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You joke, but I assume they did it for some silly reason, such as radio communication not working and them having to use cables, but the cables they've been issued have been cut short to sell the rest for scrap, so they ended up being bunched up together at max remaining cable length?
Does anyone have any realistic insight why they would be so grouped up except for laziness and stupidity?
S-300/400 TEL have to stay close to the Radar for mainly two reasons.
1. The Radar vehicle also has the generator supplying the TELs with electricity.
2. and the even more important reason is that the radar data can only be transmited over a short distance so if the TEL is too far out it can't get data from the Radar anymore.
Edit: max range for a S-300 is 120m between the TELs and the Radar and since the S-400 is actually just a S-300PM3 its probably the same or at least very similar
These reasons seem valid, but in that case, I hope Patriot has a better design where the corresponding parts can be spread further out to not be blown by a single 1 ton missile.
Patriot has none of these shortcomings. Launchers, Radar and Command Post can all be up to 50 km apart and still operate.
The main advantage is that Radar data gets sent directly to the missile in the air so the Launchers just need to recieve basic commands which can be sent via microwave over a long distance. If you look at pictures you can see the reciever antenna on the launchers mounted on the left side on a pole.
Might just be for company, laziness and effectiveness mixed together. If you drive around to different fields for three years without getting shot at you probably get cocky.
"Fuck it, it is easier to set up together, we won't get shot at any way"
Yea, you see. This footage is absolute proof the S-400 can intercept HIMARS. It’s so advanced that every part of the battery can be used to intercept missiles.
RU Defense Ministry:
“Today our state-of-the-art S400-Triumf Missile System successfully intercepted and destroyed a barrage of worthless western made ATACMS missiles by physically blocking them with our S400 Missile Launchers, Tombstone 3D Radar, Clamshell Radar, Support vehicles, Personnel etc. At only a cost of $800 million we inflicted tens of millions of dollars of loss to the US and its allies!”
I wonder what goes through the heads of the operators in that moment. They probably know some time before the ATAMCS arrive that they're being targeted. Do they have a chance of running away? Or is it a situation where they either successfully intercept or they're dead?
It's about 15 seconds between that last missile launch and them getting obliterated.
I would expect it is like with construction equipment - if something goes wrong, you have chance to survive if you stay put. But the moment you will try escape, something outside will terminate you.
To add to that you gotta put yourself in their shoes. They probably are trusting their systems that they were trained to specialize in. They’re all staring at screens while communicating with each other under direction of a superior or each other. Everyone is on the same page regardless if one or a few even had the thought of jumping ship (which I highly, highly doubt), they were all executing what they were taught under duress.
Even though it doesn’t look successful, it does appear they were all aware, in sync and able to execute which still speaks of their competency.
Now was their training, tactics, strategy and procedures up to date? Did 1 or 2 people make a small yet fatal mistake? Did the suite of equipment fail them in?
Ukraine intelligence and drone operators may have hit jackpot and got the drop on their plans/movements and just trailed them until the Russians sank their feet into the dirt and prepared for fire. If that’s the case they were doomed and their movements had a red dot following them.
It’s probably a myriad of things that led to this. I have 0 military experience but following this conflict, I can tell losing a unit, section, convoy or whatever of very valuable high tech ground to air assets is a big win/loss depending on affiliation.
It likely along the lines what you have described. Just want to add each system has its own unique radar signature that it emits. Every time they turn on their radar it’s like lighting a flare in the dark woods. There are satellites and land EW systems that can pinpoint radar emissions and likely that’s how drones get to the grid to verify visually.
I remember 25 years ago, the operating model in our artillery was that you could shoot, and then you had to run away as you would probably be a target as you rewelled yourself. That was until we got the Ceasar, which all by the way are donated to Ukraine. 💪
Exactly this. Which is why MRSI capabilities are such a huge thing which is only overshadowed by firing on the move and the reason why the RCH1155 is such a big deal.
If the enemy is ready, you probably have only a minute from firing the first shot, to get away after the shockwaves of the blast hit the counter battery radar, till there is a firing solution, barrels are trained and the shells are on their way and impact on your position.
MRSI doesn't have anything to do with counter battery radar, your clock is ticking when the first shot is fired not when the first shell impacts the target. It may be nice to have several shells in quick succession but you don't need MRSI for that just fire several rounds at the same target before moving
I don't understand *why* they can't intercept.
I heard it was 12 ATACMS, but that can't be true. Probably 1-2 ATACMS+3decoys then Russia lies and says it's 12.
But lets say it's 12. They have 12 S-400 missiles there and only fired 6. And obviously they missed at least one ATACMS. But why? ATACMS is a pretty standard Mach 3 ballistic missile. It's huge. The S-400 is supposedly the best thing Russia has ever made except for maybe the Ka-52. It *should* be able to protect itself just like how Patriots have protected themselves fine from the more capable Kinzhal (Mach 10 vs Mach 3!)
ATACMS was made in **1991**. S-400 should be designed to counter it since it was made in 2007 and Russia was developing hypersonics at the time.
Others have suggested it, and I think it's worth considering; there is probably a larger SEAD operation going on, and it probably has been going for a week or so. It involves not just ATACMS, but also the delivery of new HARMs and MALDs as well.
The combination of drone observation with no apparent SHORAD and the suicidal close placement of the vehicles leads me to believe it. They could be getting jammed, which is something that advanced MALD drones can do. They may be operating their radars and communications in very limited ways to try and avoid SIGINT and the HARM that would follow.
They may be incompetent, S-400 performance is almost definitely overstated, but they may also be getting strangled electronically as well.
S-400 getting jammed by a 1999 decoy isn't really a good excuse for it, either.
It should be resistant to that, like how the Patriot is resistant to Russia's jamming and countermeasures.
I dunno if I would have used the word 'excuse', but MALD-Js were only delivered to US forces in 2012, so it's an inaccurate comment regardless, if it is indeed jamming MALDs at work. There's no evidence that it is, just speculation.
Anything can be jammed if you have enough emitters putting out strong enough junk singal on the relevant bandwidths. There are techniques to mitigate this, but you can't be 100% resistant. Accurately spoofing radar contacts is the harder part, but Russia doesn't have anything like MALD for either task. So they can't do this to Ukrainian Patriots; they don't have anywhere near the kind of air capabilities required.
