Posted on 09/19/2017 8:08:23 PM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
Russia's most powerful surface combatant, the nuclear powered Kirov class battlecruiser Pyotr Veliky (Peter the Great), is a fascinating vessel to say the least. The ship is the manifestation of the Soviet Union's top naval weapons technology during the waning years of the Cold War. You can read all about it in this past profile I did on the class. Although she has received some light upgrades in recent years, Pyotr Veliky will be leaving the fleet in the next couple of years to undergo a deep refit. Her long mothballed sister ship, the Admiral Nakhimov, is finishing a similar deep refit and will be taking the Pyotr Veliky's place as the flagship of the Northern Fleet .
This means that Pyotr Veliky still has much of its original armament, including the 20 massive P-700 'Granit/SS-N-19 'Shipwreck' anti-ship cruise missiles stored in canted launch tubes in her bow. And its one of these hulking "carrier killers" that Pyotr Veliky test fired this week. Thankfully, the Russian Ministry of Defense released video of the launch, which is a pretty rare sight to say the least:
I described the SS-N-19 in a previous profile I wrote on the Kuznetsov class aircraft carrier, which also carried a dozen of these missiles:
"These missiles were designed in the late 1970s and intended to allow Russia’s future capital ships to be able to reliably strike American carrier battle groups from outside the range of their surface-based weapon systems. In combat, the missiles would be launched in large salvos, they would then scream toward their targets as fast as mach 2.5 at altitude or at about mach 1.5 while low over the water.
The missiles were very advanced for their time, integrating networking and automated cooperative “swarm” tactics. They were launched at a target (or targets) usually based on third party data, such as coordinates derived by a scout ship, a maritime patrol aircraft, or even a submarine. They would fly toward their targets from over 350 miles away on inertial navigation, then as they approached the suspected target area, one missile out of the swarm would “pop up” to higher altitude to use its own active radar and anti-radiation sensors to obtain updated targeting info. It would then classify these targets and assign them to missiles in the swarm below.
If the pop-up missile was destroyed another one would automatically take its place. The missiles could also accept midcourse updates from third party sources as well and supposedly had connectivity to the now defunct Soviet-era EORSAT satellite network. Once in the terminal attack phase of their flight, each surviving missile would acquire its own target and prosecute that target, blazing over the horizon at supersonic speeds and giving (presumably) American close-in weapon systems little time to react.
There is no doubt, the P-700 was born to be a high-end carrier killer. Their speed and numbers would overwhelm a Carrier Battle Group’s defenses, and their individual warheads were large enough to register a kill even on America’s largest surface combatants.
The Soviet Navy’s aspirations were clear, with twenty of these monsters available on Kirov class battlecruisers, two dozen on Oscar class nuclear guided missile submarines, and a dozen on the carriers that would eventually be known as the Kuznetsov class, Soviet surface action groups could have filled the air with these deadly missiles."
The SS-N-19 with its booster attached is about the size and weight of a combat loaded MiG-21 and packs a 1,650 high explosive charge or a 500kt thermonuclear warhead. In the case of the former, a near miss is still a certain kill, although it's very unlikely that the Russians still deploy these missiles loaded with nuclear warheads.
PUBLIC DOMAIN
Russian crew handles a massive P700/SS-N-19.
So yeah, this was the missile behind Soviet Russia's "carrier killer" strategy of the last decade of the Cold War. But technology has changed a remakrably since the 1980s and the upgraded Kirov class ships will do away with the SS-N-19 system altogether. In a previous piece on the upgrades that will be done to these vessels, the description of what will take the SS-N-19's place is impressive:
"These refitted Kirov class battlecruisers will supposedly feature a whole new set of sensors and subsystems, and most ominously, weapons. Russia’s TASS news agency reports that the ships will receive totally updated multipurpose vertical launch systems, making these ships capable of carrying a much wider variety of anti-ship missiles and many more of them.
Navyrecognition.com sums up this upgrade well, and their analysis is consistent with other sources on the matter:
The Sevmash Shipyard and the Special Machinebuilding Design Bureau (KBSM, a subsidiary of Almaz-Antei) made a deal for 10 3S-14-11442M vertical launch systems (VLS) to equip the Project 11442M Admiral Nakhimov missile cruiser being upgraded now. The contract is valued at 2.559 billion rubles ($33.5 million).
