Let me express my doubts: why would they hit Kyiv with Zircon?
Apparently, out of doubt it will soon be possible to collect the series. But what can you do if from time to time… “Zircons” fly into the information space and are knocked down by packs of “Daggers”. Well, no one is against it, war is worse than hunting and fishing, those who are supposed to lie there are simply enchanting.
But sometimes the level overwhelms.
I watched very carefully for 24 hours what was happening in the telegram channels on both sides of the LBS; something was happening that was not entirely clear. The Ukrainians shouted loudly that they had been hit with Zircon, our most rabid part spoke in the style of “Yes, but if we need to, we’ll add more,” and a very small part of the sober-minded tried to think about the situation.
In fact, the evidence that it was “Zircon” from the Ukrainians was not something the cat cried, but scribbled with a claw. Is this picture, with the alphanumeric “3M22” painted on it, proof? Is this a marking? Are you seriously?
And there is another number. No. 23066. And this number seems to indicate that this is not a top ten item. And here I would think about where it landed. Although, if, as some claim, here we use parts from microwaves and washing machines with all our might, then everything fits together. They took something out, relabeled it as “3M22” and sent it where it was supposed to go. That is, for assembly. Here you have a manually applied number and everything else. Sarcasm, of course, but what else?
But without laughing, then all this hype, of course, is good to a certain extent, but in fact, it is more than difficult to make an identification based on one detail. Especially if you start asking stupid questions out loud.
And the first stupid question is: what does the command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine say about what arrived there? And on the basis of what information did the Ukrainian side conclude that it was Zircon?
But the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine and the rest of the command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine... are silent! And he says nothing on this topic! And, by the way, it’s clear why: because Kiev has no information about Zircon at all and cannot have it! Therefore, the Ukrainian military, who have not lost their brains, are distantly watching the unfolding carnival and are silent. On the one hand, they have nothing to say, and they can remain silent, because now others will say everything for them.
And then, to identify a rocket, you first need to at least have an idea of what it looks like and what it’s made of.
Attention, second stupid question: who saw “Zircon”?
Answering this question, I would say this: whoever was supposed to saw it saw it. There is such a thing - secrecy. And it is she who determines, through the implementation of certain norms set by documents, who has access to missiles of this nature. Developers, manufacturers, testers, engineering and technical personnel. The rest, sorry, are not allowed. There are pictures in Google-Yandex - study them.
Now someone in the know will indignantly say that the pictures there have nothing to do with Zircon, these are the free imaginations of draftsmen on the theme of the American hypersonic X-51, so what can I say... there’s nothing to say, we’ll remain silent. It's like that. We look at the X-51, fortunately that it is hypersonic, and we realize that the Zircon is probably the same. Or perhaps not, but we are not supposed to know that yet.
Therefore, on the basis of which, gentlemen, experts even from the Kyiv Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Expertise, who studied the wreckage, concluded that it was “Zircon” - the third question. To which there is no answer, and it is not yet possible to ask experts. I hope - for now. Otherwise it would be very interesting to ask briefly.
And the last question: where did they launch it from? It is clear that the start from the Crimea region was tracked, but still?
Here some people already screamed that there was nowhere to launch from, since we planned the Zircon on the Nakhimov, Peter the Great, the Antey nuclear submarine and a number of projects such as the nuclear destroyer Leader and the eighth-generation submarine Husky. That is, they have mastered Wikipedia, and the process has begun. And they even measured the distance from Murmansk to Kyiv, concluding that the Zircon could not fly.
They remembered, however, that they could (well, they promised on all sorts of forums) to use the Zircon to modernize the Bastion coastal anti-ship complex. Or they might not have modernized it. It's so vague with us, you know.
