On May 23, 2012 the Rocket Forces and the Space Forces crews performed a successful launch of a prototype of a new ICBM. According to the official report, the missile launch took place at 10:15 MSK (06:15 UTC) from a mobile launcher deployed at the Plesetsk launch site. If the Rocket Forces representative was quoted correctly, the missile carried a single warhead, which reached its designated target at the Kura test site.
This appears to be the second test of the new missile, which is developed by the Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology. The first test, on September 27, 2011, was unsuccessful. Few details about the missile are known. Judging from the press reports, it appears to be a development of the Topol-M/Yars line, although it is probably different enough to be considered a completely new ICBM. Some sources suggest that the missile uses a new propellant.
As I mentioned earlier, development of yet another new ICBM hardly makes any sense (well, it does for MITT). Don't forget that there is a new "heavy silo-based ICBM" project somewhere. Of course, the new missile was immediately advertised as a potential response to the U.S. missile defense plans. No surprises there - any nonsense seems to be justified if it is billed as something that could counter missile defense. Missile defense is the gift that keeps on giving.
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http://www.vedomosti.ru/tech/news/1775210/s_kosmodroma_pleseck_zapuschena_novaya_sekretnaya_raketa
Now that Russia has developed a new ICBM that, by the Kremlin’s own words, “can’t be intercepted” by the proposed NATO European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA), is the "diplomatic crisis" between Moscow and NATO over?
Frank Shuler
USA
Haha. No. Of course not. The Avangard project is a further development of the Topol model, and is "heavily based on the technical decisions made in developing the Topol-M and Topol-MR (Yars)".
http://bmpd.livejournal.com/236869.html
It's likely that eventually the Avangard will be the replacement for the Topol-M, while the original Topol gets fully replaced by the Yars.
Usually well-informed "Коммерсант"
http://kommersant.ru/doc/1941514
Yes, the Kommersant version seems quite reasonable. Still, beats me why Russia would need another ICBM. Do they miss old Soviet days when there were seven different missiles in service?
It is not "version". It is Knowledge. :-)
And such "another ICBM" is necessary, that there was no "another LIQUID ICBM". :-)
http://www.izvestia.ru/news/525277
"...Ракета другая, она больше «Ярса», и разницу видно невооруженным взглядом."
:-)))
Pavel, is this really a different missile? The information we have seems to imply that it's a derivative of the Bulava, a missile already going into service, and that it's somewhat unified and based on the Topol-M and Yars missiles.
If they phase out the Topol, and UR-100 missiles, they will be left with 1) Topol-M/Yars (very similar) 2) Avangard 3) Heavy liquid-fuel ICBM. So only 3 types. And the Avangard will have great similarity with the Bulava, which will be the main SLBM.
Why Russia need land version Bulava ?
Alexander: Something tells me the the "liquid-fuel ICBM" project will go ahead anyway. All this is a massive waste of money.
Pavel:
Need to think out of the box a bit on this one. Perhaps a historical analogy is in line -- think about the Skorost, why it was developed, how it was going to be deployed and the primary target set's location. Can't say much more for now.
w/r, SJS
Pavel:
Designer Goryaev (NPOmash) already told: don't wait from us for a miracle... the new liquid ICBM hardly will be designed earlier, than in 10 years.
"...If we didn't made liquid ICBM more than 30 years, difficulties are possible at the most various stages, and it can't be predicted in advance...".
http://ria.ru/defense_safety/20120508/644176938.html
But in 10 years still 100 times will exchange...
Alexander: That much was clear from the beginning. Still, I don't see how the arguments that were used to start the "heavy liquid-fuel ICBM" - it's heavy, MIRVed, etc. - would change if a new solid-propellant one appears. It's not like any of this is driven by an actual military need.
SJS: You are not saying that the Soviet Union had almost ten different types of ICBMs and was building more because there were unique target (or any other) requirements for each one, are you? As I said before, none of this has anything to do with military requirements. It (almost) never had.
Pavel:
All that matters is that there is a new types re-entry vehicles for which more heavy ICBM, than Topol-Yars and Bulava is really necessary. It strongly pushes the "New Heavy ICBM Project" forward and provides to it support.
However I will notice also that RVSN Command and officers any more don't want to deal with dangerous heptyl (UDMH). So the "New Heavy Liquid (just) ICBM Project" has no unanimous support even among them.
Alexander: What I don't understand is the "really necessary" part. Necessary for what? What is it that Topol-M/Yars warheads cannot do?
>>What is it that Topol-M/Yars warheads cannot do?
Replicate fast enough to reach the 1550 number. The military wants numerical parity with US. Can't do it with the pace of Topol-M production, apparently.
Pavel , New Liquid Fuel ICBM offers two things that neither Topol-M/Yars/Avangrad cannot provide which is Volume and Weight.
