You’re again giving the Kh-22 too much credit. Tom Cooper once told me that they sent some of the bombers with these missiles to Iraq. In tests, they couldn’t fire a single one for a good hit. They all exploded less than 30 seconds after launch and the ones that did get through landed quite some distance from their targets…
Of course if you arm them with a nuclear warhead the accuracy isn’t all that important, yet if it blows up in mid-air, your bomber fleet might get evaporated.
As for the source for my 4 SOv statement, I’m sorry, but I’m not allowed to tell you that, nor elaborate it. But, if you look logical, you can see it. The new exercise, started yesterday, has again only Admiral Ushakov in its ranks, this is the former Bestrassny… That’s again a single Sovremenny.
On the pacific, I have this extremely nice picture of the Pacific fleet’s major surface combattants in their port, again only one Sovremenny in the picture…
So, officially maybe they still have 8 or so in service. But only 4 of them are operational. And I really don’t want to know what kind of state their reserve ships are in, taking in account their ACTIVE ship’s state.
That is probably also the reason why they sent some salvage and rescue tugs on the last exercise, they have become quite scared.
For Garry, indeed, the flight profile of Kh-22 is for most of the time high, this means AEGIS is designed to kill it. It doesn’t really matter what speed there since SM-2 can handle it. The AEGIS was developped to counter such long range strike missiles while they were still high. When they dive, the speed increases, they get harder to find on radar (slower fire solution) and hence they get harder to kill. Therefor SM-2 had to kill them before that manuever. These things are probably visible from a very long range on the AEGIS related radars.
Yes, for Hyperwarp:
More pictures are a bit higher in this thread, but they are extremely large, so I hope you don’t have a dial up…
As you will have noticed, it looks 100% similar to P500, the difference between them is in the inside, it uses a different booster and has different fuel. That is also the reason why we don’t know for sure whether Varyag carries the P1000 or P500…. The tubes look the same, although some minor differences, yet these differences aren’t large enough to say for sure it has a different missile. The Speed of Vulkan is only Mach 2 or Mach 2.5. The difference is range, 700km (this range was achieved by using lighter titanium alloys and a new more fuel efficient turbojet engine. It was tested from 4 refurbished Echo II class vessels (called project 675KMV). It was tested in mid ’80s and entered service in ’87. A fift conversion was stopped. The submarines were withdrawn in mid ’90s. Too expensive.
Now, the sources state that the conversion of Varyag with this missile was begun yet got abandonned…. That leaves some space of course, did they really stop it and changed everything back to P500? Or could they use the missiles from the submarines (as spare missiles for testing) and proceeded with the refit? Nonetheless, I think the system is becoming useless, unless the Russians can keep their space based guidance up to date (which I fear they can’t) AFAIK, they launched the last Kasatka-B missile somewhere in 2002.
For the Kirovs, Severomorsk (or was it a different shipbuilder?) received funding for the full repair of Admiral Nakhimov in the beginning of this year. Ushakov will be soon scrapped.
Russia to scrap its biggest nuclear cruiser for $40m
Severodvinsk based plant Zvezdochka will dismantle the nuclear cruiser ex-Admiral Ushakov, ITAR-TASS reported.
2004-09-07 16:44
Severodvinsk based Design Bureau Onega is responsible for development of the dismantlement project of the cruiser which is moored at Zvezdochka. The Russian Federal Agency on Atomic Energy ordered the project.
According to ITAR-TASS with the reference to the Zvezdochka plant?s press department, $40m is needed to scrap the biggest Russian cruiser and $10m from this sum would be spent to develop a dismantling project as Russia has no experience in cutting such big nuclear powered cruisers. The ship cannot even fit any dock at the plant, so it will be scrapped afloat. The main task for the designers is to create a technology of the safe extraction of the reactor unit and its storage during 50 years. It will take not less than 1.5 years to develop the technical documentation.
Heavy nuclear missile cruiser Admiral Ushakov (Kirov before 1992) was built at the Baltiysky shipyard in St Petersburg in 1980 and used to be the flagship of the Russian navy. Since 90?s the cruiser needed repairs and did not take part in the exercises. In June this year the cruiser?s name was transferred to destroyer Besstrashny based in Severomorsk, so the former navy flagship Admiral Ushakov carries only number 090 on its bow at the moment.
From the last reports, the Sankt Petersburg, the first Lada/Amur will be launched in Octobre, I hope some pictures come out…
Here are some others:
The A-50 (1/144 Trumpeter) with Kh-55 and S300FM (scratchbuilt):
Pyotr Velikiy in the background, still completing that one:
Velikiy during building process, she’s a bit too dark, although in the 2000 exercise with Kursk she was painted very dark. But still I might repaint her…:
The Sovremennys, there are only 4, believe me! All others are decommissioned. That is also why the Moskit is being overrated lately. Everyone is beginning to nag about that “super missile”, while the Russian Navy hardly uses it. (Although the Chinese Navy starts to use it now)
There are some small craft of the Nanuchka and Tarantul class using it in small numbers too. Although in Kaliningrad last year, they fired a Styx in the exercise… They still use those old things!
