Russia-Ukraine latest: Ukraine downs wave of Russian drones; concert hall attack a ‘significant Russian intelligence failure’ | WorldNews

By Sean Bell, military analyst

The US ambassador to Ukraine has announced that Russia launched “hundreds of missiles and drones” over the past few days, including hypersonic missiles at Kyiv.

The Russian military has recently introduced two new hypersonic missiles – which fly at greater than five times the speed of sound – into its inventory: the air-launched Kinzhal and the ship-launched Zircon missiles.

These missiles were first tested in 2017, cost around $10m each, and were described by President Putin as “indestructible”.

However, the US-provided Patriot missile system appears to have had some success in destroying these hi-tech weapons.

The major challenge these hypersonic missiles present is the limited time available to track, target and intercept the weapons.

They travel at more than twice the speed of a bullet, which creates an immense technical challenge. Russia claims they are the only nation to have such weapons, but is that true?

Russia has been obliged to disclose its hypersonic weapon capability due to the demands of the Ukrainian war.

Although these weapons have a very impressive capability, every time they are launched the West will be watching, tracking, analyzing and evaluating the Russian capability.

This will enable the West to better understand the missile’s strengths, but more importantly also exploit its vulnerabilities.

The West takes great care not to showcase its secret programs to maximize their effectiveness if ever required for major conflict.

In the first Gulf War, the US Air Force deployed the F117 Nighthawk – a stealth fighter developed by the top secret US Skunk works and a US “Black” project.

The Nighthawk had been in service for a decade before it was used in a major conflict, and the attendant secrecy meant that no potential adversary had the chance to develop effective counters to its battle-winning capability.

The West has undoubtedly developed a very impressive range of secret capabilities that will remain covered until required, to preserve the element of surprise and operational effectiveness.

Although Mr Putin’s appears to have fielded a unique and dangerous military capability, it is very likely that despite decades of military development, Russia’s cutting edge technology is fast becoming obsolete.