Well, Looky Here. ANOTHER Russian Hypersonic Missile Deployed Into the Field (2023)

I just can’t understand why the accurate, unbiased western military-media complex isn’t reporting this stuff.

R-37 (missile) – Wikipedia

The Vympel R-37 (NATO reporting name: AA-13 “Axehead”)[1] is a Russian hypersonic air-to-air missile with very long range.

It is designed to shoot down tankers,AWACSand otherC4ISTARaircraft^[1]while keeping the launch platform out of range of any fighters that might be protecting the target.

Seems to work pretty good on plain old jet fighters, too.

Operational history

The R-37M has, since October 2022, been the main threat against the Ukrainian Air Force. The Ukrainian Air Force lacks fire and forget missiles. They relied on the R-27 missiles, both the R-27ER and R-27ET, the R-27ET’s range is 60 miles. The Ukrainian pilot must illuminate the Russian aircraft with their radar to guide the missile to the target. Russian pilots firing active radar, fire and forget, R-77 give the Russian pilots the ability to launch their missiles and then take evasive action. Ukrainian pilots were forced to “exploit ground clutter and terrain-masking to get close enough to fire before being engaged”.

A report by the Royal United Services Institute states that in October some six R-37Ms were being fired at the Ukrainian Air Force a day. The Su-35S is also used as a carrier for the R-37M. Four MiG-31 were also deployed to Crimea.[citation needed]

In August 2022, Russian forces maintained a Combat Air Patrol of either a pair of Su-35S or MiG-31s on station to shoot down Ukrainian aircraft. Since Ukrainian forces launched a counteroffensive in August they have lost “four MiG-29s, six Su-25s, a Su-24, and one Su-27”. The Royal United Services Institute has credited most of the kills to the R-37M writing: “The VKS has been firing up to six R-37Ms per day during October. The extremely high speed of the weapon, coupled with very long effective range and a seeker designed for engaging low-altitude targets, makes it particularly difficult to evade.”

There is a reason why the Ukraine air force basically no longer exists, and, except for the dwindling threat from Ukraine’s ground-based air defense systems (the Ukes themselves have taken to destroying donated Israeli Iron Dome systems as useless junk), enjoy total airspace dominance. Which has lead to scenes like this on the last remaining death alley out of Bakhmut:

State of the dirt roads which now supply the remaining Ukrainian units in Bakhmut. Convoy graveyard. https://t.co/sJidgl8UNW

— Big Serge ☦️🇺🇸🇷🇺 (@witte_sergei) April 8, 2023

Couple of weeks back I put up a post about the three hypersonic missiles the Russians had already deployed in the field, the Kinzhal, the Zircon, and the Avengard. Now add the Vympel, giving Russia a land killer, a ship killer, a city killer, and now a plane killer.

But not to worry, after the dismal performance in recent tests threatens to send one of the two hypersonics the US is currently developing to the local dustbin, America has one hypersonic missile…still in development. Might be available for use by 2025. Might not, too.

Sad to say, at least as far as hypersonics go, Russia isn’t a “near peer” competitor to the US. In fact, the US is not even a peer competitor to Russia. And this isn’t trivial. Sufficient quantities of these missiles would allow Russia to negate America’s biggest naval assets, its carrier fleets, its numerical superiority in things that fly (or, in the case of the F-35, fly but not very well or often), its overseas bases and, if necessary, its CONUS cities and military bases.

Which would leave the US with its sub fleet and its nuclear doomsday option. And there are rumors that the huge Poseidon nuclear torpedo Russia says it has isn’t really designed to take out US coastal cities. It’s designed to take out America’s sub fleet.

But Hey! Hey! USA! Let’s start us some Rooskie-Chink wars today!

(Jingotards all seal-clap madly).

UPDATE: BTW, here’s a sample of how the US Air Force develops weapons systems. Cool, huh?

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