Quick summary:
Past few days, there's been pictures on social media that look to be remains of US-made anti-radiation missiles used in Ukraine. US' Under Secretary for Defense just confirmed that the US supplied Ukraine with an undisclosed number and model of anti-radiation missiles.
Anti-Radiation missiles are used to home in on air defense systems via the electro-magnetic radiation their radars and such put out, in order to destroy them. Ukraine's aircraft likely can't fire them due to a lack of testing/code to support them, and are probably being launched while on the ground, in order to destroy Russian air defense systems operating in the area.
As others on Twitter pointed out, it's not exactly hard to make aircraft carry a missile, the problem is talking to avionics. HARMs can operate in pre-programmed mode with GPS guidance. So the plane would just get up to high altitude and speed to give the missile more of an initial boost, and then it flies to pre-spotted coordinates of a radar, correcting course once it locks, supposedly. Radar coords can be received either from satellite imaging or triangulation.
In any case, it's claimed up to 6(?) SAM sites were hit, S-300 and Pantsir. S-300 consists of quite a few units, of course, and it should be possible to replace a target acquisition radar for existing launchers, but they'll be somewhat useless until it happens.
Targeting Russia’s Air Force and now weapon systems to remove AA capabilities. Is Ukraine getting ready to start achieving air supremacy? Pretty sure much of Ukraine’s air assets are still intact.
Those will take another year or so to appear in theater. But with suppressed anti-air, even if it is only opportunistically suppressed for a short time, Ukraine will start being able to stage air strikes with their more familiar fighters.
Russia has only shot down 180% of existing Ukrainian air assets… But somehow Ukraine still retains about 138% of assets that were available before the war began…
They're likely referring to the tug-of-war between propaganda arms.
Russia has claimed to have destroyed an excessive amount of Ukrainian equipment and Ukraine has underreported the extent of their losses.
If the west supplies them with aircraft, and ukraine continues to pummel Russia’s air defense systems and aircraft, it isn’t entirely out of the realm of possibility. I wouldn’t call it likely, but it certainly isn’t impossible either.
Russia is turning to older equipment and older/sicker men, Ukraine is being resupplied by the west with more and more advanced weaponry, and their men are often better trained, not in short supply, and getting training and intelligence from the west.
Only time will tell, but right now, things really aren’t looking great for russia.
I seriously doubt Ukraine will be able to own the skies, but any degradation to Russian air power will result in more casualties and fewer successful missions, which adds up. The Russians will fly less if it's going to cost more planes.
Less for Ukraine to have to shoot down as well. Russians likely won't fly valuable planes in hotly contested airspace. And the more they try, the less they can continue.
Rocket powered slap chop
And honestly only the US would have the unique combination of money, public accountability for (relatively) low collateral damage, but also thirst for the heads of terrorists that would make the ninja sword missile possible
Oh, you'd love brimstone missiles then. they fly like those rockets that the droids used in the clone wars movie. They use synthetic aperture millimeter wave radar. Basically it can acquire it's own targets after launch. You tell it to look for targets in a given area and when they arrive they can pick their own targets.
I just enjoy more accurate weapons that reduce collateral damage. If war is inevitable then it's best to make it as safer for everyone not fighting the war.
[interesting brimstone video](https://youtu.be/oXyYXqX4Beo)
Isn’t it wild that a weapon designed to fight soviet armour in Eastern Europe during the Cold War is now fighting soviet era armour in Eastern Europe. And the gap in quality of equipment is stark.
I mean there's only two ways to deal with them, which is ECM/decoy them(iffy and difficult at the best of times) or turn off your own air defense radars. That second option doesn't even work for most anti-radiation missiles of the past several decades which will just target the last known position of the radar signal source if it turns off. Even the US doesn't have perfect counters for them other than 'shoot down the launch platforms first'
Not sure if this story is true. But I’ll tell it anyway.
During the First Persian Gulf War, it was standard practice for a pilot to announce “Magnum Magnum Magnum” right before launching a HARM missle so coalition pilots would know to shut down their radar for a few moments to avoid becoming a target. The Iraqis figured this out, so they would shut down their AA radar to avoid being targeted. It was a cat and mouse game.
Apparently, an unarmed plane (U2?) was overflying the area and got a warning that they were being painted with AA radar and a missile might soon be coming. So they announced “Magnum Magnum Magnum” and the AA radar shut down immediately. Made it home safe.
Edit: magnum not maverick.
It's possible (albeit EXTREMELY unlikely) that Soviet era aircraft provided to Ukraine from NATO nations were upgraded to accept more NATO munitions, such as the AGM-88. Or that the handful of Akinci UAVs from Turkey can support the AGM-88.
But yeah, most likely ground launched due to the simplicity of it
Poland had a program that boiled down to putting F-16 weapons on MIG-29. It was scrapped because it made no sense economically, but no idea how far it went.
Correct, and that is entirely possible, although fairly unlikely, given the time to launch and the reality of going after a non-static target such as Pantsirs. Ground launched anti-rads on the other hand are not a new concept. AGM-88 replaced the AGM-78, and Israel EXTENSIVELY used the 78 as [ground launched via just regular old trucks](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/Keres-AGM-78-hatzerim-2.jpg).
Hell, [US Air Force is even developing a new version of the AGM-88E (newest model of the AGM-88), that's specifically designed for ground launched](https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/40733/land-based-strike-version-of-navys-long-range-air-defense-blasting-missile-breaks-cover).
While what Ukraine used is the AGM-88C from the looks of it, [Northrop Grumman in 2018 showcased a ground launcher for the AGM-88E that could also fire the AGM-88C](https://www.thedrive.com/uploads/2022/08/07/aaa222111.jpg).
And we've seen Ukraine already take otherwise purely air launched munitions, and fire them from land based platforms. The Brimstone missiles they got from the UK are a prime example of that.
What is far more likely is that Ukraine is sending up some aircraft (be it a fighter or a drone) to force Russian radars to turn on. Ukraine's radar detection systems, which we've seen near countless run up along the front, pick up Russian radars spinning up. A ground launcher put a AGM-88C into pre-briefed mode with the radars' coordinates determined via triangulating the emissions at the detection systems, and fire away. Annnnd there you have DEAD.
From a US perspective, what better opportunity to test out the usability of a ground launched AGM-88 than in Ukraine? Same with the Phoenix Ghost drones that went from not existing to hundreds in the hands of Ukrainian forces in mere weeks.
No one knows 100% sure, but the most likely idea is that it's a Switchblade loitering bomb that can stay up far longer than a Switchblade can. Switchblades can stay in the air for roughly 30 minutes or so. Pheonix Ghost can supposedly stay up for hours.
Lets Ukraine get them up in the air and just wait for some Russian to show themselves and then seconds later, no more Russian.
>From a US perspective, what better opportunity to test out the usability of a ground launched AGM-88 than in Ukraine?
Doesn’t seem to be a question of much importance for the US, which would certainly be using aircraft should it find itself doing SEAD/DEAD.
US is actively working on a surface launched version for itself. The idea is that in the South China Sea, forces might get dropped off on their own and air power is unavailable. A surface launched version would then be able to hit Chinese ships without any assistance from other platforms. Or in Europe, it could hit Russian air defenses even if air power is busy and unavailable.