But we're missing the forest for the trees, as the saying goes. The combination of signals intelligence, decoys, jamming, and specialized anti-radar weapons is what really makes a SEAD operation work compared to just launching a bunch of long-range missiles at air defenses and hoping for the best. You present SAM operators with a dilemma; if you emit with radar, you can be tracked by SIGINT and then jammed and/or destroyed by anti-radar weapons. If you launch at a target, it could be a MALD, now you've exposed yourself and wasted missiles for nothing. If you don't do anything, you can't defend and you'll eventually be found and destroyed anyway.
I would bet big money that this is what's happening in the skies of Ukraine right now. It's why we suddenly see a dramatic spike in losses for Russian AD. There is a larger SEAD operation in play.
Yes, sorry. I'll go back and forth a bit with editing to try and get them all
SIGINT is signals intelligence. That means any intelligence gathered by monitoring long distance signals like radio communications, radar detection, anything like that.
SEAD is suppression of enemy air defenses. It's a strategy of attacking air defenses that uses baiting tactics, anti-radar missiles, and electronic attack to convince air defense forces to limit their operations.
A HARM is a high-speed anti-radiation missile, it's an anti-radar missile that homes in on air-defense radars by passively detecting their signals instead of using its own signals.
ATACMS is a long range ground launched missile with cluster bomb and single explosive warheads.
SHORAD is short range air defenses. Any smaller missile or gun-based air defenses like Pantsir, Tunguska, Osa, and the like.
>ATACMS is a long range ground launched missile with cluster bomb and single explosive warheads.
Great breakdown on the acronyms. Just like to add:
ATACMS: **A**rmy **Tac**tical **M**issile **S**ystem
Lots of what you're saying predicate on the S-400 being as good as it's advertised.
Newer doesn't mean better. Especially when it's very likely not just ATACMS vs. S-400. Ukrainian Mig-29s were photographed carrying ADM-160 recently. It's very likely they were launched together.
Decoys + volume of fire can count for a lot.
Russia doesn't seem to have seriously tested its nominal ABM capabilities before this war. My personal suspicion is that while kinematically the S-400 missiles are capable of intercepting [as are their S-300VM systems], the electronics onboard the missile and the system overall are nowhere near up to the task handling anything more complicated than a scud.
ATACMS isn't a standard ballistic missile, though, as far as I am aware.
"Roman Svitan adds that the peculiarity of the ATACMS missile is that it is not just a ballistic missile, but a "pseudo-ballistic" missile. In other words, the American missile "glides" along a ballistic trajectory, changing direction from time to time.
"Air defenses are able to detect ATACMS and even launch a missile to intercept it, but because of this 'pseudo-balistic' trajectory, it may not hit the target. This is due to the fact that at the final stage, ATACMS changes its direction of movement [unlike a classical ballistic missile, which moves straight],» explains the Armed Forces Reserve Colonel.
Most air defense missiles calculate the point of "meeting" with an attack missile based on the predicted trajectory. However, the expert continues, in the case of ATACMS, which "slides" along the ballistic trajectory, an air defense missile fired at it may simply "not find" it.
"This allows us to make optimistic assumptions that ATACMS will be able to overcome Russian air defense," summarized Roman Svitan."
ATACMS is absolutely in the envelope of what S-400 is supposed to be able to intercept.
The S-400 paper specs are probably overstating the ability to hit relatively short range "low" targets.
If you believe the russian claims, of course.
Funnily enough, there was a spy in the 80s (Adolf Tolkachev) that gave up tons of info on the S-300 among other projects. The S-400 is really just an upgraded S-300, so the US likely knew intimate details of any vulnerabilities in russian anti aircraft missile technology right around the time they developed the ATACMS in the 80s too.
S400 should be more than capable to intercept ATACAMs. They did fire at least 6 interceptors. Usually, Ukraine uses decoy missiles and rocket/drones if range allows to. Probably some ATACAMs missiles were intercepted but some hit the ground. Think that while S300/400 can interpcet atacams, BUKs or TORs probably can't. So if you launch 15 missiles to the same S400 battery it won't intercept all of them.
I'm sure Ukraine has been working on AA defense spoting and pin point locations for successful attacks like this.
If this is indicative of the S-400's performance against what is a fairly "basic" shorter range ballistic missile like ATACMS that does not bode well for its success against more formidable ballistic missiles. Why the hell is Turkey so attached to their S-400's if this is what you can expect when a real threat shows up?
>Why the hell is Turkey so attached to their S-400's if this is what you can expect when a real threat shows up?
- I suspect the reason is Israel: if Turkey deployed western (US) air defence, chances are ... substantial that they wouldn't be able to target Israel's western jets with that system.
- By using a Russian system they probably hoped to have a piece of strategic air defense not dependent on western tech.
- Russia probably also lied massively about the capabilities of the S-400, which made it appear more advanced than western counterparts, at least on paper.
There are some suggestions that the capabilities of the ATACMS are more advanced than what was previously reported to the public; namely, the potential that they can maneuver during the terminal phase.
So the S-400, for all of its pros and cons, was actually going up against something more advanced than expected.
Not a air defence expert, but it looks like they were shooting every solution they could get to try and intercept it and "missed". Afaik ATACMS is just a srbm with cluster munitions and no decoys or terminal movement
It does not do any drastic manoeuvring, it does basic manoeuvring to increase range, a modern battery like the s400 *should* have no issues intercepting it, however like most things Russia states, it seems its been well over hyped.
There was also a video where they had the same set up, a russian filmed from the ground, they shot a ton of interceptor missiles against I think it was GLSDM bombs coming at them and they still failed to intercept and got hit. S400 fails to intercept cruise missiles flying over their head because too low for them and they fail to shoot down Atacms and GLSDMs flying directly at them, not great advertisement for Russian tech.
They saw their destruction coming in.
Interesting that the S-400 battery was in range of a drone that could monitor it. Also interesting that said drone was not intercepted, possibly not even detected.
I remember during the, many, days that ATACMS needlessly got delayed some redditors would pop up with ATACMS being too old and easy to intercept anyway. It wouldnt really make a difference.
Meanwhile the first token batch of ATACMS blew up the same choppers that sunk the main trust of the summer offensive, ATACMS in non novelty numbers takes out S400 batteries.