Yes there are some Delta IIIs out there, but I don’t know how many, nor how active they are. I think the Delta IV class is regarded as most important, and I suppose the Borei design will be based on Delta IV too.
Same with Akula, There are some Akulas in service. Vepr and Volk are both quite active in Exercises, they also participated in the exercise with the French Navy.
Globalsecurity isn’t all that fast in updating, and is sometimes really overrating the Russian Navy. They also still think that Pyotr Velikiy has a two eight-cell launchers for the SA-N-9 Gauntlet, with 128 reloads… 😀 😀 (for the people not knowing yet, it has eight eight-cell launchers with 64 missiles and no reloads)
There is also one Kynda, Admiral Golovko in the Black Sea fleet, although is mostly inactive.
ALso one Kashin II destroyer is still active, it has Uran launchers instead of Styx. (Smetliviy, she’s also in Black Sea Fleet)
For the Fleets:
Baltic fleet, Flagship: Bespokoiniy (I’m not 100% sure, could be Nastoychiviy too)(Sovremenny class)
Northern fleet Flagship: Pyotr Velikiy (Kirov class
Pacific fleet flagship: Varyag (Slava class)
Black Sea Fleet flagship: Moskva (Slava class)
The major surface part of the pacific fleet consists of 1 Sovremenny (named Burniy), 4 Udaloy (Admiral Shaposhnikov, Admiral Tributs, Admiral Panteleyev, Admiral Vinogradov) and 1 Slava (Varyag). The fleet is based at Vladivostok and the nuclear propelled surveyence vessel SSV 33 (Kapusta) is used as a powersource in port. Otherwise this vessel is decommissioned…
For the Baltic fleet, that is 2 Sovremenny (Bespokoiniy and Nastoychiviy), 1 Neustrashimy (Neustrashimy herself) and 2 Upgraded Krivak I (Pylkiy and Legkiy, upgraded for Uran, although they do not carry this missile and with a Fregat Air/ Surface search radar) They also have numerious landing craft of all types and some small craft. They also have Kilo class diesel-electric subs. The new Lada/Amur type vessel Sankt Petersburg might go to this fleet too (judging from the name and task that is). The fleet is mainly based at Kaliningrad, but also has a base on an island near St-Petersburg.
It should be noted that the Baltic fleet has a very good commander and that most of the ships, I think about 75%, are rather young and have less than 20 years of life in them… Of course on the other hand, it should be noted that by bad maintenance, this means the wear and tear might have taken some years of their age. In Kaliningrad, the ships looked very good from some distance, it soon became obvious why… They hads pray painted all the ship, including the rubber coaming around the weathertight doors etc. (part that should really not be painted). Also, Neustrashimiy lacks some very important bolts to keep her lattice mast on its place. This indicates the bad state they are in. Yet, these ships are regarded as very well maintained in the Russian fleet and are hence deployed regularily. (there is even no money to give the crew meat. Only the officers get meat onboard)
The Black Sea fleet has more trouble. They have a much smaller fleet, yet they are based in Ukraine (now it’s being changed to a base in Russia itself). They had lots of money constraints and got their powersupply interrupted regularily by the Ukrainian supplier. They even had to burn wood on small burners in the ship to keep themselves warm.
Northern Fleet: Some ships are in good condition, Pyotr Velikiy being awarded for being the best unit in the fleet. They have most of the major ships, including Pyotr Velikiy, Ustinov (Slava class), Admiral Chabanenko (udaloy II), 3 Udaloy class vessels (Admiral Kharlamov, Admiral Levchenko, Admiral Spiridonov?), 1 Sovremenny (Bestrassniy, apparently renamed Admiral Ushakov now).
They of course operate most of the Nuclear submarines and have numerious bases. Kuznetsov is having some trouble. Being in repairs most of the time and lacking pilots and planes.
The P1000 is a missile based on the P500 Bazalt. It has/was supposed to have a range of 750km and a speed of 1.5 to 2.5 Mach. Otherwise it has the same specs as Bazalt. There is no external difference hence it is not sure whether Varyag carries the missiles or not.
The missile was tested from submarines too, I think 4 Echo II class vessels have been rebuilt to test it. Now, development of the missiles was abandoned. (too expensive).
Warfare.ru, contains some mistakes, and some inefficiencies, like Pilkiy and Legkiy are Krivak I according to that source. It’s Krivak Imod and there is a huge diffence, since they don’t have the Silex/Rastrub ASW system anymore. And are equipped for 8 Uran missiles. But I like the source and I will certainly look at it a bit more now. Some nice pictures too.
So, I hope Dionis that his can help you out a bit…
Sign In
