Thread by @TrentTelenko

English Translation & comment🧵in later tweets

The ship was spotted off Sevastapol three days ago. That is about 300 km B.C. Odesa away. The Ukrainian Neptune missiles have a range of about 100 km. Recently, UK Harpoon deployed anti-ship missiles. Their range is 220 km.
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https://twitter.com/coolservativ/status/1514315347536621571

Before this latest invasion of Ukraine kicked off, Ukraine conducted tests of the Neptun / Kharpunski ASCM hitting a target at 280 km.

This Pre-invasion Ukraine coverage map-tweet will give you an idea what that range means.

https://twitter.com/Orion__int/status/1486024618700075009

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Ukraine was on-course to have three batteries/Divisions of Neptune launchers with six four round launchers per battery/Division.

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https://twitter.com/mhmck/status/1392484368413831175

"Sources said" when the Latest Russian invasion arrived there was a 'test battery' and part -- the number of launchers is classified -- of a single production battery.

Again "Sources said" The use of human agent planted target markers by the RuAF took out a lot of UAF S-300
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SAM's & this small Neptun capability.

These "Sources" were wrong as the Ukrainian General Staff was playing the long game & may even have purposely planted disinformation regards their losses.

Good on them if doing so helped nail Moskva

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The Neptun has been derided by some as a "500 kt missiles which is obsolescent in the age of supersonic sea skimmers."

Ummm...no.

The single most important thing in a anti-ship cruise missile it its electronics and the Neptun has been in development
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https://twitter.com/Global_Mil_Info/status/1514393427969986565

...since 2010 & went into production in 2019.

The R-360 Neptun was planned for ground launch off a truck, sea launch off fast attack crafts, and air launch, against naval and ground targets.

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The Neptune R-360 missile has a mass of 870 kg [1,918 lb], the weight of the warhead is 150 kg [331 lb]; missile diameter - 380 mm [15 in]; maximum launch range - 280 km [151 nmi].

The range of altitudes of flight sea skimming R-360 - from 3 to 10 m [9.8 - 32.8 ft AMSL]
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The Neptun concept of operations [CONOPS] was to work with radio direction finding (D/F) gear and drones for visually identifying the targeted ship.

Now, the following is my speculation based on the newness of the Neptun electronics & capabilities in the latest Harpoon ASCM
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1st I think you need to assume that the Neptun have data links which would be extended through these drones so operators could delay seeker activation until Neptun were close to a target ship.

IOW Ukrainian Navy TB2's have data link pods other Ukrainian services don't.
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I also think it is also necessary to assume Neptun missile salvos can talk to each other & use 'blip enhancers' that re-radiate incoming radar signals more powerfully.

IOW, you make your radar blip bigger & closer volume.

Two missiles in a volley do this next to each other
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...so the center of the incoming blip is not directly over either missile.

Radar guided CIWS cannon fire & missile fire aimed at the center of the overlapping blip will by definition miss both missiles until close range 'burh through.'

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Thus one of the two missiles in the Ukrainian missile salvo was picked off by Moskva CIWS.

So, I think more than incompetence was involved in the disabling of Moskva.

Returning to public knowledge...
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...the planned Neptune Battery/Division composition -

o One RKP-360 command post (CP) / Launch Control Center (LCC)
o 6 x USPU-360 four round transporter erector launcher (TEL), with 24 ready rounds, and
o One TZM-360 transporter/transloader for each TEL, plus

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plus one TM-360 resupply truck per TEL. With High Frequency (HF) & satcom on the CP/LCC and each TEL, the system was designed from the outset for dispersed operations in an non-line-of-sight (NLOS) environment.

The TEL would operate up to 24 km inland & use NVIS Skywave HF

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radio to maintain contact with the CP/LCC & TZM-360 transporter/transloader.

NVIS Skywave HF radio is immune to satellite intercept and ground/air intercept requires trucks & aircraft carrying SIGINT gear to have correctly polarized antennas to get the signal

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...and properly geo-locating the transmitter for rapid strikes is...problematic.

This is a SIGINT skill set Western military's have let atrophy due to the easy availability of satellites.

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What most people, other than @RALee85, are unaware of is that the Neptune R-360 was part of a family of four missiles Ukraine was creating to mirror image Russia/China's anti-access area denial (A2AD) strategy back at Russia to make Crimea militarily untenable.
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These missiles were as follows

o Vilkha GMLRS 180 km,
o Neptun derivative GLCM/ALCM 300+ km, and
o Hrim 2 TBM ~400 km - the latter is Moscow suburbs.
o The Korshun GLCM that is a Tomahawk GLCM lookalike and likely able to go 1000+ km.
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Neither the Hrim 2 nor Korshun are ready.

The State Kyiv Design Bureau “Luch” Vilkha M Multiple Launch Rocket System started production in 2019.

It is a Ukrainian weapon in the class of the US GMLRS-ER smart artillery rocket.
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The UA service name for the Vilkha is "Alder", which has a range of up to 70 km equivalent to the non-modernized MLRS "Tornado".

The longer range version was not authorized by the Zelensky government for the UA.

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ukrmilitary.com/2021/04/70.html

The Ukrainian Luch Design Bureau was trying to sell the longer 130-180km ranged Vilkha-M to Egypt back in November 2021.

See:
Egypt in talks with Ukraine to buy high-precision rockets systems
By Dylan Malyasov
Nov 4, 2021
defence-blog.com/egypt-in-talks…

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It's unclear how many of the 70km or longer ranged versions of the Luch's 300mm GMLRS are available to Ukraine.

But, I think it is clear they have "some" and they are using them to a long term Ukrainian General Staff plan.

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Point in fact, I think it was one of the Luch's GMLRS that nailed the Russian Landing ships in #berdyansk & not a Toska-U/ SS-21 Scarab

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https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1507046965804212233

I'm thinking that we will see a lot more of these Ukrainian 300mm GMLRS soon in & after the break out from Kherson.

Things may get really hot for the Russians in Sevastopol very soon.

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