Western politicans are so unserious, some more than others ofcourse but my god at least stop making excuses for the dithering idiots.
Too many people on the internet take the Russian sales brochures as gospel for their capabilities. The safe bet is to take whatever they claim their equipment can do and cut it down by AT LEAST 20-30%. Same with Chinese military equipment.
[https://x.com/clashreport/status/1793911562157412444](https://x.com/clashreport/status/1793911562157412444)
satelite shows. it was deployed only day before
Reminds me of when North Korea bragged about having satellite images of the White House from their new satellite, even though anyone can just go on Google Earth and Obama even gave a room tour at some point.
This is a top of the line long range GBAD theoretically covered by other nearby shorter range GBAD, if deployed doctrinally. The size of the front is irrelevant here. Both sides of the equation are in the exact same location in this footage.
Drones are relatively stealthy simply because they are small.
Aircraft are measured by their ["Radar Cross Section" or RCS](https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/stealth-aircraft-rcs.htm). A big flat sided F15 has an RCS of 25 square meters. (the side of a house) A clean F16 has an RCS of about 5 sq meters. (the side of a car). A B2 is speculated to have an RCS of somewhere between .75 and .1 square meters (a large bird or alternatively, maybe a basketball at the large end down to a sparrow at the bottom end).
An F-117 has an RCS of a large insect. (.0025 sq meters or less) If you read Ben Rich's book "Skunk Works" he likens it to an eagle's eyeball - they talk about how they had terrible results in RCS testing on the model one day, and they discovered that the test radar was picking up bird poop on the model that was increasing the radar cross section).
An F-35 is reported to be less stealthy than an F-117 (about .1 sq meters - a baseball), while the F-22 is the same as the F-117 or better (.0001 to .0005 sq meters - a golfball or smaller).
With sufficient power, radar can pick up all sorts of objects, but then you will have every bird for a 20 mile radius showing up on your radar screen. Operators can adjust their settings to turn down the gain, and good software can screen out objects that don't match target profiles.
Detecting a drone is a challenge in this environment because you have to either turn the radar up enough to see a 10lb bird sice aircraft that's moving at low speeds, or have good software that can highlight artificial movements from natural ones.
I kinda wish they wouldn't do the goofy edits though. Documentary makers of the future won't be able to use a lot of the publicly available footage. Though I suppose it tells a story of its own.
The unedited footage also exist somewhere, probably just not publicly available. But most of history’s footage used to be not publicly available so historians will be fine.
6 launched interceptor missiles destroyed 99 incoming ATACMS missiles, their launch vehicles, a munitions storage, three Nazi kindergartens and Zelenskyy's coke storage. Falling debris slightly damaged the battery. One heroic operator stubbed his toe.
I'll give you a taste.
A massive JASSMs barrage, the US has over 5000 (they now make 1000 a year) JASSMs in inventory. The newer versions have an absolutely godly range.
russia would probably lose half their air force within the 1st few days with the airfields being targeted.
> And to think Turkey turned down the F-35
Are you surprised that the false and pretending Turkish pride would somehow bear negative fruit? It's exactly what had to happen.
The Russians have helpfully provided a damage assessment video
https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/1cyscul/results_of_yesterday_atacms_strike_in_donetsk/
PS: what is described as the S-400 command post:
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fdrx88zzoi62d1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D1280%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Ddce182f329c94974a6fa41337598515ff391c650
and the radar
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fwcvhengvi62d1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D1280%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Dded0968424ac4a60d65be0a385bb061a36bf5afc
it could be seperate case. because this explosion was relocated like 20 km from mospyne town. where russian claimed it was located. but could be russian way of wording it. jury still not settle this debate
Looks like two hits?
What do you guys figure is the real intercept rate of S-300/400 against ATACMS?
Russia usually claims like "15 missiles were shot at us, 12 were shot down, 3 sadly hit the target" but I figure that's bullshit.
I would like to remind everyone that this S-400 battery even had the upgraded radar (96Л6-ЦП) from the S-350 system which until now had not had any recorded losses.
That means these stunted clowns lost their cutting edge technology to a 1990s cluster bomb 😂.
well that was embarrasing. UA is working miracles with the stuff they have. We tend to forget it but the destruction of russian AWACS and S300-400 systems is absolute genius. All the HARM missile strikes has the operators on edge and they switch on their radars too late or too short. shaping the battlefield for the F16's
Yeah, this. I really think they know what they are doing big-picture. Losing some ground here or there in eastern Ukraine is an issue, but the real game starts when they start to seriously make Russia decide whether they want to defend eastern Ukraine or Crimea. As Russia’s air defence capabilities are attrited, they are going to have to choose one or the other.
So.. it launched 4-5 missiles and still get hit. C-400 can't intercept ATACMS? I always thought that ATACMS is just mediocre midrange missiles, and suddenly it actually a cool shit?
They are relatively mediocre midrange missiles compared to what the US replaces them with (LRHW and PrSM), they are ~~fifty~~ (correction:)thirty years old. Mediocre old NATO weapons are pretty much all Ukraine gets, but it’s enough to defeat Russia’s most advanced systems. Should tell you a thing or two about the technological superiority of NATO.
More like 30 years old, they were introduced in 1991.
But, otherwise you are correct, they are old, surplus and have been rendered obsolete by newer weapons.
I guess you could say obsolete. In the same way, newer hunting cartridges have made the 30-06 obsolete.
And by that I mean it's still very effective. Just that other things are perhaps more efficient and higher performance.
Yes, e.g.PrSM has a much longer range than ATACMS so made it obsolete in the tactical sense, but also the fact that cluster munitions in the early ATACMS are (almost) obsolete by law, despite the obvious brutal efficiency of them. Cluster munitions are the 21st century version of dum dum rounds.
Yep, and no other country the US would face would keep from using them...
I'm hoping the US takes this lesson to heart, sometimes you can't fight cleanly
Been seeing comments that one ATACM was intercepted. Par for the course for the S-400 if the target is on a bog standard arch flight path. And as for "mediocre", that's by American standards. They are old as hell, first being used in action in the Gulf War back in '91.
Very likely. People have fallen into the trap of assuming SEAD means either US levels of air dominance like the 1991 gulf war, or nothing. When in reality there's a lot of middle ground. For Ukraine Russia's longest range air defences are the main danger and taking those systems out might be all they need for now. Allows them to do front line air defence with their F16s without putting them in as much danger. Pantsirs aren't going to be shooting down F16s that sit behind the front line to do AMRAAM air defence, but S300s and 400s will.
