Oreshnik...what kind of missile is that?

Oreshnik...
Today Putin showed up on air and announced that Russia had used against Ukraine a new ballistic missile called "Oreshnik"...

I'll say this: in all the years I've been following the Russian defense industrial complex, I've never heard anything even close to being codenamed "Oreshnik"...

What kind of missile is that?

So, Putin literally stated that: "The missiles attack the target at a speed of 10 Machs, which is 2.5-3 km per second. The modern air defense systems available around the world and the missile defense systems being created by the Americans in Europe do not intercept such missiles. This is off the table." That’s right, we’ve heard pretty much the same being said about the Kinzhals and Zirkons. Just keep that in mind.

But what's the point of rolling out some new hypersonic missile if you’ve got Kinzhals and Zirkons? At the same time, its performance features are the same: 10 Machs, while the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal boasts even more, and still, Patriots and SAMP/Ts successfully intercept the latter.

Also, hear me out on some nuances.

Around afternoon on Thursday, I observed an attempt across multiple Russian media platforms to justify the strike on Dnipro by claiming it wasn’t an ICBM, which is associated with nuclear arms, but a medium-range ballistic missile, the MRBM. That is, the Kremlin’s media machine has been ordered to downplay the significance of the weapon used against the Ukrainian city earlier today.

And then, Russia’s top schizophrenic comes into the arena, talking about the Oreshnik hypersonic missile. Like “no, wait, this wasn’t an ICBM, it was some ordinary, conventional stuff”…

It seems that after what’s been done, understanding what he actually did and what the consequences might ensue, given such an insignificant initial effect, after it became clear that the examination of fragments will show xactly what kind of missile was used, someone in the Kremlin felt his anus shrinking to the size of a needle's eye. We are waiting impatiently for this “wunderwaffe” to be showcased to us in order to draw the appropriate conclusions, and even more. They will eventually showcase it, right?

О.Коvalenko.