Russia is armed with a lot of high-precision missiles, with which it terrorizes Ukraine. One of these missiles is Kinzhal, which the invaders used several times to strike at the Ukrainian rear.
Kinzhal is one of the newest Russian missiles, carried by the MiG-31K aircraft, which often takes off in Belarus. Channel 24 tells how dangerous the “Dagger” is and whether our air defense forces can counteract this missile.
How many times has Russia used Kinzhal in Ukraine
It is not known for certain how many “Daggers” Russia has. Ukrainian portals “Military” and Defense Express suggest that Russia has a very limited stock of such missiles. In particular, we are talking about dozens of missiles. The fact that the enemy does not use these missiles en masse may indeed indicate that there are not so many of them.
The first case of the use of “Dagger” in Ukraine became known on March 18, 2022. Russia struck an ammunition depot in the Ivano-Frankivsk region, which was confirmed by the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
The network even published a video with the fall of a rocket allegedly in Delyatyn, Ivano-Frankivsk region. The video shows that the rocket hits at an angle of 90 degrees to the surface, which is typical for ballistic missiles used by Iskander.
Video of a missile attack on Delyatyn (Attention! The video contains obscene language 18+)
On May 9, 2022, three missiles of the Kinzhal complex were launched from Tu-22M3 strategic aircraft at civilian facilities in the Odessa region.
The command of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported that on August 7, 2022, the Russians used the “Dagger” to strike targets in the Vinnitsa region.
During a massive missile strike on January 26, 2023, the Russian military used two MiG-31Ks to launch Kinzhal missiles from Russian airspace at facilities in Kyiv and Zaporozhye.
Also, the invaders used 6 Kinzhal missiles at once during a massive missile attack on Ukraine on March 9, 2023. The air force does not remind that such an amount was used in a single strike.
Russian “Dagger” did not reach Ukraine
On September 14, a Kinzhal missile fell in the Russian Turkmen District of the Stavropol Territory near the village of Kendzhe-Kulak. Photos from the scene were published by Stavropol Governor Vladimir Vladimirov.
Six people were injured from the Kinzhal explosion: one firefighter and five civilians who came to look at the scene. According to “Military”, this indicates that the rocket detonated some time after the fall.
Russian media are promoting the version that a Tu-141 drone fell in the Stavropol Territory. However, the remains at the site of the explosion do not confirm this version.
Fallen in Russia “Dagger”: video
On September 14, the Russians attacked Krivoy Rog. The then head of the Dnepropetrovsk OVA, Valentin Reznichenko, informed that the Russians had hit Krivoy Rog precisely with the help of the Kinzhal missile system.
The missile crash site is located 200 kilometers from the Kinzhal MiG-31 carrier base in Akhtyubinsk. The settlement could be located on the trajectory of the Kh-47m2 missile, which the Russian MiG-31 could launch from the Caspian Sea.
They released 6 “Daggers” at once on March 9
The Russian military this time went beyond their attacks, which we predicted before. During a massive missile strike on March 9, the enemy used 6 Kinzhal hypersonic missiles at once.
The speaker of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Yuri Ignat, commented on this missile strike during the broadcast of Channel 24. He noted that the invaders used different types of aircraft for this attack.
I don't remember this ever happening before. Six “Daggers” were fired by the enemy in total. He used different aircraft, in particular strategic aviation, – said Yuri Ignat.
Note that one of the “Daggers” hit the infrastructure facility in Kyiv. This was told by the head of the KMVA Sergey Popko.
Features of the rocket “Dagger”
Kh-47m2 “Dagger” is a Russian hypersonic aviation missile system, which is one of the latest. This is a missile with a nuclear or conventional warhead.
Hypersonic weapons are missiles in which the warhead moves at hypersonic speeds in the atmosphere. That is, in the range of 5000 – 25000 kilometers per hour.
The maximum speed of the “Dagger” is Mach 10 – up to about 12,000 kilometers per hour .
The missile was adopted by Russia in 2018. In terms of dimensions and appearance , the Kinzhal missile is similar to the Iskander OTRK ballistic missiles . The only difference between the complexes is that the X-47 is launched from an aircraft.
The MiG-31K is capable of carrying 1 missile and hitting targets at a distance of up to 2,000 kilometers. Also, Tu-22M3 strategic bombers capable of carrying 4 missiles can be carriers of Kinzhal missiles. From the Tu-22M3, the enemy can hit targets with “Daggers” at a distance of 3 thousand kilometers.
Why “Dagger” is difficult to intercept
Considering that the missiles can maneuver on the flight path, it is believed that it is almost impossible to intercept them : air defense systems will be detected too late and will not have time to react.
Therefore, the main advantage of the Daggers is their speed, which leads to two main consequences:
- the missile is extremely difficult to intercept,
- before the explosion, the missile is capable of penetrating any armor.
Therefore, “Daggers” are considered as a means against large ships and bunkers.
The Air Force does not yet have the technical ability to see the moment the “Dagger” is launched. The representative of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Yuri Ignat, said that in order to disguise the very moment of launch, the Russians were lifting a dozen MiG-31s into the air, one of which was the carrier of the hypersonic X-47M2.
Immediately after the launch, the “Dagger” flies into the stratosphere and flies down at high speed. “There is very little time to effectively identify it and try to bring it down,” Ignat reported.
The Defense Express military portal wrote that due to the fact that the missile reaches speeds of up to 12,000 kilometers per hour, it is impossible to intercept it on the marching section even with specialized anti-missile systems.
At the same time, upon impact, in the terminal section, its speed is still, most likely, up to Mach 3.4, and the angle of incidence is 80-90 degrees, which also requires specialized anti-missile systems to effectively intercept it.
Due to the fact that the “Dagger” is actually the second stage of the Iskander ballistic missile, the aircraft for it serves as a means for accelerating to supersonic speeds at an altitude of more than 10 kilometers.
Ukraine will be able to shoot down “Daggers”
Alexander Kovalenko, a military-political observer for the Information Resistance group, said that the Aster 30 Block 1 anti-aircraft missile can intercept ballistic and supersonic missiles, including Russian Kinzhal missiles.
Aster 30 Block 1 missiles are launched from the FSAF SAMP / T air defense system, which Ukraine will receive from Italy and France.
The system can track dozens of targets and intercept 10 at once. According to Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, the SAMP/T anti-aircraft missile system can be deployed in Ukraine within two months.
“Dagger” will not change the rules of war
In May 2022, the head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said that the use of hypersonic weapons by Russia “did not have significant consequences.”
Aside from the speed of the weapon, in terms of its effect on a specific target, we don't see any really significant game-changing effects to date,” Milley said.
As of May, the United States said that Russia had used 10 to 12 hypersonic missiles in Ukraine. Milley noted that this was the first time that a hypersonic weapon had been used in combat and said that the Pentagon analyzed each such strike.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said he agreed with Milley and did not think that the use of hypersonic weapons “would force Putin to raise the stakes on the use of nuclear weapons.”
“I think he is trying to create a specific effect with this weapon. And, as Milley noted, hypersonic weapons move at a speed that complicates counteraction. But this has not changed the game,” the head of the Pentagon said.