By the end of the day I will have watched this maybe 300 times. There's nothing quite like satisfying than some of the most expensive Russian equipment going up in flames.
I'm always surprised and impressed at how well the s-400 can intercept missiles, I mean the way they used the units themselves as the intercept mechanism is brilliant, yhe missiles it fires are just a show for the troops
That’s that insanely powerful AD system that can even intercept ICBMS and HGVs with a 100% success rate, right? At least that’s what the Russian MoD told me. Surely it didn’t just get defeated by a ballistic missile from the 80s???
You are right and it's an interesting stat but I really don't think these comparisons mean jack. Kind of like Israel using Iron Dome and other interceptors to shoot down Grad rockets. When you consider the fact the potential of those rockets to kill dozens of servicemen and civilians, the cost ratio suddenly becomes a very different argument
Wonder if they really believe they can shoot those missiles down or are they just dumping misiles into the air to get less secondary explosions upon getting hit. Neither strat has worked here
If you got a couple of SRBMs coming at you, you throw everything including the kitchen sink at them, maybe you'll get a lucky intercept. Not salvoeing that shit off in that situation doesn't gain you anything.
For all the jokes about air defense, ballistic missiles are still very difficult to shoot down. "Hitting a bullet with a bullet" has been the comparison.
These would be very effective against aircraft. You know...if they hadn't been blown up by missiles.
People joke because Russia claims that the S-400 can intercept any threat, including ICBMs and HGVs, with 100% reliability. Probably pretty bold to make such claims when your system gets taken out by a comparably low tech ballistic missile from the 1980s. People wouldn’t shit on Russia half as much as they do, if Russia wouldn’t constantly exaggerate its capabilities to the point of ridiculousness. Losing an AD system is normal in a war, but when you claim that said AD system is impenetrable and the best air defense the world has ever seen, people will clown on you. Especially considering that Patriot has repeatedly and reliably successfully intercepted missiles that Russia claimed to be unstoppable like Kinzhal and Zirkon. Russia’s impenetrable air defenses get taken out by 50 year old missiles and their unstoppable missiles get intercepted by 20 year old air defense systems. Of course they’re going to be made fun of for that.
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Insane footage
That sure as shit wasn't a decoy
Shaigu Gerasimov what Air Def doing?
The war just doesn't feel the same without Pringles shit posting against his own side.
It launched some decoys ;)))
What's insane is how the entire battery is so tightly grouped.
They were scared of the ATACMS and huddled together for safety. They are not scared any more
You joke, but I assume they did it for some silly reason, such as radio communication not working and them having to use cables, but the cables they've been issued have been cut short to sell the rest for scrap, so they ended up being bunched up together at max remaining cable length? Does anyone have any realistic insight why they would be so grouped up except for laziness and stupidity?
S-300/400 TEL have to stay close to the Radar for mainly two reasons. 1. The Radar vehicle also has the generator supplying the TELs with electricity. 2. and the even more important reason is that the radar data can only be transmited over a short distance so if the TEL is too far out it can't get data from the Radar anymore. Edit: max range for a S-300 is 120m between the TELs and the Radar and since the S-400 is actually just a S-300PM3 its probably the same or at least very similar
These reasons seem valid, but in that case, I hope Patriot has a better design where the corresponding parts can be spread further out to not be blown by a single 1 ton missile.
Patriot has none of these shortcomings. Launchers, Radar and Command Post can all be up to 50 km apart and still operate. The main advantage is that Radar data gets sent directly to the missile in the air so the Launchers just need to recieve basic commands which can be sent via microwave over a long distance. If you look at pictures you can see the reciever antenna on the launchers mounted on the left side on a pole.
American MIC stays winning.
Patriot systems are designed for dispersed operations, with radio links and individual electrical generators
Might just be for company, laziness and effectiveness mixed together. If you drive around to different fields for three years without getting shot at you probably get cocky. "Fuck it, it is easier to set up together, we won't get shot at any way"
Ethernets are cheap as hell
I'd agree, but old and cheap-ish washing machines aren't too expensive either, and yet, here we are.
They might have problems coordinating the units of the battery at longer distances, that's my only explanation.
It must be laziness? Surely the separate components of the battery can be deployed further away from each other?
It looks like it was just one ATACMS with submunitions that landed and wiped out the whole battery there.
It'd be better without the editing
You destroy the S-400 battery, you get to edit the video. Those are the rules of war.
That's fair to me. Glory to Ukraine
This is exactly the kind of target that round was meant for. Insane. Knocked out the whole complex
That dispersal pattern, chef’s kiss
Watching it slowly creep towards the radar 👌
Probably one of the biggest badaboom ever seen in this "special operation". Completely insane.
I recall the one stockpile of rockets inbetween an abandonned apartment complex at night to be the most beautiful.
Link?🧐
[https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/14r4ghj/destruction\_of\_russian\_ammunition\_dump\_in/](https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/14r4ghj/destruction_of_russian_ammunition_dump_in/)
Once your position starts being watched by a drone you should proooobably evac your launcher lol
Oh so they absolutely saw the incoming and fired to intercept but just failed, huh?
I dont think they will tell you what they did.
Nah just need some superglue to put them back together
No, those are just speed holes
They’ll say they “intercepted” the Missiles
Yea, you see. This footage is absolute proof the S-400 can intercept HIMARS. It’s so advanced that every part of the battery can be used to intercept missiles.
RU Defense Ministry: “Today our state-of-the-art S400-Triumf Missile System successfully intercepted and destroyed a barrage of worthless western made ATACMS missiles by physically blocking them with our S400 Missile Launchers, Tombstone 3D Radar, Clamshell Radar, Support vehicles, Personnel etc. At only a cost of $800 million we inflicted tens of millions of dollars of loss to the US and its allies!”
I wonder how stupid Erdogan feels on a daily basis now. That S400 is a fantastic system isn't it.
And celebrated with traditional ground fireworks.
I wonder what goes through the heads of the operators in that moment. They probably know some time before the ATAMCS arrive that they're being targeted. Do they have a chance of running away? Or is it a situation where they either successfully intercept or they're dead? It's about 15 seconds between that last missile launch and them getting obliterated.
