To increase the ability to cope with the risk of external attacks, Russia will equip the Zircon hypersonic missile to all nuclear submarines.
According to the Commander of the Russian Navy, Admiral Nikolai Evmenov, the life expectancy of the multipurpose nuclear submarines of the 949A and 971 projects of the Russian Navy will be doubled, they will be equipped with new weapons.
The ships of this class have launchers designed to be able to launch both the Zircon missile and the new generation Kalibr-PL long-range cruise missile.
He added that, in addition to the submarines will carry strategic missiles, the others will be equipped with Kalibr cruise missile. Along with the announcement of the new equipment plan, Russia also decided to equip Zircon early to cope with new threats.” Repair and modernization of Project 949A and 971 nuclear submarines will continue. After modernization is completed, the submarine will have specification that West can’t match, “said the Russian general.
At the same time, testing of the Zircon on the submarine will begin in the first quarter of 2021 in parallel with further testing on the destroyer Admiral Gorshkov.
“This is a plan that has been put forward by the Russian Defense Ministry to soon complete and put into service this world’s leading hypersonic missile line. Along with the ship’s test firing, we simultaneously test the Zircon on board. nuclear underground Yasen “, General Evmenov added.
According to Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, he has instructed to increase the number of warships equipped with Zircon missiles: “It is necessary to increase the number of ships operating in remote waters, including those carrying missiles. The Kalibr cruise and the Zircon supersonic missile in the Russian Navy “.
Talking about the reason Russia needs to increase the provision of hypersonic missiles to Zircon for long-range warships, Deputy Minister of Defense, Alexei Krivoruchko said, to cope with unpredictable developments in some naval waters. Russia is active, increasing the Kalibr and Zircon equipment is essential at the moment.
With the superior technological advantage of this weapon, it can easily overcome the enemy’s defensive fire net thanks to Mach 9 speed and a range of 1,000km. In particular, this weapon can attack targets at sea and on land.
The new missile will be deployed on warships equipped with the Kalibr ground attack cruise missile. According to the Deputy Minister of Russia, no one can intercept Zircon missile by existing air defense systems. The missile uses liquid fuel scramjet engine.
A scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet) is a variant of a ramjet airbreathing jet engine in which combustion takes place in supersonic airflow. As in ramjets, a scramjet relies on high vehicle speed to compress the incoming air forcefully before combustion (hence ramjet), but whereas a ramjet decelerates the air to subsonic velocities before combustion, the airflow in a scramjet is supersonic throughout the entire engine. This allows the scramjet to operate efficiently at extremely high speeds.