Okay, let’s leave out nuclear cruisers, leave nuclear submarines alone, and just keep coastal missile systems in mind. What remains? Yes, a lot of things in general. Some gentlemen forgot that we seem to have been working on a unification program since 2012, so it is theoretically possible to launch Zircon from the same UKSK, which is 3S14. Together with "Caliber" and "Onyx". But here there are possible options, because we don’t have many ships with UKSK, but we do have them. And these are by no means nuclear-powered cruisers, the size of a small village, but completely sane corvettes, frigates, and so on.
But here’s the thing, a ship is an even more noticeable phenomenon than an airplane. Yes, I glance a little towards the same MiG-31 with the Dagger, well, you understand. If panic begins on the other side when the 31st takes off in the evening, then that means they can see. Naturally, with the help of US satellites, it is possible to detect the exit of any ship from any Russian port. And they detect it.
But here the only thing that was sanely voiced from the other side was the arrival of some kind of ballistic missile from the Crimea. Therefore, they have already recovered - from the territory of Crimea.
Or maybe we should listen to ours?
And with ours from the RF Ministry of Defense everything is as usual, but about attracting fleet not a word.
“On the morning of February 7, a group strike was carried out against targets in the rear regions of Ukraine with high-precision weapons long range air and ground based. Among other things, industrial enterprises where unmanned boats, coastal missile systems, and missiles for rocket launchers are assembled were attacked.”
It is somewhat vague, but even before the Ministry of Defense did not list exactly what the strikes were carried out with an accuracy of one. The fact that there was no talk about Zircon is a normal and quite ordinary thing.
But here something else becomes clear, even more important: the ships were not involved in this task. At all. Only coastal launchers remain under suspicion. Precisely coastal ones, the Zircon is primarily an anti-ship missile. That is, with great nuances in application.
We should never forget that an anti-ship missile is primarily designed to destroy ships. That is, radio-contrast targets, which are ships against the background of the water surface. In cities it is more difficult for anti-ship missiles, but they can also work. So the use of Onyx and possibly Zircon against coastal targets for testing purposes is justified. In the end, if there are no targets at sea, what now, not test the missiles?
So if the Zircon was launched, it was from a coastal complex, modernized for the use of this missile. However, there was no information about such complexes in the media, and all assumptions are based only on the fact that no launches were made from the ships.
What did they say on the other side?
It was like this: during the missile attack, at approximately 7.40, a number of TG channels broadcast reports that a ballistic missile was coming from Crimea in the direction of Kyiv. A little later, at 7.44, the Ukrainian Air Force confirmed the movement of a “high-speed missile” towards the capital. Well, then it went crazy.
However, already in the afternoon information came from the Americans that the missile was supersonic, but not hyper.
In general, if you look at the map, this is what it turns out: from Sevastopol (well, there is a place where you can secretly place vehicles from the BRKK) to Kyiv in a straight line, 700 km.
The announced speed characteristics of the Zircon are Mach 6-8 (7200-9600 km/h). Let's take 6M, that is, 7000 km/h to make the calculations easier.
Using the calculator, we find that the Zircon flight from Sevastopol to Kyiv takes no more than 6 minutes. Well, with acceleration, possible maneuvering - let it be 10 from our bounty, although it is clearly too much.
Doesn't fit.
Why? It's simple. How does the start happen? The rocket is ejected with a starting charge, orients itself, turns on the engine and begins to accelerate and set course according to a given program. Even if it was “seen” by air defense radars at the moment of launch. Fine. How long does it take for the radar operators to figure out exactly where the missile is going? At least a minute, or even two. Everyone is convinced that they are heading to Kyiv, then the report. First to your superiors, then further along the team.
Communication works well, the command does not sleep, and gives orders quickly. From the moment he starts, he has no more than 2-3 minutes to do everything. Who will give information to telegram operators there? And even more so, to confirm that “a very fast rocket is coming”? Bredovo. They didn’t have that much time, even if the missile was detected by radar around Kyiv. We had to do other things, for example, try to shoot down a rocket.
But, nevertheless, it was not possible to shoot it down.
