not only in the fact of its modern design and competitive characteristics for its time. It was also in the fact of Rostov being made of military-grade element base, which provided a very impressive durability and reliability. In 1970s it was a very desirable item, and an expensive one. Eventually Rostov went on to produce a truly world class equipment.
While other Russian military-industrial firms went on in 1980s to directly compete with the best of the best.
So, for young students of Open Source Intelligence (OSInt)--do not discard consumer products, they may give you some interesting insights into the real state of the affairs. Does iPhone give some insight today? Sure it does--decent processing power. It is also produced in China, but does China produce processors? No, in fact, it merely packs crystals into the package. But again, does military need this kind of processors? Well, not quite. Military applications are a different game. It could be a truly shocking revelation for many when they will learn that Soviet Union pioneered satellite television and, in fact, after US satellite navigation system Transit (NAVSAT) was launched, Russians followed with their own Parus (and its civilian version Cicada) satellite navigation. Where was Europe and others? Nowhere to be found. In fact, at that time, Jean-Loup Chrétien (one of my heroes) flew to space on Soviet Soyuz ship (becoming the first European to do so) and, later, became the Hero Of The Soviet Union, which is a title awarded to some really special people and Jean-Loup is one of them.
Considering the fact that today GLONASS is the only other truly global satellite navigation system, GPS being first, of course, what does this say about Russia weapons? Obviously for people "being shocked", it also comes as a surprise that Russia actually produces this:
And this allows Russia to produce this:
So, when US (or NATO) generals say this: "Their army’s equipment and strategy was “outmoded”; their air force’s
bombs and missiles were “more dumb than smart”; their navy was “more
rust than ready”. For decades, this was Western military leaders’ view,
steeped in condescension, of their Russian counterparts. What they have
seen in Syria and Ukraine has come as a shock. " They better learn Russia's history. Will they? No. So, prepare for more "shocks".
To Be Continued.......
P.S. US media space was so poisoned by Israeli "achievements" (this is not to say that Israelis are not good, no, they are pretty good and I do have respect for them) that they completely forgot that they dealt with the enemy who is manifestly not ready for serious combined arms warfare. They are learning, though. Vietnam...ahem....
What Russian Internet is abuzz since this morning, then the radical change of whole naval paradigm is much closer than even most optimistic prognoses predicted. This morning Russian media broke news of nuclear missile cruiser Admiral Nakhimov, which is currently undergoing deep modernization, (after the list of state purchases for this modernization was published) to be armed with newest hyper-sonic ASM 3M22, aka Zirkon.
Very little is known about this missile other than it is true hyper-sonic (M=5 +) High Precision Weapon and that it will change naval warfare drastically. The rumors about this missile were circulating for some years and some of them were absolute rubbish. What was clear, though, was the fact that Russia was well on her way in the advanced hyper-sonic R&D. This, at some point of time was confirmed by none other than Dmitri Rogozin. Procurement of the ASM, against which no defense exists, is a true game changer. I will not go into the details of this game-changing but the future of naval warfare looks very different from hyper-sonic vantage point than it was drawn by many contemporary military thinkers. We'll wait and see.....