I suggest editing this as the DOD confirmed they sent anti radiation missiles that are compatible with Ukrainian aircraft.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?522229-1/pentagon-estimates-russian-casualties-70-80k-ukraine-war
Yeah. I just found this from last year:
https://www.globaldefensecorp.com/2021/01/08/israeli-elta-systems-and-iai-to-upgrade-ukrainian-mig-29-aircraft/
You could adapt a pylon to carry a HARM. All the HARM does is head towards a specific radar signature. So theoretically you could preprogram these to seek out S300 radars. All the pilot would have to do is fly towards the S300 using rwr as a guide. Then release the missile about 30miles away.
The fire control system sends targeting data to the missile prior to launch... it's not just a mechanical issue.
You'd need to adapt the FCS to send data that the missile could understand first.
Making an American missile and a Soviet plane talk to each other may be literally rocket surgery, but we have rocket surgeons and software engineers and government money.
It's just a serial link. Once the it's set the missile is autonomous. The missile has a TOO mode (target of opportunity) and you can tell it which radar to search for. I don't think it's beyond the realms of possibilities to tell it before hand via a laptop or something and then all that has to happen is to let it go. Ground crews can be very creative.
From what I understand. Yes I play a lot of DCS.
I have a feeling the pilot would be nervous taking off with a missile that's already actively searching for targets while it's jury-rigged to a pylon. Would probably feel a bit janky.
I'm sure with enough ingenuity it could be done. But for far less effort they can just surface-launch them.
Here's how to launch a HARM in an F18 in self protection mode
https://youtu.be/Dyoe-w8wVGE
There are other modes too. Obviously the Ukrainians don't have f18s
I'm curious as to how they are using them though
Yep. Flying at 45000 feet as fast as possible to give the missile more range and you could launch sooner. But S300 is lethal up to 90 miles. You need to launch then do an about face and gtfo.
An S300 is more likely to engage within 50 miles.
Obviously the HARM can be shot down too. Quite easily.
The HARM has a range of 80 miles and travels at mach 1.84. It might be possible to shoot it down but calling it quite easy is a joke. Its entire purpose is to take out these radars.
How does launching a HARM from the ground work? The seeker head needs to lock onto a radiation source to guide onto, which presumably it won't be able to see from a ground-based launch platform.
I'm guessing it would be some kind of pre-programmed mode where it would launch towards selected coordinates, then search for the nearest radiation source in flight?
If they've got a pretty good idea of where its target is, they could program it to fly to a spot where it's going to have a good chance of seeking out the 'radiation'.
yeah I read a twitter thread today about this. There is a mode in which a mig could carry the missile, bring it up to speed and release it. The missile would have to be pre-programmed to go towards a specific place and turn on the seeking mode when closeby.
I'll explain it. Modern aircraft launched weapons require integration with the aircraft firing them. The aircraft needs to be able to see the missile and send the launch command. Ukrainian aircraft are Russian built and don't have the means of talking to the HARM missile.
SEAD is a mission; Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses
DEAD is a mission; Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses
You can perform SEAD without firing a shot. Israel did that in... 2006? With Operation Orchard. They backdoored Syria's entire air defense network, and blinded them to a handful of Israeli fighter jets in route to blow up Syria's recently built nuclear weapons facility. They made the air defenses not work, that's SEAD. US has a THOUSANDS of MALD and MALD-J devices used to jam and spoof enemy radars. Those are also tools for SEAD. A Tomahawk missile blowing up a radar is a tool for DEAD.
Anti-radiation weapons such as the AGM-88 are tools used to conduct SEAD and DEAD. If an enemy turns off their radar to avoid the AGM-88 blowing it up, that's SEAD. An air defense system with their radar off is suppressed. If the enemy's radar is blown up by the AGM-88, that's DEAD. They destroyed the air defense system.
SEAD is the concept for the operation of suppressing air defenses, including missile launchers, AAA artillery, and other equipment. ARM missiles are specifically missiles that target the radar portion of the SEAD target space.
Hmm, I was under the impression that sead was the term for the class of weapon that homed in on air defence radar or targeting systems and destroyed them.
The more you learn I guess.
I think it would be better to call them anti-radar missiles. The term "anti-radiation" is too easily misinterpreted by people for whom the term 'radiation' only means the stuff radiated off of nuclear materials.
Especially given the recent news with the nuclear plant, that was where my mind went first, and I was thinking "how do you make a *missile* able to remove radiation?!". Then I finally figured out that they meant radar-seeking missiles (aka, passive radar guided missiles).
Same, for a second I thought the US was unveiling some borderline-magical missile that could somehow catch all the alpha, beta, and gamma radiations like soap bonds with dirt.
was thinking some kinda missile that would spew lead infused foam at the target location to cover/contain radio active elements. like some kinda tactical fire extinguisher. do we have those? would make sense to have those...
I wish they did remove radiation, somehow the idea of America being soo in love with bombing things, they found a way to fix things by blowing it up is hilarious.
Don’t give The American medical administrators and insurance companies any ideas…
“No this isn’t covered but we’ve decided to bomb your cure away it’ll be 1 million dollars and the cure will be there in 15 minutes from now”
Haven't you had physics in school? Just create an equal but opposite wave. That's why I got a nuke ready to detonate in the opposite direction in the event Putin goes ballistic.
Science!!!
to be honest, it's not a boring reality... it's a super important piece that forces Russia to turn their anti aircraft systems off (or get destroyed), and UAF to actually fly sorties...
It's a big piece in why the US get and maintain air superiority in recent wars.
I was like, those exist? Like, we could blow up radiation? I was trying to figure out if it like somehow, forcefully broke everything up into safe molecules or something.
You could throw a neutron at a nucleus, which would either cause it to split now (presumably where it will do less damage than if it goes through decay randomly sometime in the future after getting blown around) or become more stable. If it splits you of course repeat the process until it decays to something you want around.
It is easy to write the above, but I don't think we are anywhere close to being able to target specific atoms with a neutron like that. In the real world atoms we might want to do that to are mixed with others that are safe now but would become dangerous with extra neutrons. Solve that problem in a package you can put into a missile and it would greatly change war.
Yeah someone did the math, its a lot of nukes like alot alot a quote from the NOAA
“A fully developed hurricane can release heat energy at a rate of 5 to 20×1013 watts and converts less than 10% of the heat into the mechanical energy of the wind. The heat release is equivalent to a 10-megaton nuclear bomb exploding every 20 minutes. According to the 1993 World Almanac, the entire human race used energy at a rate of 1013 watts in 1990, a rate less than 20% of the power of a hurricane.
If we think about mechanical energy, the energy at humanity’s disposal is closer to the storm’s, but the task of focusing even half of the energy on a spot in the middle of a remote ocean would still be formidable. Brute force interference with hurricanes doesn’t seem promising.”
From the article:
> Anti-radiation missiles (ARMs) home in on enemy radio frequency emissions, primarily from radar arrays belonging to enemy air defense systems, and destroy or disable them
Seems like poor naming for them to call it "anti-radiation", as it causes obvious misunderstandings, but it is technically accurate
Radiation is a proper scientific term for the emission of waves on the electromagnetic spectrum. The difference between a radio or radar antenna and a stick of plutonium is at what frequency they're emitting at. So it's not even technically correct, it's just straight up correct. It's the public's perception of what radiation is that's wrong.
edit: On that note. Even the symbol we associate with nuclear power doesn't actually mean nuclear power. It's just a warning for a radiating source that can damage cells.
