Unveiled by Russian President Vladimir Putin in March 2018, the Kh-47M2 Kinjal is among several new weapons being described as “invincible”. [code Otan : AS-24 « Killjoy »] is an aeroballistic missile that can be armed with a 500 kg fragmentation warhead or a nuclear warhead. have reach [annoncée] 2000 km, it could fly at a speed close to Mach 10, after being fired upon by a MiG-31K “Foxbat” fighter aircraft. Its hyperspeed clearly means it theoretically leaves almost no reaction time for air defenses.
In recent years this Kh-47M2 Kinjal has been the subject of much publicity… No doubt for the purpose of intimidation and “strategic reporting” to NATO, as Colonel David Pappalardo wrote in an issue of Vortex magazine published by Aerospace. In any case, this missile, which was first used in combat in Ukraine in March 2022, did not provide the Russian armed forces with any significant operational advantage.
“Hypersonic missiles have entered service. Although their use has received much media attention, their operational efficiency is not yet mature,” General Thierry Burkhard, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, recently stated. [CEMA]. However, he also warned: “We cannot ignore the emergence of this threat” because “full operational capability will be achieved one day”.
#Ukraine: Today, reports indicated that a Russian Kh-47M2 Khinzal ballistic missile was shot down by air defenses #Kiev at 02:40 on May 4th – for the very first time.
The debris matches the unified warhead arrangement used in the Kh-47M2 and Iskander series missiles. pic.twitter.com/RjAcBQYEUN
— 🇺🇦 Weapon Tracker of Ukraine (@UAWeapons) May 5, 2023
Is the Kh-47M2 Kinjal really invincible, having brought no operational value to Russian forces deployed in Ukraine at the moment? The question comes after the specialized Ukrainian website Defense Express published – unauthenticated – photos that appear to show the remains of one such missile, shot down near Kiev on May 4 and shot down a priori by a Patriot battery became .
Only the Ukrainian Air Force initially refused to make the slightest comment… Then, through their spokesman, Colonel Yuri Ignat, they denied shooting down a Kh-47M2 Kinjal on May 4th [soit après la mystérieuse attaque de drones ayant visé le Kremlin, ndlr].
Then, barely twenty-four hours later, the Ukrainian Air Force finally claimed to have intercepted a Russian hypersonic plane.
“Yes, we launched the Kinjal missile, which is second to none. I congratulate the people of Ukraine on this historic event,” said General Mykola Oleshchuk, his chief of staff, on May 6. And to clarify that a Patriot air defense battery had been requested and that the missile in question had been launched from a MiG-31K from Russian airspace.
Despite the denials by the UAF (and conflicting information as they directed users to the site that only published wreckage images this morning https://t.co/5024HAy5Tr), we are confident in our ID. It’s possible that the UAF just doesn’t want to reveal their capabilities.https://t.co/870az0yx4O
— 🇺🇦 Weapon Tracker of Ukraine (@UAWeapons) May 5, 2023
Why did the Ukrainian General Staff deny shooting down a Kh-47M2 Kinjal and then claim the opposite and congratulate themselves on it? In order not to reveal sensitive information to the Russian armed forces? Perhaps…although they must have been aware of their missile’s failure…assuming they had actually fired a Kinjal, like the shape of the wreck’s fairing photographed by Defense Express.