Kyiv Post Military Update – August 8, 2022. A photo of a missile component said to have been found by Russian forces in the southern sector, and a photo of a HARM missile depot at a US Air Force base. The HARM missile is designed to target anti-aircraft radars. Identification information on the fragment identified the missile as a HARM AGM-88 missile manufactured by the US company Raytheon. The photo collage is from the news platform Tsaplienko_Ukraine Fights.
A senior White House official on Monday confirmed recent reports that Ukraine’s air force is now deploying HARM anti-radar missiles, a game-changing weapon that has been responsible for downing as many as 17 of them. anti-aircraft systems of the Russian military in the last 72. hours.
Colin Kahl, the US Deputy Secretary of Defense for Policy, told reporters in Washington that the US had initially sent an unspecified number of AGM-88 High-speed Anti-Radiation Missiles (HARM) to Ukraine as part of A recent shipment of weapons. It was the first official admission that modern weapons were used by the United States in the war in Ukraine.
“In the latest round of military aid, we have added a number of anti-radar missiles that can be fired from Ukrainian planes and can affect Russian radars and other things,” Colin Kahl said at a press conference on Monday.
Kahl said the U.S. and its allies have also helped Ukraine get spare parts and other parts to get Ukrainian MiG-29 fighter jets into the air, but he did not say what type of aircraft they were. used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF). WHYAYELLO
Ukrainian military news outlets said Romanian or Slovak MiG-29s, both upgraded to NATO standards and now believed to be in the hands of Ukraine’s air force, are the most likely missiles to be fired.
The HARM missile is a state-of-the-art technology missile currently in use by the US Air Force and Navy. A “smart” weapon, HARMS is designed to evade anti-aircraft radar and target the radar at the last location, even if the radar operator disables the anti-aircraft system.
Ukrainian social media, followed by independent media and official sources, reported increased damage and destruction of Russian air defense systems across the battle line. Ukraine’s Joint Defense Command said its units destroyed four RF S-300 systems on Sunday, and a Pantsyr-S1 system on Monday.
Data collected by the General Staff of the Ukrainian Army (AGS) estimated that the RF lost at least 17 air defense systems to all causes from Friday to Monday in the war across Ukraine, but did not say how the UAF destroyed the systems.
Russian social media and state-run news sites reported on Sunday that soldiers in the Mykolaiv-Zaporizhia region found parts of a US-made HARM missile from the wreckage of an S-300 air defense system that was recently destroyed by an air-to-air missile. . Some reports show pictures of the serial number of the weapon. Kahl’s statement on Monday effectively confirmed that it was definitely a HARM missile.
In the early days of the war, the Kremlin described the S-300 anti-aircraft system (NATO designation SA-10 Grumble) as an important part of Russia’s technological superiority over Ukraine’s armed forces.
The UAF has used ground-launched long-range missiles, conventional artillery and even high-risk behind infantry lines in previous attempts to defeat RF air defense systems such as the S-300. The distance of the best air defense system of the Russian Federation placed behind the Russian lines – usually 50-70 kilometers – has mostly kept the advanced Russian S-300 system out of the Ukrainian arsenal.
Developed by Raytheon and Northrop Grumman, the HARM missile has a range of 185 km, making it the longest range weapon known to have been delivered by the US to Ukraine so far in the war.
Depending on the model, a single HARM missile is said to cost between $280,000 and $850,000. HARM missiles used by the US Air Force and others severely damaged land-based air defenses in the Yugoslavian and Iraqi wars, and were a key contributor to Allied air power in both conflicts.