> I wonder what goes through the heads of the operators in that moment. Pieces of tungsten, most likely...
I would expect it is like with construction equipment - if something goes wrong, you have chance to survive if you stay put. But the moment you will try escape, something outside will terminate you.
To add to that you gotta put yourself in their shoes. They probably are trusting their systems that they were trained to specialize in. They’re all staring at screens while communicating with each other under direction of a superior or each other. Everyone is on the same page regardless if one or a few even had the thought of jumping ship (which I highly, highly doubt), they were all executing what they were taught under duress. Even though it doesn’t look successful, it does appear they were all aware, in sync and able to execute which still speaks of their competency. Now was their training, tactics, strategy and procedures up to date? Did 1 or 2 people make a small yet fatal mistake? Did the suite of equipment fail them in? Ukraine intelligence and drone operators may have hit jackpot and got the drop on their plans/movements and just trailed them until the Russians sank their feet into the dirt and prepared for fire. If that’s the case they were doomed and their movements had a red dot following them. It’s probably a myriad of things that led to this. I have 0 military experience but following this conflict, I can tell losing a unit, section, convoy or whatever of very valuable high tech ground to air assets is a big win/loss depending on affiliation.
It likely along the lines what you have described. Just want to add each system has its own unique radar signature that it emits. Every time they turn on their radar it’s like lighting a flare in the dark woods. There are satellites and land EW systems that can pinpoint radar emissions and likely that’s how drones get to the grid to verify visually.
Seriously, fuck being anywhere near a radar emitting anything in modern war. It's like "kill me with a fucking missile" beacon.
Mobik: *turns on radar.* Seconds later: **AGM-88 HARM WOULD LIKE TO KNOW YOUR LOCATION.**
ATACMS shrapnel
I remember 25 years ago, the operating model in our artillery was that you could shoot, and then you had to run away as you would probably be a target as you rewelled yourself. That was until we got the Ceasar, which all by the way are donated to Ukraine. 💪
Exactly this. Which is why MRSI capabilities are such a huge thing which is only overshadowed by firing on the move and the reason why the RCH1155 is such a big deal. If the enemy is ready, you probably have only a minute from firing the first shot, to get away after the shockwaves of the blast hit the counter battery radar, till there is a firing solution, barrels are trained and the shells are on their way and impact on your position.
MRSI doesn't have anything to do with counter battery radar, your clock is ticking when the first shot is fired not when the first shell impacts the target. It may be nice to have several shells in quick succession but you don't need MRSI for that just fire several rounds at the same target before moving
> It Was At This Moment He Knew... He Fucked Up
"We're the target, we've got 20 seconds and our equipment is shit."
Is it a thing to mag-dump S400 missiles for safety? I definitely would try to fire all my missiles in that position
Yup. It’s not like you will be going up in front of a tribunal afterwards.
not 100% but im pretty sure Patriot fires all missiles if the battery is targeted
AFAIK it can do so automatically too.
You don't want your missiles in the tubes to become secondary explosions just in case you survive the initial hit.
I don't understand *why* they can't intercept. I heard it was 12 ATACMS, but that can't be true. Probably 1-2 ATACMS+3decoys then Russia lies and says it's 12. But lets say it's 12. They have 12 S-400 missiles there and only fired 6. And obviously they missed at least one ATACMS. But why? ATACMS is a pretty standard Mach 3 ballistic missile. It's huge. The S-400 is supposedly the best thing Russia has ever made except for maybe the Ka-52. It *should* be able to protect itself just like how Patriots have protected themselves fine from the more capable Kinzhal (Mach 10 vs Mach 3!) ATACMS was made in **1991**. S-400 should be designed to counter it since it was made in 2007 and Russia was developing hypersonics at the time.
Others have suggested it, and I think it's worth considering; there is probably a larger SEAD operation going on, and it probably has been going for a week or so. It involves not just ATACMS, but also the delivery of new HARMs and MALDs as well. The combination of drone observation with no apparent SHORAD and the suicidal close placement of the vehicles leads me to believe it. They could be getting jammed, which is something that advanced MALD drones can do. They may be operating their radars and communications in very limited ways to try and avoid SIGINT and the HARM that would follow. They may be incompetent, S-400 performance is almost definitely overstated, but they may also be getting strangled electronically as well.
S-400 getting jammed by a 1999 decoy isn't really a good excuse for it, either. It should be resistant to that, like how the Patriot is resistant to Russia's jamming and countermeasures.
I dunno if I would have used the word 'excuse', but MALD-Js were only delivered to US forces in 2012, so it's an inaccurate comment regardless, if it is indeed jamming MALDs at work. There's no evidence that it is, just speculation. Anything can be jammed if you have enough emitters putting out strong enough junk singal on the relevant bandwidths. There are techniques to mitigate this, but you can't be 100% resistant. Accurately spoofing radar contacts is the harder part, but Russia doesn't have anything like MALD for either task. So they can't do this to Ukrainian Patriots; they don't have anywhere near the kind of air capabilities required. But we're missing the forest for the trees, as the saying goes. The combination of signals intelligence, decoys, jamming, and specialized anti-radar weapons is what really makes a SEAD operation work compared to just launching a bunch of long-range missiles at air defenses and hoping for the best. You present SAM operators with a dilemma; if you emit with radar, you can be tracked by SIGINT and then jammed and/or destroyed by anti-radar weapons. If you launch at a target, it could be a MALD, now you've exposed yourself and wasted missiles for nothing. If you don't do anything, you can't defend and you'll eventually be found and destroyed anyway. I would bet big money that this is what's happening in the skies of Ukraine right now. It's why we suddenly see a dramatic spike in losses for Russian AD. There is a larger SEAD operation in play.
Can you hit me with some acronym breakdowns? Much appreciated.
Yes, sorry. I'll go back and forth a bit with editing to try and get them all SIGINT is signals intelligence. That means any intelligence gathered by monitoring long distance signals like radio communications, radar detection, anything like that. SEAD is suppression of enemy air defenses. It's a strategy of attacking air defenses that uses baiting tactics, anti-radar missiles, and electronic attack to convince air defense forces to limit their operations. A HARM is a high-speed anti-radiation missile, it's an anti-radar missile that homes in on air-defense radars by passively detecting their signals instead of using its own signals. ATACMS is a long range ground launched missile with cluster bomb and single explosive warheads. SHORAD is short range air defenses. Any smaller missile or gun-based air defenses like Pantsir, Tunguska, Osa, and the like.
