Many people know about DARPA that this agency stood at the origins of the Internet. Yes, this is so, and not only the Internet, however, in addition to successful projects, the agency actively supports various kinds of projection and "sawing" projects, either expecting that crazy ideas can "shoot" unexpectedly, or in the same way "mastering "appropriations. They could not pass by the "burning" topic - the fight against hypersonic missile launchers, anti-ship missiles and aeroballistic maneuvering hypersonic combat equipment (AGBO) of ICBMs, SLBMs, etc. Type of the same "Vanguard" 15Yu71.
The agency unveiled the Glide Breaker concept of a "hypersonic interceptor" at the D60, DARPA's 60th Anniversary Show. The "concept" itself was presented in the form of a couple of drawings by the artist with explanations, apparently, there is nothing else yet. This "interceptor", according to the developers, will be a small maneuvering vehicle capable of detecting and hitting hypersonic maneuvering targets not somehow, but with a direct hit, that is, kinetically. Honestly, the developers either completely lost their insolence, or in the agency itself, someone really wanted to pilfer funds into interested pockets, because the concept does not stand up to criticism.
Even the task of detecting and determining the exact, up to meters, location of a hypersonic warhead or KR / RCC is quite difficult because of the plasma "tail" trailing behind the object. This is if you use radar, but if you use IR systems or electro-optical systems, then the task is also not simplified.
Let us recall what was written more than 10 years ago by the then head of the 4th Central Research Institute of the Ministry of Defense, Major General Vasilenko, in a wonderful article "Asymmetric response", in which the anti-missile defense measures, which were then implemented in the new complex of means of overcoming missile defense (KSP ABM), were partially brought to the attention of the potential adversary. new ICBMs and SLBMs of Russia. In that material, it was said mainly about non-maneuvering, classic warheads, but much also applies to maneuvering ones.
In the atmosphere, the luminosity of its wake has a decisive influence on the optical signature of a block. The achieved results and implemented developments allow, on the one hand, to optimize the composition of the heat-protective coating of the block, removing from it the materials that are most conducive to the formation of a trace. On the other hand, special liquid products are forcibly injected into the trace area in order to reduce the radiation intensity.
In any case, whether there is a trace or not, it is still necessary to determine the exact location of the device itself. Therefore, getting into such an object with a kinetic interceptor is an almost insoluble task for a country with a higher level of development of air defense systems and missile defense technologies than the United States. And we must also take into account that the object maneuvers, and quite unpredictably, and even if its trajectory were predictable, the interceptor needs maneuverability several times higher than that of the target. Is this possible at hypersonic speeds? Let's clarify: is it possible at such speeds for Americans who are not champions in the field of hypersound, how to put it mildly?
Besides, who said that the AGBO maneuvering in the ionosphere or the upper stratosphere will not have the means to overcome the missile defense system?
In this regard, another method and the corresponding countermeasures come to the fore - small-sized atmospheric decoys with a working height of 2 … 5 km and a relative mass of 5 … 7% of the mass of the warhead. The implementation of this method becomes possible as a result of solving a two-pronged task - a significant decrease in the visibility of the warhead and the development of qualitatively new atmospheric decoy targets of the "wave-flying" class, with a corresponding decrease in their mass and dimensions.
"Vololet" - this is exactly the hypersonic "glider", that is, we are talking about maneuvering after the covered apparatus of false targets. But even without false goals, the task of kinetic interception of such goals, either at the present or at the promising (at least in the short and medium term) level of development, is practically unsolvable. A different, more realistic method would be offered for nothing, like directed streams of heavy fragments or lethal elements created by a controlled detonation of warheads - but no. Moreover, the "successes" of the same kinetic interceptors against never maneuvering and even non-intercontinental warheads when testing GBI and SM-3 antimissiles, in general, cannot please the creators. Not to mention the programs themselves. For 20 years of GBI development, the system was able to bring only 44 interceptors, capable of repelling only medium-range threats in the absence of any countermeasures and means of overcoming. And then - only at landfills. SM-3 is also not happy with its successes, and the development of the SM-3 Block 2B version was stopped, and it is unlikely that they will return to this idea (it's not about money, as stated, but about technical difficulties). The MIRV program with MKV interceptors to intercept MIRV missiles is also dead. And if it were not so - with those successes in identifying targets and detuning from interference and false targets that exist, these MKVs have almost no meaning.