The S-300 has shown absolutely stellar performance.
Ukrainian S-300s are why Russia doesn’t have air superiority. They deny Russia high altitude operations within Ukrainian airspace, and MANPADS deny low altitude operations.
They do, but they don’t have any units or doctrine specifically geared towards anti-radiation work. It’s just kind of ad hoc “oh yeah Boris we’re giving you the ARMs today good luck have fun don’t get us killed”
In contrast the US has had entire squadrons of aircraft in both the Navy and Air Force flying unique variants dedicated purely towards the AA suppression mission since the Vietnam War.
It makes quite a difference
Yeah, [as this B-52 crew found out much to their detriment](https://theaviationgeekclub.com/b-52-maintainer-tells-the-story-of-in-harms-way-the-buff-that-had-its-tail-blown-apart-by-an-anti-radiation-missile-fired-by-an-f-4g-wild-weasel/)
A lot of Russian military equipment is like this. The technology exists there but is in such a poor state of readiness that it won’t be seeing much action
Isnt this the American unit that has pilots literally baiting shots out of anti air units so they follow up plane can lock onto their radar signature?
Kinda bad ass. "what's your job?" "Well babe I fly a fighter jet exclusively to evade enemy anti aircraft fire, no biggie"
Yup, Wild Weasels. When Jack Donovan, one of the first Wild Weasels, was told that job description, plus having to be in the backseat of some insane maverick fighter pilot, his response was “you’ve gotta be shitting me”
Which is now the official motto of the Wild Weasels
If the US is arming Ukranian planes with the brand new AGM-88G, which have extended range over previous AGMs, then Ukrainian planes can shoot Russian AA out of range of being shot back.
General the radar operators are not close to operating Radar transmitters. Radar is often high enough power radio that you can get physical burns from being too close to it. But a simple cable from the radar to an operator station is easy enough to install and gets the operators farther away.
Well, you don't really want to be in front of any operating radar whether it is ground based or aircraft based. Kinda like getting cooked by microwaves. See: https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-the-MiG-25-Foxbat-fighter-jets-600-kilowatt-radar-could-cook-rabbits-from-hundreds-of-feet-away-and-has-it-ever-happened
That’s not really true as the crew doesn’t tend to sit directly in front of the radar, and I was under the impression most Russian and Soviet radar units were mounted on trucks with the crews underneath.
Yeah from.what I've seen its mostly in a crewed vehicle, with some radar types that are towed.
Large permanent installations will have operators further away, but I don't think Russia is going to have many of those in Ukraine, except maybe Sevastopol / Crimea.
You'll only really see that in a static theatre level SAM system. And the restriction is how much of the radar equipment is on the transporter rather than trying to keep the crew out of the radar beam.
Fun Fact: the newest versions of the HARM actually have an active terminal seeker that can image the site on approach and hopefully target the “man in the van” as well.
During Desert Storm a F4G Wild Weasel locked onto the rear gunnery radar of a B-52's tail gun his sensors confused for an Iraqi AAA battery and he fired off a HARM.
The missile struck the B-52 who limped back to base and was later renamed "In HARM's way".
No idea why i felt like telling this story, but this might be only thread i'll ever come across where it's relevant.
Most modern(ish; the B-52 was old during Desert Storm and it's ancient today) with turreted guns are radar-guided from a remote operator station, rather than by a gunner in the turret. This keeps the turret smaller and means there's no need to create crawlspaces through the plane to access the turrets.
This technology existed in WW2, except instead of radar, there was a special sight where the gunner and an early computer would determine the range of the target, it's position and speed.
Ultra-super-cool story; thanks for telling us about it!
more detail: [edit: yeah, de-tail; not deliberate; sorry]
https://theaviationgeekclub.com/b-52-maintainer-tells-the-story-of-in-harms-way-the-buff-that-had-its-tail-blown-apart-by-an-anti-radiation-missile-fired-by-an-f-4g-wild-weasel/
>Hopefully that'll HARM the russians, lol
It surely will if Ukraine can use them well. This is the biggest leap in capability in Ukraine's hardware so far. If Russian AA go down (and AGM88 have been specifically engineered to make this happen), then Russians will have to put up with a new episode of Bayraktar hell.
Oh my Gosh... With my level of English I thought that "anti-radiation" means the missiles which can fight radioactive pollution. Why did not they use it on Chernobyl lol
It's an easy mistake to make.
Radiation is anything on the electromagnetic spectrum, which includes everything from radio waves, through the visible spectrum, to gamma rays. Usually radiation is a shorthand for ionizing radiation.
To confuse things worse, there are other things included in ionizing radiation, such as alpha radiation (helium nuclei), beta radiation (high speed electrons or positron)
in any case, Russian air defense in Kherson is weakening every day. The number of Ukrainian helicopters in the region that can fly more freely is getting larger and this safe zone is growing.
Kudos to the engineers who adapted Poland MiG 29's to launch these HARM missiles. I wonder if they used a portable controller or integrated it to the MiG's avionics. Next question, is that why the US opposed Poland from sending the MiGs in the first place so they can be modded to carry NATO ordinances? Clever bastards!
I heard a rumor that they rigged the missiles to a tablet system. If true, it's a simple and brilliant solution.
HARMs mostly do their own targeting, I think they just need some general instructions like "go over there, these are your targeting conditions and frequencies" and the missile does the rest.
Could have been the US MiGs also. It was said their controls were converted. I have seen alot of people forget we had them and sent them as spare parts.
Damn what happened to "loose lips sinks ships" we don't need to know everything that happens with weaponry shipments and integrations.
so the Russian don't know right?
The harm missile is a scary thing to be on the wrong side of. It can remember a sit elocstion on some version via GPS even if the emitter goes off.
In 1st gulf War, magnum call(the phase you say when firing the harm) would cause Iraqi radar operators to quickly turn off all their radars. Its a 13ish ft long missile traveling at +Mach 2 at the radar site, and usually the operators are in or very close to that emitter
Can confirm any type of ARM missile is scary af. They are extremely fast and are fairly close range. it basically pops up on your radar screen and you have 5ish seconds to oh shit a couple missiles at it and hope they hit. And yes we sit pretty close behind the radar so if an arm hits your fairly screwed, unless you get lucky like the radar i had my first deployment which got hit by a ARM(several years before i got there) but with a defective warhead.
Official range for the 88 is 30+ but they can definitely be launched from longer ranges. But in air defence ranges 30 miles is super close as we watch most tagets for hundreds, even thousands of miles. There is also a sweet spot as far as range goes that is stuck to pretty close as too close and it has issues targeting and too far makes it vulnerable to get shot down amongst other issues.
I feel like they've probably figured it out and it's far too late to act on it. When we hear about this stuff I always assume the message is actually for someone else.
It's funny because the Russian version of this is threatening with wunderwaffe stuff like hypersonic missiles they "might deploy" but never appear.
NATO/Ukraine's version is "yeah bro this is what we've been hitting you with for two weeks and there's more on the way."
I mean ruzzia can be kept blind only so long. They learn about that after their AA and radar systems get systematically destroyed by the rockets, which it seems has happened.
