Russia Deploys Avangard Missile Into Combat Duty

In the Orenburg region of the southern Urals, the Russian Defence Ministry on Saturday put its fearsome “Avangard” hypersonic missile into combat duty at the Yasnenskoye missile formation. It is one of the six “next generation” weapons that Russian President Vladimir Putin announced in March 2018, according to the Russian news agency TASS.

Russian Hypersonic Glider

According to the TASS report, the Avangard warhead can manoeuvre and outclass any missile defence while travelling at a hypersonic speed of about 32,000 kmph.

The USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republic) started researching hypersonic warheads in the middle of the 1980s, which led to the development of the Avangard hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV), according to a report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), an American think tank.

The project was reportedly restarted in the middle of the 1990s under the name “Project 4202,” according to the report. However, the initial effort was abandoned due to the collapse of the USSR in 1991.

In addition, the CSIS report asserted that this missile is nuclear-capable, has a range of over 6,000 km, weighs about 2,000 kg, and can transport either a nuclear or conventional payload. According to the TASS report, the nuclear warhead on the missile is “more than 2 megatons in TNT (trinitrotoluene) equivalent.”

According to CSIS, Avangard's manoeuvrability could make its trajectory unpredictable, making intercept attempts after its boost phase more challenging. Between 1990 and 2018, the Avangard had about 14 flight tests, according to a CSIS report.