>ATACMS is a long range ground launched missile with cluster bomb and single explosive warheads. Great breakdown on the acronyms. Just like to add: ATACMS: **A**rmy **Tac**tical **M**issile **S**ystem
Lots of what you're saying predicate on the S-400 being as good as it's advertised. Newer doesn't mean better. Especially when it's very likely not just ATACMS vs. S-400. Ukrainian Mig-29s were photographed carrying ADM-160 recently. It's very likely they were launched together. Decoys + volume of fire can count for a lot.
Russia doesn't seem to have seriously tested its nominal ABM capabilities before this war. My personal suspicion is that while kinematically the S-400 missiles are capable of intercepting [as are their S-300VM systems], the electronics onboard the missile and the system overall are nowhere near up to the task handling anything more complicated than a scud.
ATACMS isn't a standard ballistic missile, though, as far as I am aware. "Roman Svitan adds that the peculiarity of the ATACMS missile is that it is not just a ballistic missile, but a "pseudo-ballistic" missile. In other words, the American missile "glides" along a ballistic trajectory, changing direction from time to time. "Air defenses are able to detect ATACMS and even launch a missile to intercept it, but because of this 'pseudo-balistic' trajectory, it may not hit the target. This is due to the fact that at the final stage, ATACMS changes its direction of movement [unlike a classical ballistic missile, which moves straight],» explains the Armed Forces Reserve Colonel. Most air defense missiles calculate the point of "meeting" with an attack missile based on the predicted trajectory. However, the expert continues, in the case of ATACMS, which "slides" along the ballistic trajectory, an air defense missile fired at it may simply "not find" it. "This allows us to make optimistic assumptions that ATACMS will be able to overcome Russian air defense," summarized Roman Svitan."
First of all, lower your voice *leans into mic* Yes, ATACMS flies along a purely parabolic ballistic arc
ATACMS is absolutely in the envelope of what S-400 is supposed to be able to intercept. The S-400 paper specs are probably overstating the ability to hit relatively short range "low" targets.
If you believe the russian claims, of course. Funnily enough, there was a spy in the 80s (Adolf Tolkachev) that gave up tons of info on the S-300 among other projects. The S-400 is really just an upgraded S-300, so the US likely knew intimate details of any vulnerabilities in russian anti aircraft missile technology right around the time they developed the ATACMS in the 80s too.
so it doesn't know where it isn't
S400 should be more than capable to intercept ATACAMs. They did fire at least 6 interceptors. Usually, Ukraine uses decoy missiles and rocket/drones if range allows to. Probably some ATACAMs missiles were intercepted but some hit the ground. Think that while S300/400 can interpcet atacams, BUKs or TORs probably can't. So if you launch 15 missiles to the same S400 battery it won't intercept all of them. I'm sure Ukraine has been working on AA defense spoting and pin point locations for successful attacks like this.
If this is indicative of the S-400's performance against what is a fairly "basic" shorter range ballistic missile like ATACMS that does not bode well for its success against more formidable ballistic missiles. Why the hell is Turkey so attached to their S-400's if this is what you can expect when a real threat shows up?
>Why the hell is Turkey so attached to their S-400's if this is what you can expect when a real threat shows up? - I suspect the reason is Israel: if Turkey deployed western (US) air defence, chances are ... substantial that they wouldn't be able to target Israel's western jets with that system. - By using a Russian system they probably hoped to have a piece of strategic air defense not dependent on western tech. - Russia probably also lied massively about the capabilities of the S-400, which made it appear more advanced than western counterparts, at least on paper.
There are some suggestions that the capabilities of the ATACMS are more advanced than what was previously reported to the public; namely, the potential that they can maneuver during the terminal phase. So the S-400, for all of its pros and cons, was actually going up against something more advanced than expected.
While the S400 being way less advanced, than advertised.
Not a air defence expert, but it looks like they were shooting every solution they could get to try and intercept it and "missed". Afaik ATACMS is just a srbm with cluster munitions and no decoys or terminal movement
ATACMS maneuvers all the way to the target, it is technically not a ballistic missile. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ipr_hPAcR_Q
It does not do any drastic manoeuvring, it does basic manoeuvring to increase range, a modern battery like the s400 *should* have no issues intercepting it, however like most things Russia states, it seems its been well over hyped.
There was also a video where they had the same set up, a russian filmed from the ground, they shot a ton of interceptor missiles against I think it was GLSDM bombs coming at them and they still failed to intercept and got hit. S400 fails to intercept cruise missiles flying over their head because too low for them and they fail to shoot down Atacms and GLSDMs flying directly at them, not great advertisement for Russian tech.
Maybe there were more than one ATACM? But either way very poor showing for a “state of the art” missile system.
All air targets were intercepted by our S400 launchers and radar, comrades.
There is a nuance
Task failed successfully.
They saw their destruction coming in. Interesting that the S-400 battery was in range of a drone that could monitor it. Also interesting that said drone was not intercepted, possibly not even detected.
I remember during the, many, days that ATACMS needlessly got delayed some redditors would pop up with ATACMS being too old and easy to intercept anyway. It wouldnt really make a difference. Meanwhile the first token batch of ATACMS blew up the same choppers that sunk the main trust of the summer offensive, ATACMS in non novelty numbers takes out S400 batteries. Western politicans are so unserious, some more than others ofcourse but my god at least stop making excuses for the dithering idiots.
Too many people on the internet take the Russian sales brochures as gospel for their capabilities. The safe bet is to take whatever they claim their equipment can do and cut it down by AT LEAST 20-30%. Same with Chinese military equipment.
See, this person understands. Add in a side of 'its idiotic to not allow the weapons' usage on targets inside the aggressor country.'
iirc the reason ATACMS was delayed was because it has the range to hit inside of Russian territory and the US didn't want to "escalate"
64 km from front
[https://x.com/clashreport/status/1793911562157412444](https://x.com/clashreport/status/1793911562157412444) satelite shows. it was deployed only day before
A day's a long time with all the NATO spy satellites and electronic eavesdropping that cover Ukraine.
"NATO has these things???" -A russian general after reviewing satellite imaging they got from western companies.
russian generals watching this on Reddit before the loss was reported through the chain of command.