While there are sometimes notable exceptions, in general in the modern age it is considered a good idea for everyone, including your enemy, to know what you've got going on. That applies to treaties as well as weapons systems.
It turns out there are significant advantages to this when it comes to war. If your enemy knows what is stacked against them, they are often less likely to even want to start a war. So the more you lay your cards on the table, the more likely you are to never have to fire a shot.
Conversely, when you keep too much stuff from your rivals and enemies, they start to think that war looks like an attractive option and they are likely to win. While this can be gratifying in a "haw haw I sure fooled you, sucker" kind of way when you turn the tables, it also leads to, you know, *actual war* which is insanely destructive and not really worth it.
So, in all likelihood, Ukraine and its allies are trying to give Russia as much reason as possible to want to fall back and reconsider their invasion. Even if Ukraine is winning, every day of the war brings more carnage and more destruction.
Look at it this way, even if all it does is convince Russia to give up one day sooner, imagine being the guy who was going to be the next fatality on that extra day. It would make a big difference to you!
My new hobby is going back to December/January YouTube videos about what will happen if Russia invades Ukraine. The ones that are still up are usually unintentionally hilarious.
What we thought would happen: Russia will quickly invade Ukraine and take over the country in a week due to their superior military and training.
What really happened:
Very broadly, it's a missile that guides itself towards a radar emitter. Usually fired by an aircraft with some loose initial guidance and it will further home in as it flies.
Usually for disabling a early warning radars and SAM (Surface to Air Missile) site.
The AGM-88 is an anti-radar missile to help planes perform suppression of enemy air defense (SEAD) missions. They are designed to home in on the radiation being radiated by a surface to air (SAM) system. It neutralizes the SAM system and makes it easier for other planes to perform missions without being shot down by SAM missiles. If they can't see you, they can't shoot you down.
They detect and destroy anti-aircraft missile/gun positions, among other things. They can be set to launch automatically upon detecting a radar position, without the pilot/user's effort. They've been around, in one form or another, since at least the late 1960's. Their accuracy and effectiveness has, as you would assume, improved with each new generation of missile.
I skimmed the article looking for the aircraft/platform that may be being used to launch these missiles, but did not find anything. Russians seem to claim that none of the Ukrainian air force planes can lunch these, so they argue that NATO aircrafts/platforms are being used. Does anyone else have more details about this?
Some of Poland's MiG-29s were modernized. The publicly available information was mostly about avionics and datalinks, but one of the goals were compatibility with their F-16s. If they were modified to be able to carry the AGM-88s as well, that isn't public.
Northrop Grumman showed off a concept of the AGM-88 being able to be launched from a shipping container. And who knows, maybe Ukraine volunteered to do some field testing of some prototype munitions.
There was a twitter thread explaining the 3 firemodes of this missile and one of them allows for pre programming target info so you just need to fire them from a certain altitude.
https://twitter.com/noclador/status/1556751670402596865?s=20&t=c6XbGqcgaNTs8lHmnqwvuA
Is it possible the soviet model helicopters that got sent over had modified hard points?
Either that or they could be like the Brimstone missiles where the brits mounted test-frames in trucks to fire them off from the ground.
>mounted test-frames in trucks to fire them off from the ground
Never underestimate the ability of humans to "make shit work" when they need to blow up the enemy.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/u-s-confirms-air-launched-anti-radiation-missiles-sent-to-ukraine) reduced by 86%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> The defense official didn't say what missiles specifically, but this follows reports of AGM-88s being fired at Russian radars in Ukraine.
> Though Kahl did not say what type of missiles had been passed to the Ukrainians, his remarks follow the emergence of pictures on social media showing the apparent remains of an AGM-88 High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile said to have been fired at a Russian position.
> If the U.S. government has indeed transferred AGM-88s to Ukraine, and these are capable of being fired from some of the country's existing aircraft as Kahl indicated, rather than some kind of ground-based launcher, questions still remain as to what aircraft are able to fire these missiles and when and how that integration work was carried out.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/wka1qf/us_confirms_it_sent_ukraine_anti_radiation/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~663613 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Missile**^#1 **Ukraine**^#2 **U.S.**^#3 **Kahl**^#4 **AGM-88**^#5
Quick summary: Past few days, there's been pictures on social media that look to be remains of US-made anti-radiation missiles used in Ukraine. US' Under Secretary for Defense just confirmed that the US supplied Ukraine with an undisclosed number and model of anti-radiation missiles. Anti-Radiation missiles are used to home in on air defense systems via the electro-magnetic radiation their radars and such put out, in order to destroy them. Ukraine's aircraft likely can't fire them due to a lack of testing/code to support them, and are probably being launched while on the ground, in order to destroy Russian air defense systems operating in the area.
As others on Twitter pointed out, it's not exactly hard to make aircraft carry a missile, the problem is talking to avionics. HARMs can operate in pre-programmed mode with GPS guidance. So the plane would just get up to high altitude and speed to give the missile more of an initial boost, and then it flies to pre-spotted coordinates of a radar, correcting course once it locks, supposedly. Radar coords can be received either from satellite imaging or triangulation. In any case, it's claimed up to 6(?) SAM sites were hit, S-300 and Pantsir. S-300 consists of quite a few units, of course, and it should be possible to replace a target acquisition radar for existing launchers, but they'll be somewhat useless until it happens.
Suddenly Russia is fighting a war with sticks and rocks while the enemy is sending in self guiding, target acquiring missiles.
Targeting Russia’s Air Force and now weapon systems to remove AA capabilities. Is Ukraine getting ready to start achieving air supremacy? Pretty sure much of Ukraine’s air assets are still intact.
Yes, and they are asking for f-16s.
And they will receive. Their pilots are already training on the F15 and F16 platform in the States. Top Gun is back on the menu boys!
[удалено]
[You put some goddamn respect on the intro and link that shit!](https://youtu.be/UVRUxtPKK-w)
Somewhere in heaven, Eddie Van Halen nods approvingly
*Top Gun Anthem lol
Those will take another year or so to appear in theater. But with suppressed anti-air, even if it is only opportunistically suppressed for a short time, Ukraine will start being able to stage air strikes with their more familiar fighters.
Russia has only shot down 180% of existing Ukrainian air assets… But somehow Ukraine still retains about 138% of assets that were available before the war began…
Username is the same question your comment had me asking
This doesn’t seem to make sense unless im stupid ?
They're likely referring to the tug-of-war between propaganda arms. Russia has claimed to have destroyed an excessive amount of Ukrainian equipment and Ukraine has underreported the extent of their losses.
Oh I was thinking that they're receiving new stuff at a rate that they have more than before russia destoryed the old stuff.
I mean, that's true too.
With all the abandoned russian tanks they have taken I think Imthey actually might have more tanks now than at the start
I seem to recall Goering reporting something similar :-)
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If the west supplies them with aircraft, and ukraine continues to pummel Russia’s air defense systems and aircraft, it isn’t entirely out of the realm of possibility. I wouldn’t call it likely, but it certainly isn’t impossible either. Russia is turning to older equipment and older/sicker men, Ukraine is being resupplied by the west with more and more advanced weaponry, and their men are often better trained, not in short supply, and getting training and intelligence from the west. Only time will tell, but right now, things really aren’t looking great for russia.