Having bigger Volume and Weight allows you to try different types of RV e.g one that uses scramjet and they tend to be heavier which can be compensated by throw up weight.
No one know in the next 20-30 years how ABM will take shape , having bigger volume/throw-up weight will allow you to hedge against uncertainty of the future.
Liquid fuels allows you much better ISP over Solid Fuel and they are less heavier which have over all impact on thrust,volume and weight of missile ....Liquid fuels allows you more compact icbm every thing being equal compared to solid fuel ....the known draw back is longer boost phase and liquid fuel being cumbersome but with technology they might have progressed on that front too.
I have a question about warheads for rs24, bulava and so called avangard. There are new type or some kind of modernisation because former SU has nukes 300kt and more on icbm's.
Somewhere i find price for topol m and bulava, 40 and 30 mil $, but how much is price for warhead - is it included in the price of icbm or not.
Regards
artjomh
We both realize the New START number of 1550 is fantasy. The US bomber inventory declared in New START, only 60 aircraft; consisting of 16 B-2s and 44 B-52Hs, can carry 1,136 weapons by themselves. Fear not my friend, the American inventory of nuclear weapons is falling and will do so regardless of any farther Washington-Moscow arms agreements. The active debate here is how many warheads and what type of delivery systems are really needed for deterrence? While I have always been a proponent of land based silo ICBMs as necessary for the military defense of the United States, I now have real doubts Minuteman will be replaced. I can honestly say that the future US nuclear arsenal may well consist of Trident and the B-2 bomber and their successors.
Frank Shuler
USA
Austin: Well, maybe, but why would anybody care about the volume or weight? All these scramjets offer absolutely no advantage compared to regular ICBMs/warheads (assuming that there is such thing as "advantage" in this business). As for missile defense, in 20-30 years it will be exactly where it is today and where it was 20-30 or 50 years ago - nowhere.
Scramjet warhead can maneuvrable, very difficut to intercept.
Frank,
My comment wasn't about capability, but about perception of capability (which is, after all, what deterrence is). Russian military wants to be perceived to have numerical parity with US, even if in actuality the numbers don't really matter all that much after a certain threshold (200-300 warheads?).
If Russia doesn't appear to have the same number of Stuff as the US, you'd have retards in the media harping about the failure of Russia as a state and Putin personally as a human being. Doesn't really matter how many cities you can actually blow up, if your deterrent is not seen as credible and if some faux-analysts start making specious arguments about US nuclear primacy.
Pavel: I was only commenting on the technical reason why Russia ( or for that matter any body ) would build a heavy ICBM with a throw up weight of ~ 4 T plus , the advantage being bigger weight/volume ratio which consequently has impact on what you carry and how many you can carry , scramjet was just an example i pointed out , it could be simple Ballistic MIRV ,MaRV or Active Guided MIRV , a bigger throw up weight affords to carry these in large number with more Penaids.
As to why some one would built scramjets , strictly and technically speaking it gives the guided RV the ability to have powered guided flight through the atmosphere at hypersonic speeds and maneuverer at higher/medium atmosphere without loosing speed complicating ABM's ability to calculate an intercept point , since most current ABM systems are heavily dependent on ground based radar to do those calculations till such point the KV/Interceptor reaches a kill box where they become completely autonomous kill vehicles.
A pure ballistic RV interceptor point is quite predictable and MaRV can make that more complicated but it lacks the ability to sustain energy/manouvering in the atmosphere.
Now coming back to the reality if it actually offers advantage ,likely not. Even a pure ballistic RV along with decoys are a hard nut to crack and there are enough evidence presented in US scientific community that spoofing ABM interceptors even with simple decoys the odds are heavily stacked in favour of BM/Decoys. Now one can just calculate hundreds of decoys and warhead in Russia-US exchange context and odds favour the BM overwhelmingly.
Unfortunately in this ABM versus BM game truth is the real casualty and every time a ABM is tested against BM in simulated test and results are declared successful and more promising for ABM even if these are trumped up , the greater is the determination of BM folks to remain ahead of the game and technological curve by building better BM with more overall exotic features and RV.
The only way to solve this is to have some limits on deployment of ABM and BM/Warheads or both parties agree on some mechanism acceptable to both which does not restrict ABM deployment or numbers but keeps a check that it does not go out of hand and maintains strategic stability not just between US and Russia but among established Nuclear powers.
It is very likely that it's NOT a new design - it may be Bulava deployed in land-based launchers.