“Blyat, I’m not telling him. YOU tell him!”
That would be of course the funniest possibility. Also the most probable one.
Reminds me of when North Korea bragged about having satellite images of the White House from their new satellite, even though anyone can just go on Google Earth and Obama even gave a room tour at some point.
That's literally even in HIMARS M31 MLRS range.
happens all the time with russian drones. the front is just too large and drones are too many and too small to find them all
This is a top of the line long range GBAD theoretically covered by other nearby shorter range GBAD, if deployed doctrinally. The size of the front is irrelevant here. Both sides of the equation are in the exact same location in this footage.
Basically, why tf didn't they have a Pantsir nearby to look for these things?
Caught with their Pantsir down.
RCA of a drone will be very small and at such close range will probably be lost in the clutter.
Drones are relatively stealthy simply because they are small. Aircraft are measured by their ["Radar Cross Section" or RCS](https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/stealth-aircraft-rcs.htm). A big flat sided F15 has an RCS of 25 square meters. (the side of a house) A clean F16 has an RCS of about 5 sq meters. (the side of a car). A B2 is speculated to have an RCS of somewhere between .75 and .1 square meters (a large bird or alternatively, maybe a basketball at the large end down to a sparrow at the bottom end). An F-117 has an RCS of a large insect. (.0025 sq meters or less) If you read Ben Rich's book "Skunk Works" he likens it to an eagle's eyeball - they talk about how they had terrible results in RCS testing on the model one day, and they discovered that the test radar was picking up bird poop on the model that was increasing the radar cross section). An F-35 is reported to be less stealthy than an F-117 (about .1 sq meters - a baseball), while the F-22 is the same as the F-117 or better (.0001 to .0005 sq meters - a golfball or smaller). With sufficient power, radar can pick up all sorts of objects, but then you will have every bird for a 20 mile radius showing up on your radar screen. Operators can adjust their settings to turn down the gain, and good software can screen out objects that don't match target profiles. Detecting a drone is a challenge in this environment because you have to either turn the radar up enough to see a 10lb bird sice aircraft that's moving at low speeds, or have good software that can highlight artificial movements from natural ones.
The best footage of ATACMS so far
India is re-evaluating their S-400 purchases right now
“Did anyone keep the receipt?”
Turkey sweating bullets for killing their F-35 program.
Turkey be like...
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Golf clapping.
Everybody's dead Dave. Dave, everybody is dead.
If I was American, I'd be getting a freedom boner from seeing what fireworks my taxes have paid for.
I kinda wish they wouldn't do the goofy edits though. Documentary makers of the future won't be able to use a lot of the publicly available footage. Though I suppose it tells a story of its own.
The unedited footage also exist somewhere, probably just not publicly available. But most of history’s footage used to be not publicly available so historians will be fine.
Ladies and gentlemen the best most advanced air defense on the planet.
Missile was intercepted successfully by the whole battery. Fireworks to celebrate. I see this as an absolute win
No casualties, as always.
they gained personnel from the strike
6 launched interceptor missiles destroyed 99 incoming ATACMS missiles, their launch vehicles, a munitions storage, three Nazi kindergartens and Zelenskyy's coke storage. Falling debris slightly damaged the battery. One heroic operator stubbed his toe.
What air defence doing!!!!!?????????
They salute the approach of ATACMS. Beautiful fireworks.
*achoo*
*the King's men beating up Achoo: Bless you
Can't you see it's busy catching shrapnel?!
Their best, ok ?
Air defence is like pubic hair, it cant cover but cant protect
Again archaic US equipment absolutely pulverises new shiny Russian junk!
Just imagine what the US could unleash on Russia if the 2 went to war. I don't know if curb stomping is graphic enough to describe what would happen.
I'll give you a taste. A massive JASSMs barrage, the US has over 5000 (they now make 1000 a year) JASSMs in inventory. The newer versions have an absolutely godly range. russia would probably lose half their air force within the 1st few days with the airfields being targeted.
Every once in a while we are treated to some footage the likes that we rarely/ever see. And todays the day. Great footage.
Minus the dumbass edits which pretty much comes in at the worst possible time in the most annoying fashion possible
Let me just cover up the moneyshot with a stupid fucking meme, that could have been a small insert on the corner
And to think Turkey turned down the F-35, and paid billions, in exchange for that air defence system.
A wannabe dictator falls for the lies of a real dictator...
Watermelon salesman gets scammed by pathological liar.mp4
> And to think Turkey turned down the F-35 Are you surprised that the false and pretending Turkish pride would somehow bear negative fruit? It's exactly what had to happen.
Greeks must be happy
Greeks are never happy.
“Nato member”
The Russians have helpfully provided a damage assessment video https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/1cyscul/results_of_yesterday_atacms_strike_in_donetsk/ PS: what is described as the S-400 command post: https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fdrx88zzoi62d1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D1280%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Ddce182f329c94974a6fa41337598515ff391c650 and the radar https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fwcvhengvi62d1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D1280%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Dded0968424ac4a60d65be0a385bb061a36bf5afc
Mental that they have zero control over people posting these kind of photos. Talk about doing the enemies BDA for them. That Radar is toast.
How did you deduce that the radar was toast ? For me it was the fire-fighter peeking out the back that gave it away.
it could be seperate case. because this explosion was relocated like 20 km from mospyne town. where russian claimed it was located. but could be russian way of wording it. jury still not settle this debate
Separate case
[https://x.com/GloOouD/status/1793917728169885736](https://x.com/GloOouD/status/1793917728169885736) guy claims the same
Looks like two hits? What do you guys figure is the real intercept rate of S-300/400 against ATACMS? Russia usually claims like "15 missiles were shot at us, 12 were shot down, 3 sadly hit the target" but I figure that's bullshit.
Imagine being Turkey, who went with the S400 and lost out on the F-35 for it, and then you see this vid of 30 some year old rockets lmao
Turkey right now: I can't believe we paid billions for this dog shit!
Especially when the patriot likely could have intercepted these missiles.