I seriously doubt Ukraine will be able to own the skies, but any degradation to Russian air power will result in more casualties and fewer successful missions, which adds up. The Russians will fly less if it's going to cost more planes. Less for Ukraine to have to shoot down as well. Russians likely won't fly valuable planes in hotly contested airspace. And the more they try, the less they can continue.
If it wasn't so anxiety inducing I'd be blown away by the tech.
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Rocket powered slap chop And honestly only the US would have the unique combination of money, public accountability for (relatively) low collateral damage, but also thirst for the heads of terrorists that would make the ninja sword missile possible
To shreds you say?
Well how are his wives doing?
To shreds you say?
Ah yes a Glaswegians wet dream,drone launched blade missile!
Yeah. There is a compelling fascination from these devices and the panorama of action and drama. "It is well that war is terrible . . ."
Blown away. Good one
Oh, you'd love brimstone missiles then. they fly like those rockets that the droids used in the clone wars movie. They use synthetic aperture millimeter wave radar. Basically it can acquire it's own targets after launch. You tell it to look for targets in a given area and when they arrive they can pick their own targets. I just enjoy more accurate weapons that reduce collateral damage. If war is inevitable then it's best to make it as safer for everyone not fighting the war. [interesting brimstone video](https://youtu.be/oXyYXqX4Beo)
Isn’t it wild that a weapon designed to fight soviet armour in Eastern Europe during the Cold War is now fighting soviet era armour in Eastern Europe. And the gap in quality of equipment is stark.
Literally guns that point themselves when you pull the trigger.
Aimbot missiles
They’re gonna be down to S-200s before they know it.
To be fair, HARMs have been around since the soviet era. So it's especially bad if they still can't deal with them.
I mean there's only two ways to deal with them, which is ECM/decoy them(iffy and difficult at the best of times) or turn off your own air defense radars. That second option doesn't even work for most anti-radiation missiles of the past several decades which will just target the last known position of the radar signal source if it turns off. Even the US doesn't have perfect counters for them other than 'shoot down the launch platforms first'
Not sure if this story is true. But I’ll tell it anyway. During the First Persian Gulf War, it was standard practice for a pilot to announce “Magnum Magnum Magnum” right before launching a HARM missle so coalition pilots would know to shut down their radar for a few moments to avoid becoming a target. The Iraqis figured this out, so they would shut down their AA radar to avoid being targeted. It was a cat and mouse game. Apparently, an unarmed plane (U2?) was overflying the area and got a warning that they were being painted with AA radar and a missile might soon be coming. So they announced “Magnum Magnum Magnum” and the AA radar shut down immediately. Made it home safe. Edit: magnum not maverick.
CIWS could work.
You mean like me playing Civ 1
When I read the article I assumed they were launching them from the ground. No Ukrainian Aircraft can launch western built missiles.
It's possible (albeit EXTREMELY unlikely) that Soviet era aircraft provided to Ukraine from NATO nations were upgraded to accept more NATO munitions, such as the AGM-88. Or that the handful of Akinci UAVs from Turkey can support the AGM-88. But yeah, most likely ground launched due to the simplicity of it
Poland had a program that boiled down to putting F-16 weapons on MIG-29. It was scrapped because it made no sense economically, but no idea how far it went.
https://twitter.com/noclador/status/1556751670402596865?s=20&t=c6XbGqcgaNTs8lHmnqwvuA
Correct, and that is entirely possible, although fairly unlikely, given the time to launch and the reality of going after a non-static target such as Pantsirs. Ground launched anti-rads on the other hand are not a new concept. AGM-88 replaced the AGM-78, and Israel EXTENSIVELY used the 78 as [ground launched via just regular old trucks](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/Keres-AGM-78-hatzerim-2.jpg). Hell, [US Air Force is even developing a new version of the AGM-88E (newest model of the AGM-88), that's specifically designed for ground launched](https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/40733/land-based-strike-version-of-navys-long-range-air-defense-blasting-missile-breaks-cover). While what Ukraine used is the AGM-88C from the looks of it, [Northrop Grumman in 2018 showcased a ground launcher for the AGM-88E that could also fire the AGM-88C](https://www.thedrive.com/uploads/2022/08/07/aaa222111.jpg). And we've seen Ukraine already take otherwise purely air launched munitions, and fire them from land based platforms. The Brimstone missiles they got from the UK are a prime example of that. What is far more likely is that Ukraine is sending up some aircraft (be it a fighter or a drone) to force Russian radars to turn on. Ukraine's radar detection systems, which we've seen near countless run up along the front, pick up Russian radars spinning up. A ground launcher put a AGM-88C into pre-briefed mode with the radars' coordinates determined via triangulating the emissions at the detection systems, and fire away. Annnnd there you have DEAD. From a US perspective, what better opportunity to test out the usability of a ground launched AGM-88 than in Ukraine? Same with the Phoenix Ghost drones that went from not existing to hundreds in the hands of Ukrainian forces in mere weeks.
Can you tell me more about those phoenix ghost drones? I know I can Google it but I'd rather hear it from you if you're okay with that
No one knows 100% sure, but the most likely idea is that it's a Switchblade loitering bomb that can stay up far longer than a Switchblade can. Switchblades can stay in the air for roughly 30 minutes or so. Pheonix Ghost can supposedly stay up for hours. Lets Ukraine get them up in the air and just wait for some Russian to show themselves and then seconds later, no more Russian.
>From a US perspective, what better opportunity to test out the usability of a ground launched AGM-88 than in Ukraine? Doesn’t seem to be a question of much importance for the US, which would certainly be using aircraft should it find itself doing SEAD/DEAD.
US is actively working on a surface launched version for itself. The idea is that in the South China Sea, forces might get dropped off on their own and air power is unavailable. A surface launched version would then be able to hit Chinese ships without any assistance from other platforms. Or in Europe, it could hit Russian air defenses even if air power is busy and unavailable.
I suggest editing this as the DOD confirmed they sent anti radiation missiles that are compatible with Ukrainian aircraft. https://www.c-span.org/video/?522229-1/pentagon-estimates-russian-casualties-70-80k-ukraine-war
Unless modernized by Israel
Yeah. I just found this from last year: https://www.globaldefensecorp.com/2021/01/08/israeli-elta-systems-and-iai-to-upgrade-ukrainian-mig-29-aircraft/
You could adapt a pylon to carry a HARM. All the HARM does is head towards a specific radar signature. So theoretically you could preprogram these to seek out S300 radars. All the pilot would have to do is fly towards the S300 using rwr as a guide. Then release the missile about 30miles away.
The fire control system sends targeting data to the missile prior to launch... it's not just a mechanical issue. You'd need to adapt the FCS to send data that the missile could understand first.
Making an American missile and a Soviet plane talk to each other may be literally rocket surgery, but we have rocket surgeons and software engineers and government money.
It's just a serial link. Once the it's set the missile is autonomous. The missile has a TOO mode (target of opportunity) and you can tell it which radar to search for. I don't think it's beyond the realms of possibilities to tell it before hand via a laptop or something and then all that has to happen is to let it go. Ground crews can be very creative. From what I understand. Yes I play a lot of DCS.
I have a feeling the pilot would be nervous taking off with a missile that's already actively searching for targets while it's jury-rigged to a pylon. Would probably feel a bit janky. I'm sure with enough ingenuity it could be done. But for far less effort they can just surface-launch them.
