Revealed, the dubious reality behind Russia's hypersonic missile claims
The 3M22 Zircon hypersonic missiles, a relatively new design touted by Russia for their anti-ship capabilities, have been met with scepticism. Defense Express, a notable analysis platform, has described them as the biggest fraud committed by missile manufacturers and the Russian Federation's Ministry of Defence, highlighting several concerns surrounding the Zircons.
Ukrainian intelligence's announcement of the number of missiles currently in the Russian arsenal and the factories' monthly production capacity has raised a series of questions about the new Russian Federation designs, as we read on the Defense Express website.
We are talking about anti-ship missiles with a range of about 1,000 kilometres, whose first recorded use occurred in early February 2024. The 3M22 Zircon missiles, which are the subject of discussion, are considered by analysts to be "the biggest fraud" committed in the Russian military sector.
Why is Russia producing so many 3M22 missiles?
This is the first – and at the same time, the most important – question that Defense Express analysts pose. The Russians are supposed to produce up to 10 of these missiles per month, which is "an unexpectedly significant and strange pace of production for a hypersonic missile." This behaviour is even more bizarre, considering that the Russian Federation doesn't have enough ships to launch this ammunition. As we read, currently, the only carriers of this weapon are just two service frigates of Project 22350 and one submarine of Project 885. Moreover, the aggressor's army has several Bastion coastal complexes for launching Zircons.
Russia produces a relatively large number of missiles, even though it doesn't have platforms for their use. Defense Express suggests that this may be because, in fact, 3M22 Zircon is not an anti-ship missile—as the Russians have promoted it—but a conventional medium-range missile for attacking land targets.
Too small a warhead
The argument in favour of this thesis is supposed to be the size of the warhead. Citing earlier sources, Defense Express analysts determined that Zircon has a warhead weighing about 100-150 kilograms, of which a maximum of 40 kilograms is explosives. Such weight allows striking units with a displacement of up to about 5,000 tonnes. This is definitely too weak a weapon to destroy ships with a displacement of about 10,000 tonnes and even more so aircraft carriers, whose displacement reaches approximately 100,000 tonnes.
Furthermore, the Russians achieved the estimated range of 1,000 kilometres for the Zircons by reducing the warhead's mass. Earlier reports regarding this weapon stated that the 3M22 missile has a warhead weighing up to 400 kilograms, but the manufacturer had to resort to the simplest method of increasing the range, which is reducing the warhead.
Analysts from Defense Express used all these arguments to conclude that the 3M22 Zircons could become standard (hypersonic) land missiles with a range of 1,000 kilometres. The Russians might thus use them (now or in the future, accumulating stocks) to launch from mobile complexes to attack land targets.
It is not excluded that the Russian Federation's plans include implementing Zircon missiles into the Iskander system. This cannot currently be confirmed or denied, partly because of the lack of sufficient knowledge about the exact dimensions of 3M22. Confirmations of Defense Express's assumptions can be expected in the coming time when Zircons potentially start to be used for attacks deep into Ukraine.