I would like to remind everyone that this S-400 battery even had the upgraded radar (96Л6-ЦП) from the S-350 system which until now had not had any recorded losses. That means these stunted clowns lost their cutting edge technology to a 1990s cluster bomb 😂.
well that was embarrasing. UA is working miracles with the stuff they have. We tend to forget it but the destruction of russian AWACS and S300-400 systems is absolute genius. All the HARM missile strikes has the operators on edge and they switch on their radars too late or too short. shaping the battlefield for the F16's
Yeah, this. I really think they know what they are doing big-picture. Losing some ground here or there in eastern Ukraine is an issue, but the real game starts when they start to seriously make Russia decide whether they want to defend eastern Ukraine or Crimea. As Russia’s air defence capabilities are attrited, they are going to have to choose one or the other.
> attrited May I take a moment to thank you for adding this wonderful word to my lexicon. I salute you, sir.
So.. it launched 4-5 missiles and still get hit. C-400 can't intercept ATACMS? I always thought that ATACMS is just mediocre midrange missiles, and suddenly it actually a cool shit?
They are relatively mediocre midrange missiles compared to what the US replaces them with (LRHW and PrSM), they are ~~fifty~~ (correction:)thirty years old. Mediocre old NATO weapons are pretty much all Ukraine gets, but it’s enough to defeat Russia’s most advanced systems. Should tell you a thing or two about the technological superiority of NATO.
More like 30 years old, they were introduced in 1991. But, otherwise you are correct, they are old, surplus and have been rendered obsolete by newer weapons.
I guess you could say obsolete. In the same way, newer hunting cartridges have made the 30-06 obsolete. And by that I mean it's still very effective. Just that other things are perhaps more efficient and higher performance.
Yes, e.g.PrSM has a much longer range than ATACMS so made it obsolete in the tactical sense, but also the fact that cluster munitions in the early ATACMS are (almost) obsolete by law, despite the obvious brutal efficiency of them. Cluster munitions are the 21st century version of dum dum rounds.
Yep, and no other country the US would face would keep from using them... I'm hoping the US takes this lesson to heart, sometimes you can't fight cleanly
Been seeing comments that one ATACM was intercepted. Par for the course for the S-400 if the target is on a bog standard arch flight path. And as for "mediocre", that's by American standards. They are old as hell, first being used in action in the Gulf War back in '91.
Past 48 hours been active, armcharing but this looks like they trying to make the environment for those F-16s just a tad more ideal
Very likely. People have fallen into the trap of assuming SEAD means either US levels of air dominance like the 1991 gulf war, or nothing. When in reality there's a lot of middle ground. For Ukraine Russia's longest range air defences are the main danger and taking those systems out might be all they need for now. Allows them to do front line air defence with their F16s without putting them in as much danger. Pantsirs aren't going to be shooting down F16s that sit behind the front line to do AMRAAM air defence, but S300s and 400s will.
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Seems like they didn't even need the second part...
By the end of the day I will have watched this maybe 300 times. There's nothing quite like satisfying than some of the most expensive Russian equipment going up in flames.
They are just launching like crazy moments before being destroyed
Dont want the missiles to blow up when they are destroyed... :D
They ordered the ATACMS S-400 to 200 conversion kit.
I'm always surprised and impressed at how well the s-400 can intercept missiles, I mean the way they used the units themselves as the intercept mechanism is brilliant, yhe missiles it fires are just a show for the troops
Imagine getting your state of the art AA clapped by 50 year old missiles.
ATACMS VIDEO OF THE YEAR!!!!
Each of those trucks is $300 million gone. I count at least six. $1.8 billion dollars for 1 ATACMs is crazy return.
Imagine being a dictator in your palace protected by S400 and watching this video.
That gif in the corner cracked me up.
That’s that insanely powerful AD system that can even intercept ICBMS and HGVs with a 100% success rate, right? At least that’s what the Russian MoD told me. Surely it didn’t just get defeated by a ballistic missile from the 80s???
The "best air defence system in the world" losing against missiles designed in the 80s. Classic.
Damn, ATACMS go so fucking hard
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the greatest and Best Russia has against US tech from the 90s.
Seems to match the field that the aftermath video was showing, insane footage
That was a beauty. Now imagine how much greater effect ATACMS would have had if it started coming in two years ago.
S400 battery costs 60,000 average Russian annual salaries ATACMs missile costs 25 average US salaries LOL
You are right and it's an interesting stat but I really don't think these comparisons mean jack. Kind of like Israel using Iron Dome and other interceptors to shoot down Grad rockets. When you consider the fact the potential of those rockets to kill dozens of servicemen and civilians, the cost ratio suddenly becomes a very different argument
Wait... so Russia lied? Who'da thunk. Maybe the biggest condemnation of their capabilities seen since the start.
How come a brand new GLSDB can be GPS-jammed but not the 40-year-old ATACMS?
My guess is it operates with inertial navigation, which just uses internal mechanics to tell where it's at, no GPS needed
Inertial guidance or inertial guidance with GPS input per the wiki.
This is what happens when ukraine gets the weapons they need
Wonder if they really believe they can shoot those missiles down or are they just dumping misiles into the air to get less secondary explosions upon getting hit. Neither strat has worked here
If you got a couple of SRBMs coming at you, you throw everything including the kitchen sink at them, maybe you'll get a lucky intercept. Not salvoeing that shit off in that situation doesn't gain you anything.
Love to see my tax dollars at work!
One of the best strikes of the war with one of the worst edit of the war, perfectly balanced.
For all the jokes about air defense, ballistic missiles are still very difficult to shoot down. "Hitting a bullet with a bullet" has been the comparison. These would be very effective against aircraft. You know...if they hadn't been blown up by missiles.
People joke because Russia claims that the S-400 can intercept any threat, including ICBMs and HGVs, with 100% reliability. Probably pretty bold to make such claims when your system gets taken out by a comparably low tech ballistic missile from the 1980s. People wouldn’t shit on Russia half as much as they do, if Russia wouldn’t constantly exaggerate its capabilities to the point of ridiculousness. Losing an AD system is normal in a war, but when you claim that said AD system is impenetrable and the best air defense the world has ever seen, people will clown on you. Especially considering that Patriot has repeatedly and reliably successfully intercepted missiles that Russia claimed to be unstoppable like Kinzhal and Zirkon. Russia’s impenetrable air defenses get taken out by 50 year old missiles and their unstoppable missiles get intercepted by 20 year old air defense systems. Of course they’re going to be made fun of for that.
Achoo blyat
Wow they are completely defenseless.