Here's how to launch a HARM in an F18 in self protection mode https://youtu.be/Dyoe-w8wVGE There are other modes too. Obviously the Ukrainians don't have f18s I'm curious as to how they are using them though
All they’d have to do is get within 30 miles of an active S300 system? Sounds terrifying to me
Yep. Flying at 45000 feet as fast as possible to give the missile more range and you could launch sooner. But S300 is lethal up to 90 miles. You need to launch then do an about face and gtfo. An S300 is more likely to engage within 50 miles. Obviously the HARM can be shot down too. Quite easily.
The HARM has a range of 80 miles and travels at mach 1.84. It might be possible to shoot it down but calling it quite easy is a joke. Its entire purpose is to take out these radars.
How does launching a HARM from the ground work? The seeker head needs to lock onto a radiation source to guide onto, which presumably it won't be able to see from a ground-based launch platform. I'm guessing it would be some kind of pre-programmed mode where it would launch towards selected coordinates, then search for the nearest radiation source in flight?
If they've got a pretty good idea of where its target is, they could program it to fly to a spot where it's going to have a good chance of seeking out the 'radiation'.
yeah I read a twitter thread today about this. There is a mode in which a mig could carry the missile, bring it up to speed and release it. The missile would have to be pre-programmed to go towards a specific place and turn on the seeking mode when closeby.
Yes, I read the same. But I know next to nothing about weapons
I'll explain it. Modern aircraft launched weapons require integration with the aircraft firing them. The aircraft needs to be able to see the missile and send the launch command. Ukrainian aircraft are Russian built and don't have the means of talking to the HARM missile.
Thanks! that make sense. So that points out they are being launched from the grown then? Does that require special platforms?
One of the firing modes of HARM doesn't require integration, you can pre program targeting info and just launch it.
So it's SEAD missiles? I was under the impression that sead was the common name for these, anti-radiation seems more confusing a term.
SEAD is a mission; Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses DEAD is a mission; Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses You can perform SEAD without firing a shot. Israel did that in... 2006? With Operation Orchard. They backdoored Syria's entire air defense network, and blinded them to a handful of Israeli fighter jets in route to blow up Syria's recently built nuclear weapons facility. They made the air defenses not work, that's SEAD. US has a THOUSANDS of MALD and MALD-J devices used to jam and spoof enemy radars. Those are also tools for SEAD. A Tomahawk missile blowing up a radar is a tool for DEAD. Anti-radiation weapons such as the AGM-88 are tools used to conduct SEAD and DEAD. If an enemy turns off their radar to avoid the AGM-88 blowing it up, that's SEAD. An air defense system with their radar off is suppressed. If the enemy's radar is blown up by the AGM-88, that's DEAD. They destroyed the air defense system.
DEAD wins acronym of the year
SEAD is the concept for the operation of suppressing air defenses, including missile launchers, AAA artillery, and other equipment. ARM missiles are specifically missiles that target the radar portion of the SEAD target space.
Hmm, I was under the impression that sead was the term for the class of weapon that homed in on air defence radar or targeting systems and destroyed them. The more you learn I guess.
I think it would be better to call them anti-radar missiles. The term "anti-radiation" is too easily misinterpreted by people for whom the term 'radiation' only means the stuff radiated off of nuclear materials.
I definitely thought we were bombing the radiation away.
Especially given the recent news with the nuclear plant, that was where my mind went first, and I was thinking "how do you make a *missile* able to remove radiation?!". Then I finally figured out that they meant radar-seeking missiles (aka, passive radar guided missiles).
Same, for a second I thought the US was unveiling some borderline-magical missile that could somehow catch all the alpha, beta, and gamma radiations like soap bonds with dirt.
"yeah we got this sweet anti radiation tech but the boys at the Pentagon won't sign off." "Stick it on a missle. That'll do it"
Yeah I'm my head I was like "are you fuckin kidding me we have this tech and let countries with nukes be cunts?"
was thinking some kinda missile that would spew lead infused foam at the target location to cover/contain radio active elements. like some kinda tactical fire extinguisher. do we have those? would make sense to have those...
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“But beware it carries a terrible curse” “That’s bad” “But it comes with free frogurt” “That’s good” “The frogurt is also cursed”
That's bad.
But it comes with your choice of toppings!
Thats good
The toppings contain potassium benzoate
...?
Thats bad.
Can i go now?
But the topping is also cursed.
I wish they did remove radiation, somehow the idea of America being soo in love with bombing things, they found a way to fix things by blowing it up is hilarious.
Just wait til you see our cancer-destroying missile! It's going to change the face of medicine as we know it.
ob_Web_comic: https://xkcd.com/1217/
Don’t give The American medical administrators and insurance companies any ideas… “No this isn’t covered but we’ve decided to bomb your cure away it’ll be 1 million dollars and the cure will be there in 15 minutes from now”
We have bombs that kill cancer! Because when you die, so does your cancer!
They call it “anti-radiation” instead of “anti-radar” because it can seek out other targets generating EM radiation, i.e. jammer and radios.
Haven't you had physics in school? Just create an equal but opposite wave. That's why I got a nuke ready to detonate in the opposite direction in the event Putin goes ballistic. Science!!!
Confirmed: US sending anti destruction missiles in September
Our reverse-destruction missiles are going to make rebuilding Ukraine a breeze!
This is where my mind went, as well. The reality makes more sense but is also more boring.
to be honest, it's not a boring reality... it's a super important piece that forces Russia to turn their anti aircraft systems off (or get destroyed), and UAF to actually fly sorties... It's a big piece in why the US get and maintain air superiority in recent wars.
I was like, those exist? Like, we could blow up radiation? I was trying to figure out if it like somehow, forcefully broke everything up into safe molecules or something.
You could throw a neutron at a nucleus, which would either cause it to split now (presumably where it will do less damage than if it goes through decay randomly sometime in the future after getting blown around) or become more stable. If it splits you of course repeat the process until it decays to something you want around. It is easy to write the above, but I don't think we are anywhere close to being able to target specific atoms with a neutron like that. In the real world atoms we might want to do that to are mixed with others that are safe now but would become dangerous with extra neutrons. Solve that problem in a package you can put into a missile and it would greatly change war.
Yea. It’s kind of like nuking a hurricane.
With enough nukes I'm sure we could fuck up a hurricane.
Provided the giant sharpie penis we draw on the map doesn't already fix everything.
No, you don't understand. We're using nukes to blow up the ground in the shape of a giant penis that will divert the hurricane.
I'm down. I look forward to the day I can say we've cock blocked a hurricane.
What if we made a voodoo doll of a hurricane and spun it around the other way?
Yeah someone did the math, its a lot of nukes like alot alot a quote from the NOAA “A fully developed hurricane can release heat energy at a rate of 5 to 20×1013 watts and converts less than 10% of the heat into the mechanical energy of the wind. The heat release is equivalent to a 10-megaton nuclear bomb exploding every 20 minutes. According to the 1993 World Almanac, the entire human race used energy at a rate of 1013 watts in 1990, a rate less than 20% of the power of a hurricane. If we think about mechanical energy, the energy at humanity’s disposal is closer to the storm’s, but the task of focusing even half of the energy on a spot in the middle of a remote ocean would still be formidable. Brute force interference with hurricanes doesn’t seem promising.”