And then suddenly DARPA decides, as it was said in the beloved film, "to strike at William himself, you know, Shakespeare." On the other hand, this is a topical topic, the ruling circles of the United States have a strong burning sensation in all parts of the body due to the fact that Russia has leaped far ahead of the "shining hail on a hill" in such ultra-modern technologies of armed struggle. And a lot of money will be allocated. But money will not help much if there are no solutions. If the Americans once learn to shoot down not just hypersonic missiles and devices, but also maneuvering ones, this will not happen very, very soon, and it is unlikely that the solution will be the same as described above.
But behind the unsolvable anti-missile problems, others are not forgotten either. Conservative and informed (with ties to the US Department of Defense and the CIA) American journalist Bill Hertz in a recent article complained that the US military lacks nuclear weapons capable of hitting highly defended buried targets like bunkers and underground factories and storage facilities. They say that the Russians, followed by the Chinese and even the North Koreans, are creating strong air defense-missile defense zones, which cannot be penetrated by conventional means adapted to destroy such targets (as if there are ordinary ammunition capable of hitting targets at depths of tens and hundreds of meters). And it is strange that the term "create" is used in relation to Russia, because Russia is full of the long-notorious "access restriction zones", as the Americans call the zones in our country and next to our territory, where you can: shovel in the air from air defense fighters and air defense systems level S-300 and S-400, rake at sea from the coastal, aviation and naval deployment of operational supersonic anti-ship missiles and are still heavily covered by electronic warfare. At the same time, it is interesting how nuclear weapons can help in such zones, if we are talking in the material of B. Hertz about aerial bombs - it is practically impossible to deliver them to zones with dense even military air defense.
Hertz writes that earlier the US Air Force had strategic aerial bombs B83-1 with a capacity of up to 1.2 Mt and a tactical B61-11 with a capacity of up to 400 kt, this particular version was intended to destroy protected objects. They have not yet been completely destroyed - all B61s will be converted (with a reduction in numbers from 500 to 400) into a "high-precision" modification of the B61-12, starting in 2020, with a capacity of up to 50 kt. And the B83-1, which, by the way, was not intended to hit deeply buried targets, cannot be solved due to the power of all tasks; other solutions are also needed - it has long been assigned for disposal. And that disposal proceeded at a good pace along with the rest of the ammunition until this year, when Trump allegedly ordered it to be held back until it was "adequately replaced."
But here's the thing - no one has developed an adequate replacement and is not going to, it announced the same 50-kt B61-12, and moreover, the plans of the US Department of Energy do not say that there are any changes in the fate of the B83. This is understandable: there is not enough capacity to maintain the arsenal, production is also impossible now, and "ballast" (and sometimes even useful ammunition) still needs to be disposed of, and Trump's instructions will not help here. Because physics cannot be fooled, especially nuclear physics, and if you cannot maintain the ammunition, then it is better to destroy it, otherwise you can get in trouble. And B61-12, which we consider for some reason capable of destroying underground shelters (to be honest, this statement seems, based on the available data, propaganda), is not considered such an American one. Even if it is buried 3-6 m into the ground, it will, of course, create a wave in the ground, similar to an overhead explosion from a much more powerful bomb (about 700 kt), but it is unlikely to be able to hit any buried structures, it just will be where a more "dirty" explosion than an air blast. But the B61-11 could allegedly penetrate much deeper into the ground and hit objects at depths of up to 100 m.
And now in the United States they are trying to come up with a solution: what to do so that at least some opportunities in unprotected strong air defense zones for the defeat of relatively buried targets are preserved. The variant of using the 5-kt W-76-2 "trimming" warhead mentioned by Hertz, which was already covered in one of the articles here, looks even more dubious than the B61-12 in view of its power, and the W76 was not intended for such purposes. The problem is the same: even if you know how to do it, but you cannot produce ammunition "from scratch", you will have to redo something from the existing one, but there are no suitable solutions. Although it is possible that a certain number of B-61-11 will try to remain in service, although there were very few of them - 50 pieces. In any case, even 50 bombs of this type, given that the US adversaries, according to the CIA, have more than 10,000 highly defended underground facilities, is a drop in the ocean. True, given the fact that among such objects nonexistent in the real world were mentioned "tunnels buried for hundreds of meters for rocket trains in Russia", it should be assumed that this figure is somewhat overestimated.
It is also not very clear how Hertz, who writes about the defeat of highly protected deep objects in Moscow, expects to deliver any bomb through the air defense of the Central Industrial Region. Unless the Americans invented teleportation. If we are talking about the fact that such objects will be hit after an exchange of massive nuclear missile strikes, and moreover not one by one, when the air defense has already been destroyed in order, then there are very great doubts that after them there will be someone to deliver such a load, and especially - to give such an order. The fact is that the SNF of the Russian Federation also deals with the destruction of underground targets, and much more efficiently than in the United States.