According to the TG channel Monitor, the flight of the rocket was a kind of hybrid of the flight of the Kinzhal and Onyx, but the speed of the rocket along the entire flight path was not hypersonic. The “power of medicine” prefers not to throw around statements, which is why “experts” on the Internet are simply exhausted with effort. The only thing that Yuri Ignat, known to us, voiced was that investigators are working with the debris to determine what kind of missile was used to strike. “Splitting” an exploded rocket is not an easy task, good luck to them there.
I immediately remembered the noise that was made by the investigators of the prosecutor’s office and the Kharkov police last year. These serious missile experts seriously argued that Russia was firing North Korean KN-23 ballistic missiles at Kharkov.
Now the marking “3M22” is also proof? In general, one could then simply take it and engrave: “Tse Zircon.” And there would be fewer questions.
But as in that joke: if a fellow captain said that crocodiles fly, then they fly.
In fact, I believe the Americans and their data on the speed of the rocket. And they say that it was a completely ordinary supersonic missile, like the Onyx or Caliber, which are 2-5 times slower than the Zircon. And let no one be confused by the word “ballistic” in the Ukrainian report. This is the normal practice of using anti-ship missiles, with them reaching a height, beyond the reach of enemy air defense missiles, and descending with acceleration at the final part of the trajectory.
In general, what is causing this noise?
Yes, everything is as simple as daylight. The Ukrainians, if they didn’t miss the launch of the rocket, were unable to do anything with it. Of course, now they don’t run around with their phones and take pictures, but it seems to me that the rocket hit where we needed it. That is, the target was hit. And this is exactly what they call zrada on the other side. Full of such evil.
What they showed of the destroyed building - excuse me, knock out one entrance with a warhead of 400 kg of TNT, accelerated to 8 km/h? Somehow I can’t believe it. What if they really hit the factory? According to the one our Ministry of Defense was talking about? And why didn’t they shoot it down if they saw it? Where did the calculations go?
The crews, of course, could have reloaded, since the attack was coming from different directions. But if a significant object is removed, it would be very easy to blame everything on Zircon. They couldn’t, because it’s all hypersonic. Give Ukraine the most modern missiles, please. No, it’s a good script, a good one in its entirety. Everything is taken into account.
The only thing they didn’t take into account was that the Americans also saw the launch, tracked it, and observed all the parameters. And they understood perfectly well that there was no “Zircon” there, but something simpler and more ordinary that the Ukrainian anti-aircraft gunners simply could not intercept.
By the way, the Ukrainian observer Alexander Kovalenko gave a very good opinion that it was not the Zircon that flew to Kiev, but a completely different rocket, not with the same characteristics, the design of which used the same part as the Zircon. This is where the “3M22” marking comes from. No one yet knows what this part was responsible for in the design, but its number indicates that this is a very widespread part. And in reality it can be used in the design of other rockets, since at that time it had already been produced in quantities of more than 20 thousand units.
Some kind of wing deployment unit, for example, which was used in a rocket of a different design.
And this is one of the proofs, but I still consider the telemetry taken by the Americans to be the main one. And it indicates that the rocket did not fly at hypersonic speed, which means it was not a Zircon. And then questions to the Ukrainian anti-aircraft gunners.
In general, no one has officially confirmed this information about Zircon - neither representatives of the Russian Ministry of Defense, nor other high-ranking officials, nor the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense. A calmer part of the media believes that if there really was a Zircon strike, this means that the missile was launched using ground-based systems.
If this is so, and “Bastion” has been modernized, then this means decent hemorrhoids not only for the Ukrainian Armed Forces, but also for NATO. It is much more difficult to track a moving truck than the same MiG-31, the takeoffs of which activate the air raid warning throughout Ukraine. A hypersonic missile is a very problematic weapon for the receiving party.
But for now, it looks more like the Ukrainians have decided to use the Zircon campaign to justify their own failures. And here it is clear why they knock down “Zircon” - “Daggers” and “Calibers” in batches.
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