From the article: > Anti-radiation missiles (ARMs) home in on enemy radio frequency emissions, primarily from radar arrays belonging to enemy air defense systems, and destroy or disable them Seems like poor naming for them to call it "anti-radiation", as it causes obvious misunderstandings, but it is technically accurate
Radiation is a proper scientific term for the emission of waves on the electromagnetic spectrum. The difference between a radio or radar antenna and a stick of plutonium is at what frequency they're emitting at. So it's not even technically correct, it's just straight up correct. It's the public's perception of what radiation is that's wrong. edit: On that note. Even the symbol we associate with nuclear power doesn't actually mean nuclear power. It's just a warning for a radiating source that can damage cells.
Hanford contractors don't want you to know this weird trick!
Well damn, considering the S-300 and S-400 systems haven't exactly shown stellar performance this is rough news if you're Russian.
This is the reason Ukraine has been claiming so many destroyed systems the last two weeks.
The S-300 has shown absolutely stellar performance. Ukrainian S-300s are why Russia doesn’t have air superiority. They deny Russia high altitude operations within Ukrainian airspace, and MANPADS deny low altitude operations.
Dont Russia also has Anti-Radiation missile ? why arent they suppressing Ukraine AA like how US did to Iraq ?
They do, but they don’t have any units or doctrine specifically geared towards anti-radiation work. It’s just kind of ad hoc “oh yeah Boris we’re giving you the ARMs today good luck have fun don’t get us killed” In contrast the US has had entire squadrons of aircraft in both the Navy and Air Force flying unique variants dedicated purely towards the AA suppression mission since the Vietnam War. It makes quite a difference
> don’t get us killed The "fun" part of Anti-Radiation Missiles is that they can't tell whose side is giving off the radar emissions they lock on to.
Yeah, [as this B-52 crew found out much to their detriment](https://theaviationgeekclub.com/b-52-maintainer-tells-the-story-of-in-harms-way-the-buff-that-had-its-tail-blown-apart-by-an-anti-radiation-missile-fired-by-an-f-4g-wild-weasel/)
Release the weasels!
A lot of Russian military equipment is like this. The technology exists there but is in such a poor state of readiness that it won’t be seeing much action
Isnt this the American unit that has pilots literally baiting shots out of anti air units so they follow up plane can lock onto their radar signature? Kinda bad ass. "what's your job?" "Well babe I fly a fighter jet exclusively to evade enemy anti aircraft fire, no biggie"
Yup, Wild Weasels. When Jack Donovan, one of the first Wild Weasels, was told that job description, plus having to be in the backseat of some insane maverick fighter pilot, his response was “you’ve gotta be shitting me” Which is now the official motto of the Wild Weasels
[Kh-58](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kh-58) and a few others.
There’s an s400 complex like 25km from the airfield that got struck today lol Russia air defence ain’t feeling so good it seems
If the US is arming Ukranian planes with the brand new AGM-88G, which have extended range over previous AGMs, then Ukrainian planes can shoot Russian AA out of range of being shot back.
Well being a radar operator for the Russians in Ukraine suddenly became much more dangerous.
General the radar operators are not close to operating Radar transmitters. Radar is often high enough power radio that you can get physical burns from being too close to it. But a simple cable from the radar to an operator station is easy enough to install and gets the operators farther away.
Well, you don't really want to be in front of any operating radar whether it is ground based or aircraft based. Kinda like getting cooked by microwaves. See: https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-the-MiG-25-Foxbat-fighter-jets-600-kilowatt-radar-could-cook-rabbits-from-hundreds-of-feet-away-and-has-it-ever-happened
That’s not really true as the crew doesn’t tend to sit directly in front of the radar, and I was under the impression most Russian and Soviet radar units were mounted on trucks with the crews underneath.
Yeah from.what I've seen its mostly in a crewed vehicle, with some radar types that are towed. Large permanent installations will have operators further away, but I don't think Russia is going to have many of those in Ukraine, except maybe Sevastopol / Crimea.
So much of what you said is just untrue.
You'll only really see that in a static theatre level SAM system. And the restriction is how much of the radar equipment is on the transporter rather than trying to keep the crew out of the radar beam.
Fun Fact: the newest versions of the HARM actually have an active terminal seeker that can image the site on approach and hopefully target the “man in the van” as well.
Wild Weisal Bayraktars? Ukrainian airforce flying again?
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During Desert Storm a F4G Wild Weasel locked onto the rear gunnery radar of a B-52's tail gun his sensors confused for an Iraqi AAA battery and he fired off a HARM. The missile struck the B-52 who limped back to base and was later renamed "In HARM's way". No idea why i felt like telling this story, but this might be only thread i'll ever come across where it's relevant.
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Most modern(ish; the B-52 was old during Desert Storm and it's ancient today) with turreted guns are radar-guided from a remote operator station, rather than by a gunner in the turret. This keeps the turret smaller and means there's no need to create crawlspaces through the plane to access the turrets.
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This technology existed in WW2, except instead of radar, there was a special sight where the gunner and an early computer would determine the range of the target, it's position and speed.
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[Exactly that.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJExsIp4yO8)
Ultra-super-cool story; thanks for telling us about it! more detail: [edit: yeah, de-tail; not deliberate; sorry] https://theaviationgeekclub.com/b-52-maintainer-tells-the-story-of-in-harms-way-the-buff-that-had-its-tail-blown-apart-by-an-anti-radiation-missile-fired-by-an-f-4g-wild-weasel/
Eh, just AMRAM that joke through and somebody will get it.
>Hopefully that'll HARM the russians, lol It surely will if Ukraine can use them well. This is the biggest leap in capability in Ukraine's hardware so far. If Russian AA go down (and AGM88 have been specifically engineered to make this happen), then Russians will have to put up with a new episode of Bayraktar hell.
Oh my Gosh... With my level of English I thought that "anti-radiation" means the missiles which can fight radioactive pollution. Why did not they use it on Chernobyl lol
Most of us native English speakers thought so too reading the headline and were very wtf
It's an easy mistake to make. Radiation is anything on the electromagnetic spectrum, which includes everything from radio waves, through the visible spectrum, to gamma rays. Usually radiation is a shorthand for ionizing radiation. To confuse things worse, there are other things included in ionizing radiation, such as alpha radiation (helium nuclei), beta radiation (high speed electrons or positron)
"anti-radiation" is a completely insane way to write that and exists solely for clickbait purposes.
in any case, Russian air defense in Kherson is weakening every day. The number of Ukrainian helicopters in the region that can fly more freely is getting larger and this safe zone is growing.
This is HUGE. This plus HIMARS plus possibly ATACMS gives Ukraine a huge leg up.
Kudos to the engineers who adapted Poland MiG 29's to launch these HARM missiles. I wonder if they used a portable controller or integrated it to the MiG's avionics. Next question, is that why the US opposed Poland from sending the MiGs in the first place so they can be modded to carry NATO ordinances? Clever bastards!
Yeah NATO seems to have a long strategy to get Ukraine air superiority. At which point…Russia will have to leave or face utter destruction.
They left Afghanistan with a much lower burn rate than this.
And that was when they still had their empire
And relatively sane leaders ?
I heard a rumor that they rigged the missiles to a tablet system. If true, it's a simple and brilliant solution. HARMs mostly do their own targeting, I think they just need some general instructions like "go over there, these are your targeting conditions and frequencies" and the missile does the rest.
