Russia has deployed hypersonic Kinzhal (Dagger) missiles three times in Ukraine as part of a ‘special military operation,’ Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu stated on Sunday.
The Kinzhal missiles are part of a new arsenal of hypersonic weapons announced by President Vladimir Putin in 2018 in a bellicose address in which he claimed they could hit practically any point on the planet while evading a US-built missile shield.
Shoigu, addressing on state television, praised the missiles for their effectiveness in hitting high-value targets on all three occasions, calling them ‘unrivalled’ and ‘almost difficult to knock down while in flight.’
‘We used it three times during the special military operation,’ Shoigu explained in an interview with Rossiya 1. ‘Three times it demonstrated brilliant features.’
Russia utilised the Kinzhal system for the first time in Ukraine approximately a month after putting tens of thousands of troops into the country, attacking a massive weapons storage in Ukraine’s western Ivano-Frankivsk area.
Three MiG-31E warplanes equipped with Kinzhal missiles were transferred to the Kaliningrad zone last week, a Russian Baltic coast exclave positioned between NATO and European Union members Poland and Lithuania.
Late last month, on Russia’s Fleet Day, Putin stated that the navy would receive ‘formidable’ hypersonic Zircon cruise missiles in the coming months. The missiles can outrun air defences by travelling at nine times the speed of sound.
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