Thus, the ship’s 20 inclined below-deck launchers of P-700 Granit antiship missiles (SS-N-19 Shipwreck) will be replaced with 10 VLS modules of the UKSK versatile ship-based launch system. The VLS modules will total 80. The same solution is expected to be applied to the Pyotr Veliky cruiser.
The 3S-14 VLS can launch the missiles of the Kalibr family (SS-N-27 Sizzler). In addition, the equipment for testing the VLS using mockups of the 3M-54, 3M55 and 3M22 antiship missiles is to be ready be December 2016...”
TASS reports that the upgraded Kirovs will house a mix of hypersonic Zircon, supersonic Onix and long-range subsonic Kalibr cruise missiles, and that with an arsenal of 80 anti-ship missiles stuffed in their vertical launch tubes, these ships will have have “enough to engage any existing naval force globally.”
And this doesn't include the updates to other armaments, including its air defense systems. In total the refitted Kirov class cruisers will have somewhere around 174 vertical launch cells and will sport a seagoing version of the S-400 air defense system.
With all this in mind, and with the Pyotr Veliky heading into refit it the not so distant future, this may be the last time we get to see one of the big "Shipwreck" carrier killers being slung off a Kirov class battlecruiser's bow.
Very Interesting, Ping for your interest.
A dangerous potential adversary , no doubt. But happily for the West, the heritage of the Russian Navy is lackluster at best.
Back in the olden days we were taught to fear these ships.
High respect.
That ship class has been stunning for a long time. Have to be hideously expensive to keep running, as often as they are in the yard.
Actually while these rockets are dangerous they are not stealthy and are outdated. A supercarrier has much more to fear from innovative technology such as stealthy flocks of “seagull” drones. Each less than a foot long, armed with C4 explosive, launched far from target and directed to target from a console far away. Sorry but in the era of modern technology big surface ships are obsolete and vulnerable death traps for their crews.
[ 1,650 high explosive charge or a 500kt thermonuclear warhead. In the case of the former, a near miss is still a certain kill, although it’s very unlikely that the Russians still deploy these missiles loaded with nuclear warheads. ]
In the case of the latter.
Looks like the Rooskies need some high temp marine paint.
What ever happened to the supersonic torpedos?
It was the threat of exactly this sort of attack that lead the U.S.to develop the Aegis.
And IIRC, Aegis could defend against as much as 100 simultaneous missiles.
A few thousand drones is another matter.
Shkval
The torpedo is manufactured in Kyrgyzstan by a state-owned factory. In 2012 the Russian government asked for a 75% ownership of the factory in exchange for writing off massive Kyrgyz debt to Russia.[7]
Big looking ship, beautiful lines and powerful. But an Iowa battleship is over twice the size.
Thanks. Not supersonic, but an interesting concept/technology.
Your point would be?
A Kirov would sink an Iowa class from a couple hundred miles away.
Just like tiny navy aircraft sunk Japanese carriers and battleships.
Regardless, if you were able to hit a large artillery shell coming at you at the speed of many rifle projectiles and hit it; would you feel fine just standing there as the remaining pieces came at you at close to the original velocity?
People have a Popular Mechanix view of the effectiveness of modern defensive systems. They will never be anywhere near 80% or less effective.
Throw in the inevitable fog of war, the sailors that cannot steer out of the way of a huge cargo ship..........
The ship had very outdated instruments and the Captain was using a pointer pointing to a section of the map.. Yep they fired some missiles..
CIWS does well against sequential threats - but it is still vulnerable against saturation attacks and jamming. Sea-skimming missiles, big or small are also a complex problem for the CIWS.
Oh, and we took the CIWS off most of our naval vessels and replaced them with Sidewinder missiles in box launchers. CIWS can’t defend a ship if it’s not there.
At this point, it’s starting to not matter how high tech the launch platform is. You can put an Exocet or four on a cigarette boat containing nothing more high tech than a compass and kill warships with it.
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