Russia deploys cruise missiles in all directions

The surprising statement was made by Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Deputy Defense Minister of Russia Valery Gerasimov when speaking to Russian media. Experience in recent years, including the campaign in Syria, has allowed Russia to perfect its systems for destroying the enemy in a synchronized manner.

"The use of these weapons in Syria has shown 100% success. It is a success," the general said. Russia will attach importance to using groups of complexes of vehicles equipped with long-range cruise missiles in the air as well as at sea.

Russian warship launches Kalibr-NK cruise missile.

"Because of the special significance of this line of weapons, they have been deployed in all strategic directions," said General Valery Gerasimov. According to him, Russia will deploy long-range missiles X-101 on aircraft, warships, and submarines capable of carrying Kalibr missiles. Not only that, Russian cruise missiles are also suitable for ground equipment.

Explaining the decision to increase the Russian defense arsenal with long-range cruise missiles, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that in the future, precision weapons could replace nuclear weapons as a deterrent. This transition would reduce international tensions and increase trust in the international arena.

The Russian military leader said that according to the plan outlined by the country's Defense Ministry, by 2021, the potential of Russia's strategic non-nuclear deterrence forces will increase fourfold, creating an opportunity to completely solve the problem of non-nuclear deterrence.

Shoigu said in a lecture for the defense ministry leadership and public opinion that, along with nuclear forces, unified non-nuclear deterrence forces will play an important role in ensuring the country's defense security.

In particular, non-nuclear deterrence will play a role in solving most problems in peacetime and wartime, in preventing and ending armed conflicts, as well as in the fight against international terrorism.

According to General Sergei Shoigu, the basis of the non-nuclear deterrence group is a group of combat vehicles carrying high-precision weapons, which are surface ships and submarines with cruise missiles, in addition to long-range bombers carrying long-range cruise missiles.

And this is considered the reason why Russia is building a series of warships that can carry long-range cruise missiles. Russia currently has many classes of ships, with a total of dozens equipped with the Kalibr-NK system, with the corresponding anti-ship/ground attack cruise missiles 3M-54T and 3M-14T. In addition, these systems can also launch P-800 Oniks missiles.

Among them, the largest (Admiral Gorshkov class - around 4,500 tons) has only half the displacement of the US Tomahawk missile warships. In addition, there is also the heavy missile frigate Project 11356P/M, Admiral Grigorovich class (4,000 tons).

The remaining number is equal to 1/5 of the US destroyers including Project 20385 Gremyashchy-class frigates, Gepard 3.9-class missile frigates, Project 11661K (2000-ton class), the large number is only 1/10 (Project 21631 light missile frigates, Buyan-M class, under 1000-ton class).

In addition, the Russian Navy is continuing to equip the Kalibr-NK cruise missile system on Project 22800 light frigates, Karakurt class (800 tons) and Project 22160 corvettes, built using the modular method with 3 different configurations (1300, 1500, 1800 tons);

By 2020, when all these classes of ships are fully operational with at least 4 ships per class (Admiral Gorshkov), most are 6 ships, at most 18 ships (Project 22800, Karakurt class; Byan-M from 16-18 ships), the Russian Navy will have enough ships carrying Kalibr cruise missiles to terrify any opponent.