Over the weekend, Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed in social media posts on Telegram and Twitter that it had fired Kinzhal hypersonic missiles at Ukraine.
What are these weapons, and should we be afraid of them?
According to CNBC, Kinzhal means “dagger” in Russian. The Kh-47M2 Kinzhal is a hypersonic missile that is also an aeroballistic air-to-surface missile with an alleged range of 1,200 miles and a speed of Mach 10, or 10 times faster than the speed of sound. It is designed to be carried in fighter jets.
In general, the term “hypersonic speed” is defined as any speed beyond Mach 5, or five times faster than the speed of sound. However, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute said hypersonic speed is more complicated than just Mach.
“Since the Mach number strongly depends on the surrounding gas that the object is moving through, using a Mach number for definitions becomes more and more difficult once the surrounding gas gets thinner and thinner—and disappears completely at higher altitudes,” said the institute.
Earlier this year, “hypersonic missiles” made headlines when North Korea performed test flights of what it claimed were “hypersonic” missiles.
“There are two major defining characteristics are prerequisite to label a weapon ‘hypersonic,’” according to the Russian International Affairs Council. These include speed exceeding Mach 5 and “capability to make maneuvers (both vertical and horizontal) while traveling at this speed inside the atmosphere.”
Russia has been investing in hypersonic missile development for years. In 2018, Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin unveiled the Kinzhal and said Russia had developed a new prototype missile that “can reach any point in the world” as well as a supersonic weapon that cannot be tracked by anti-missile systems.
Both Russia and China have been leading the way in the development of hypersonic missiles and the U.S. has been “behind the curve,” according to CNBC.
Russia claims it deployed its “Kinzhal aviation missile systems with hypersonic aeroballistic missiles from the airspace over Crimea territory,” to hit a Ukrainian base.
CNBC identified a hypersonic missile target in Ukraine as a “large underground warehouse of Ukrainian missiles and aviation ammunition in Delyatin, in the Ivano-Frankivsk region of western Ukraine.”
Russia’s Defense Ministry also released a video Saturday that claimed it showed the missile strike on the arms depot. CNBC said it was not able to verify the claim.
Although President Joe Biden indicated that Russia used a hypersonic missile, according to Politico, The Pentagon had not confirmed it as of Tuesday.
“They’ve just launched a hypersonic missile because it’s the only thing that they can get through with absolute certainty,” said Biden.
According to Politico, a senior Defense Department official said Monday that they found Russia’s Kinzhal claims strange.
“It’s a bit of a head-scratcher, to be honest with you, because it’s not exactly clear why — if it’s true — why would you need a hypersonic missile fired from not that far away to hit a building?” the official said.
Some possible reasons could be that Russia’s military is running low on precision guided munitions or that Russia is trying to send a message to Ukraine and countries that have provided aid.
“But…from a military perspective, if it was a hypersonic missile, there’s not a whole lot of practicality about it,” said the official.
According to a report released last month from the Center for Strategic and International Studies said that defending against hypersonic missiles “is strategically necessary, technologically possible, and fiscally affordable,” though it may not be an easy task and will include “different approaches and new ways of thinking.”
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