At the moment, the United States does not have the ability to defend against hypersonic weapons that Russia and China are developing, according to the report of the American Accounts Chamber. The document lists other developments of the Russian military-industrial complex that may pose a threat to the United States.
“China and Russia are working to develop hypersonic weapons because their speed, altitude and maneuverability can bypass most missile defense systems, and they can be used to improve long-range strike capabilities using both conventional and nuclear weapons. There are no measures to counteract this now,”the auditors write.
Another threat from Moscow and Beijing is the latest stealth aircraft that "can fly faster, are equipped with the latest weapons and are better able to hit targets."
The authors of the report believe that Russia has made significant progress in developing technologies for building submarines and in developing tactics that allow them to avoid surveillance by the United States.
Finally, Russia, along with China, Iran and the DPRK, is capable of carrying out cyberattacks on both civilian and military facilities of the United States, the authors of the document warn.
Another potential threat from Moscow and Beijing is linked by the US Audit Chamber to global climate change.
“The melting Arctic ice could open up previously closed sea routes, potentially expanding access for China and Russia to the region, which could threaten US shipping freedom,” the report said.
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The "Avangard" missile system in hypersonic equipment will begin to enter service next year. According to the commander-in-chief of the Strategic Missile Forces, Colonel-General Sergei Karakaev, one of the regiments of the Dombarovsky Strategic Missile Forces unit in the Orenburg region will be the first to receive the latest weapons. It has been repeatedly reported that a hypersonic warhead is physically impossible to intercept. This means that Avangard completely negates the capabilities of the US missile defense system.
The general public first learned about Avangard in March this year. President Vladimir Putin in his annual message to the Federal Assembly said that the hypersonic gliding warhead is capable of accelerating to speeds twenty times the Mach number, and goes to the target like a fireball with a surface temperature of 1600-2000 degrees Celsius.
Initially, the perspective missile RS-26 “Rubezh” on a mobile soil complex (development of mobile RS-24 “Yars”) was considered as the carrier of the Avangard. However, in the spring it turned out that only the mine version was included in the state armament program until 2027 (GPV-2027) for reasons of economy. The specific type of missile is not named, but the choice of the base location for the first "Vanguards" leaves no special options.
“It has long been no secret that the Dombarovskoe Strategic Missile Forces (13th Missile Division) was created specifically to accommodate the heavy R-36M and R-36M2 ICBMs, referred to in the West as Satan,” says RIA Novosti the editor-in-chief of the Arsenal of the Fatherland magazine Viktor Murakhovsky. - This complex can be equipped with a missile with multiple warheads - up to ten blocks - and means of overcoming missile defense systems. It is too early to say how many "Vanguards" one "Satan" will take at a time and whether it will be used at all for these blocks. But all the opportunities for this are there."
Earlier, the media reported on plans to equip the UR-100N UTTKh liquid-propellant missiles with Avangard, however, it is not known whether the silo launchers of the 13th missile division are suitable for their basing. However, if necessary, the starting infrastructure can be re-equipped.
The first test launch of "Avangard" took place on September 28, 2011 and ended in failure. The rocket, launched from the Plesetsk cosmodrome, failed to hit the target at the Kamchatka Kura training ground with the warhead. However, the next four launches took place as usual. The tests ended on March 18, 2015. As Colonel General Sergei Karakaev said in an interview with Krasnaya Zvezda, the complex was officially adopted, and NPO Mashinostroyenia is already producing serial samples with hypersonic equipment.
Major General Sergei Poroskun, deputy commander of the Strategic Missile Forces for armaments, noted back in the summer that all the necessary infrastructure for the operation of the complex had already been established in the Dombarovsky missile formation, the positional area had been prepared in geodetic and engineering terms, cables for power supply lines, communications and command and control had been laid, personnel training had been organized, weapons, military and special equipment. The troops are waiting for new missiles, capable, as the developers assure, of guaranteed reaching the territory of the most remote probable enemy.
According to information from open sources, the power of one Avangard hypersonic warhead is from 800 kilotons to two megatons, which is comparable to an explosion of about 130 Hiroshima. Detailed performance characteristics have not been officially published. Presumably, the block is 5.4 meters long, the maximum speed is more than 20 times the Mach number. As Karakaev said earlier, the Avangard's body is made of composite materials, which provides resistance to aerodynamic heating of several thousand degrees and reliable protection from laser radiation. However, the main strength of these warheads is their maneuverability.
“When the Avangard was developed, the Americans, who had invested over 100 billion in the national missile defense system, found themselves in a rather stupid position,” continues Viktor Murakhovsky. - All existing and promising interceptor missiles work exclusively on ballistic objects, the flight path of which can be interpolated, detecting the target at two, three, four points of the trajectory. And it doesn't matter what reconnaissance and target designation means are used - space-based or ground-based radars. The whole principle of modern anti-missile defense boils down to launching an anti-missile at a predetermined preemptive point. However, the Avangard hypersonic maneuvering unit maneuvers along a trajectory, not following ballistics. The interception point cannot be calculated in principle."
Another factor that complicates interception is the tremendous speed of mutual convergence of the warhead and the anti-missile: more than ten to fifteen kilometers per second. It is impossible to provide an interceptor maneuver like an anti-aircraft missile, that is, with target tracking. The overloads are such that not a single structural material can withstand: if you try to sharply change the direction of the missile, the missile will simply fall apart.
On December 4, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that Washington is giving Moscow 60 days to return to compliance with the 1987 treaty signed by the United States and the USSR. At the collegium of the Ministry of Defense, Putin once again denied the accusation of non-compliance.
“Yes, the situation is changing, it has changed, but not because we violated the agreement, we are not violating anything. Yes, it is changing in the sense that other countries are developing such types of weapons, there are many such countries, in fact. Well, we would try to start negotiations with these countries,”Putin said (the United States expresses concern that the treaty does not apply to China).
“This is an arms build-up, this is another impetus for an arms race,” Putin added.
He also said that the Dagger missile system, which he spoke about in his message to the Federal Assembly, does not violate the INF Treaty: “Unique, which does not exist in the world - 2 thousand km. The Dagger is a hypersonic weapon with more than 10 Machs. who does not. Yes, we have it, but this is not a violation of the treaty on the elimination of intermediate and shorter-range missiles. Where is the violation here? This is a system located on the plane, not on the territory”(INF Treaty does not apply to air and sea-based missiles).
Putin warned that Russia would respond to the US withdrawal from the treaty: “Let's see how this happens. By and large, we already have everything, but if something happens that they are trying to scare us with, well, we will have to respond accordingly."
“As you understand, if we have such air and sea-based systems, it will probably not be difficult to carry out the relevant R&D [research and development work] and put them on the ground, if necessary,” he explained.