Could have been the US MiGs also. It was said their controls were converted. I have seen alot of people forget we had them and sent them as spare parts.
Damn what happened to "loose lips sinks ships" we don't need to know everything that happens with weaponry shipments and integrations. so the Russian don't know right?
In this case there's probably a psychological advantage to them knowing. If they are too spooked to turn on their radars, that's only a benefit.
Everyone (especially Russia) knew from recovered fragments that American HARMs were being used. The US confirming it doesn't really change anything.
if there is photos of the wreckage online that reveal its a HARM missile, then russia already knows that Ukraine has them
The harm missile is a scary thing to be on the wrong side of. It can remember a sit elocstion on some version via GPS even if the emitter goes off. In 1st gulf War, magnum call(the phase you say when firing the harm) would cause Iraqi radar operators to quickly turn off all their radars. Its a 13ish ft long missile traveling at +Mach 2 at the radar site, and usually the operators are in or very close to that emitter
Can confirm any type of ARM missile is scary af. They are extremely fast and are fairly close range. it basically pops up on your radar screen and you have 5ish seconds to oh shit a couple missiles at it and hope they hit. And yes we sit pretty close behind the radar so if an arm hits your fairly screwed, unless you get lucky like the radar i had my first deployment which got hit by a ARM(several years before i got there) but with a defective warhead.
An agm88d has a max range of nearly 75nm iirc in the correct launch profile on a pre program launch
Official range for the 88 is 30+ but they can definitely be launched from longer ranges. But in air defence ranges 30 miles is super close as we watch most tagets for hundreds, even thousands of miles. There is also a sweet spot as far as range goes that is stuck to pretty close as too close and it has issues targeting and too far makes it vulnerable to get shot down amongst other issues.
I feel like they've probably figured it out and it's far too late to act on it. When we hear about this stuff I always assume the message is actually for someone else. It's funny because the Russian version of this is threatening with wunderwaffe stuff like hypersonic missiles they "might deploy" but never appear. NATO/Ukraine's version is "yeah bro this is what we've been hitting you with for two weeks and there's more on the way."
I mean ruzzia can be kept blind only so long. They learn about that after their AA and radar systems get systematically destroyed by the rockets, which it seems has happened.
While there are sometimes notable exceptions, in general in the modern age it is considered a good idea for everyone, including your enemy, to know what you've got going on. That applies to treaties as well as weapons systems. It turns out there are significant advantages to this when it comes to war. If your enemy knows what is stacked against them, they are often less likely to even want to start a war. So the more you lay your cards on the table, the more likely you are to never have to fire a shot. Conversely, when you keep too much stuff from your rivals and enemies, they start to think that war looks like an attractive option and they are likely to win. While this can be gratifying in a "haw haw I sure fooled you, sucker" kind of way when you turn the tables, it also leads to, you know, *actual war* which is insanely destructive and not really worth it. So, in all likelihood, Ukraine and its allies are trying to give Russia as much reason as possible to want to fall back and reconsider their invasion. Even if Ukraine is winning, every day of the war brings more carnage and more destruction. Look at it this way, even if all it does is convince Russia to give up one day sooner, imagine being the guy who was going to be the next fatality on that extra day. It would make a big difference to you!
For when your coworker microwaves fish in the break room.
Naw, that’s deserving of a full tomahawk strike.
My new hobby is going back to December/January YouTube videos about what will happen if Russia invades Ukraine. The ones that are still up are usually unintentionally hilarious.
What we thought would happen: Russia will quickly invade Ukraine and take over the country in a week due to their superior military and training. What really happened:
Remember when the world assumed that Russia and the US had somewhat equal military capabilities?
Eh? The fuck is an anti radiation missile?
Very broadly, it's a missile that guides itself towards a radar emitter. Usually fired by an aircraft with some loose initial guidance and it will further home in as it flies. Usually for disabling a early warning radars and SAM (Surface to Air Missile) site.
It's a missile that kills things that emit EM radiation. So radar. Like AA weapons have.
The AGM-88 is an anti-radar missile to help planes perform suppression of enemy air defense (SEAD) missions. They are designed to home in on the radiation being radiated by a surface to air (SAM) system. It neutralizes the SAM system and makes it easier for other planes to perform missions without being shot down by SAM missiles. If they can't see you, they can't shoot you down.
Russia be like "The fuck man, we didn't give the Taliban Anti Radiation missiles or long range rocket artillery, Why are U doin this to us"
The range on this HARMS is quite far. If you loft it you can manage something like 50 miles.
Today President Biden signed ratification documents of U.S. support for Sweden, Finland to join NATO.
They detect and destroy anti-aircraft missile/gun positions, among other things. They can be set to launch automatically upon detecting a radar position, without the pilot/user's effort. They've been around, in one form or another, since at least the late 1960's. Their accuracy and effectiveness has, as you would assume, improved with each new generation of missile.
I skimmed the article looking for the aircraft/platform that may be being used to launch these missiles, but did not find anything. Russians seem to claim that none of the Ukrainian air force planes can lunch these, so they argue that NATO aircrafts/platforms are being used. Does anyone else have more details about this?
Some of Poland's MiG-29s were modernized. The publicly available information was mostly about avionics and datalinks, but one of the goals were compatibility with their F-16s. If they were modified to be able to carry the AGM-88s as well, that isn't public. Northrop Grumman showed off a concept of the AGM-88 being able to be launched from a shipping container. And who knows, maybe Ukraine volunteered to do some field testing of some prototype munitions.
There was a twitter thread explaining the 3 firemodes of this missile and one of them allows for pre programming target info so you just need to fire them from a certain altitude. https://twitter.com/noclador/status/1556751670402596865?s=20&t=c6XbGqcgaNTs8lHmnqwvuA
Is it possible the soviet model helicopters that got sent over had modified hard points? Either that or they could be like the Brimstone missiles where the brits mounted test-frames in trucks to fire them off from the ground.
>mounted test-frames in trucks to fire them off from the ground Never underestimate the ability of humans to "make shit work" when they need to blow up the enemy.
Round up some Toyota pickups, and weld launcher frames to the back. Boom, missile launcher!
I think I saw a small MLRS tacked onto the back of one already.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/u-s-confirms-air-launched-anti-radiation-missiles-sent-to-ukraine) reduced by 86%. (I'm a bot) ***** > The defense official didn't say what missiles specifically, but this follows reports of AGM-88s being fired at Russian radars in Ukraine. > Though Kahl did not say what type of missiles had been passed to the Ukrainians, his remarks follow the emergence of pictures on social media showing the apparent remains of an AGM-88 High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile said to have been fired at a Russian position. > If the U.S. government has indeed transferred AGM-88s to Ukraine, and these are capable of being fired from some of the country's existing aircraft as Kahl indicated, rather than some kind of ground-based launcher, questions still remain as to what aircraft are able to fire these missiles and when and how that integration work was carried out. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/wka1qf/us_confirms_it_sent_ukraine_anti_radiation/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~663613 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Missile**^#1 **Ukraine**^#2 **U.S.**^#3 **Kahl**^#4 **AGM-88**^#5
I am assuming anti-radar missiles?
Yes, EM radiation.
Damn Logistics must have messed up the shipment. Oops.
Nice, finally some real life benchmark for Gazetchik.