Persistent problems encountered by the Bulava missile during its flight test program raise a an interesting question - Is this experience is any different from the "good old" Soviet days? From archival documents we now have a good record of the flight test program of the R-39/SS-N-20 missile (or, rather, of the D-19 missile system), so we can compare the two.

The decision to begin development of the D-19 system was made by the Central Committee and the Council of Ministers on 21 December 1976. Almost three years later, on 21 August 1979 the Military Industrial Commission formed a State Commission that oversaw the flight test program.

The program began with a series of pop-up tests - from a submerged platform and then from a test-bed Project 619 submarine (according to data published earlier, there were 9 and 7 tests respectively).

In January 1980, the missile was first tested from a land-based launcher at the 21 Navy test range (21 GTsNP, Nenoksa test range). There were 18 launches from the test range in 1980-1982 and then one more - in June 1983. Between these, there were 15 launches from the TK-208 submarine of the Project 941 class - today this boat is known as Dmitry Donskoy and is used for tests of the Bulava missile. The missile was accepted for service in May 1983.

Missile
number
Date   Comment
1 12/28/80 Failure Caused by a serious error in technical documentation
2 04/04/80 Failure Failure of the 2nd stage engine nozzle
3 06/17/80 Failure Failure of the flight control system
5 10/03/80 Failure Failure of an on-board power source
6 12/03/80 Failure 59.5 sec into flight. Failure of the flight control system
7 12/27/80 Success 5 RVs
21 01/27/81 Success 5 RVs, one RV not found
9 04/01/81 Failure Explosion of the 2nd stage engine at ignition, 81.3 sec
8 04/22/81 Failure Missile veered off-course, self-destructed on 62.7 sec
10 11/27/81 Success 5 RVs, one RV not found
13 12/21/81 Success  
15 12/27/81 Success 4 RVs
16 01/28/82 Success 5 RVs
17 02/12/82 Success 3 or 4 RVs
23 03/03/82 Failure Failure of the 2nd stage motor, 148-150 sec
14 04/11/82 Success 5 RVs
18 04/23/82 Success 2 RVs
20 06/09/82 Success 4 RVs
30 06/29/82 Success From submarine. 3 RVs
27 07/21/82 Success From submarine. 4 RVs
31 07/22/82 Success From submarine, no telemetry
24 08/12/82 Success Two-missile salvo from submarine. 2 RVs
33 08/12/82 Success Two-missile salvo from submarine. 3 RVs
19 09/01/82 Success From a surfaced submarine
22 09/01/82 Success 2-missile salvo from submarine
29 09/01/82 Success 2-missile salvo from submarine
26 10/14/82 Success 4-missile salvo from submarine. 4 RV
28 10/14/82 Success 4-missile salvo from submarine. 1 RV. Full-range (9572 km)
32 10/14/82 Success 4-missile salvo from submarine. 4 RV
25 10/14/82   4-missile salvo from submarine. Missile not fired.
34 12/02/82 Success From submarine. Full-range. 2 RVs.
35 12/12/82 Success 3-missile salvo from submarine. 5 RVs
36 12/12/82 Success 3-missile salvo from submarine. 2 RVs
37 12/12/82 Success 3-missile salvo from submarine. 4 RVs
12 07/27/83 Success 4 RVs

(Two more missiles produced for the flight tests - No. 4 and No. 11 - were disassembled as part of the test program. Missile No. 25, which was not fired during the 4-missile salvo on 14 October 1982, was later placed on combat duty.)

As we can see, the beginning of the R-39 flight test program was quite rocky - only three of the first ten flight tests were successful. Bulava, in fact, has a somewhat better record at this point - four of its ten flight tests are believed to be successful (although only one was declared "full success"). On the other hand, these were the Soviet times when the defense industry did not really counted the money, so any flight test program was almost expected to take tens of missiles. Nobody expects today that the Bulava program will have the luxury of expending 37 missiles during tests as the R-39 program did.