Topol-M was in all probability 'low-risk' social programme for industry, to preserve skills and prove capability of building missile without external subcontractors (from former Soviet Republics). It's phased out from production and RS-24 will succeed it on land deployments, accompanied by Bulava launched from multiple platforms (think: reincarnation of SS-24 )
Speaking of liquid heavy ICBM - what these offer is larger missile footprint (area which can include targets for all separating warheads). Smaller and lighter missiles, despite the same RV load (even of the same type!) may not be able to spread them on sufficiently wide are, which - coupled with limited number of missiles and warheads (penetration aids!) - can complicate mission planning.
artjomh
Do you think there would be any Kremlin interest in an American initiative to lower the deployed inventory of nuclear warheads from 1550 to, say, 1000?
Frank Shuler
USA
Frank,
Personally, I don't think they are interested in a like for like exchanges any more. The only way new strategic reductions will make sense to the Kremlin is if they are bundled with other things: removal of B61-12 from Europe, a missile defence agreement, deep cuts to reserve warheads, etc.
During the last round of reduction talks, the big Russian interest was not cutting warheads, but rather cutting delivery vehicles (since US has an advantage at the moment). But now this isn't as relevant any more, since Russia has a decent pipeline of new strategic delivery vehicles coming in the next decade.
Cutting below 1000 would be a hard-sell for the Kremlin without progress on missile defence. Or, at least, they would try to justify saying "no" by pointing to missile defence as a reason why they can't cut to that level without additional incentives.
artjomh
That would be my personal conclusion as well. The 1500 deployed warhead limit was always President Putin’s goal going back the the Moscow Treaty (SORT). I can see the New START limits being reached and the treaty mutually extending in the future; depending on events of course. It’s in the best interest of both parties.
Frank Shuler
USA
This all seems such a waste. I wouldn't be so quick to blame missile defense, in that is only realistic with regards to the North Korea or Iran, not Russia.
It is nice to see new rocket development in Russia though, and any heavy ICBM may also be used as a sat-launcher. What I would like to see is for Baikonur's funding to go to Russian shipyards to make larger pressure-fed rockets like Excalibur or even Truax's Sea Dragon concept. Here, every ruble that goes to space also goes to Russian shipyard workers, instead of going to Kazakhstan.
By the way, according to official information the new heavy liquid fuel ICBM has an index 'Sarmat' (=Sarmatian):
http://www.yubileyny.ru/index.php/novine/1978
http://yubik.net.ru/publ/23-1-0-4769
Very interesting. But I thought it says "OKR Sarmat and development of a new liquid-fuel ICBM" - this seems to mean that these two are not quite the same.
Also, it seems to indicate that the ICBM tested last week is indeed "Avangard-R".
Pavel,
Then I turn you to the Russian cultural realities. I remind that ancient Sarmatians and Sarmatians barrows are the main historical properties of the Orenburg region:
http://www.orenobl.ru/hist_dostopr/kurgan.php
But known heavy ICBM are among barrows in the same Great Steppe. I was born and lived in the childhood in the East Orenburg region. In my consciousness the local steppe associates with Sarmatians and SS-18. And the new ICBM for this steppe should be called only 'Sarmat' certainly . :-)
Yes, I guess that makes sense.
So the Avangard R is land version Bulava missile ?
Photo of the new missile:
http://img1.1tv.ru/imgsize640x360/PR20120527220145.JPG
Not 100% sure this is Avangard (journalists are known to put weird stuff in), but it doesn't look like Topol-M either.
No, it is something else. The launch was reported to take place at 10:15 MSK - in May the Sun raises at about 4am in Plesetsk.
So what it is ? It doesn't look like Topole M / Yars
This photo is a moment 05:14 freeze frame from this film:
http://www.1tv.ru/news/techno/208191
So this is Yars missile.
Pavel , it could be the footage from the first test which failed some months back.
No. Russian TV wasn't allowed for reports neither at the first, nor at the second tests.
Hi,
I suspect it's archive footage of a Start-1 (Topol-based satellite launcher) launch from Svobodny. Those rockets have an additional 4th stage and a different (bigger) payload section to accomodate satellites, I guess that's what it is.
Martin
It is not Start-1. It has a very obvious narrowing diameter at the connection of the payload stage, while this one appears to be straight through until the nose cone.
Dear Artjomh,
the photograph released by http://img1.1tv.ru/imgsize640x360/PR20120527220145.JPG is a still frame of the second RS-24 prototype test launch on 25 December 2007 from a video sequence published by the Russian television. The picture exactly has the same missile plume and smoke expel of this test firing.
If this new rocket is what I suspect a "land" version of Bulava with some tangible inprovements over Yars and Topol-M, I could buy that. However, I agree with Pavel regarding Heavy-Liquid ICBM, it's useless. There's no need for extra space launch vehicles Russia is coming up with Angara which covers a wide range of payloads & it's not toxic, so that argument is out the door right away. Secondly, if they barely can keep up with production of new Topol-M's and Bulava's and Yars what makes them think they could take on additional rocket production? Spend that money in space and more missiles that you've got, plus renew infracstructure. Thats my 2 cents.