"Kinzhal is just an air-launched Iskander, it can't be hypersonic!"
Can and is. Let's talk about rockets.
Leaving aside the fact the ground-launched Iskander tactical ballistic missile is also a hypersonic weapon with a maximum velocity of around Mach 6, and whether Kinzhal is actually an Iskander-derived design or not (Wiki suggests it's somewhat larger and I don't think it's even well-established that it's a non-separating missile like Iskander), it's very elementary rocketry that a missile fired at supersonic speed from the stratosphere is going to be far longer-ranged and faster than one fired from the ground.
How much so? Well, we can expect the Kinzhal's carrier aircraft to release it at around Mach 2 and 60,000 feet, near the service ceiling and maximum speed of a Tu-22M and likely what the MiG-31 can actually achieve with such a large missile hanging off its belly. While this may seem like a long way from hypersonic flight, for a space launcher, this flight regime is functionally halfway to orbit.
At that speed and altitude, a Saturn V had already burned about 40% of its total propellant load and was flying beyond Max-Q (the point of maximum dynamic pressure from drag on the airframe, generally reached around Mach 1.5). To give you an idea of how quickly things progress from there, between this point (at around 90 seconds into flight) and main stage burnout is only another 70 seconds, and in that 70 seconds the rocket will accelerate to approximately Mach 8 and climb to 220,000 feet.
Clearly, launching a missile of equal size from this flight regime rather than from the ground will lead to a vastly higher-speed projectile and with it a much longer range. It's functionally the equivalent of doubling a ground-launched missile's propellant while keeping its size and weight constant.
So, yes, this is something that is easily going to be traveling at "proper" hypersonic velocity in the Mach 10+ range when penetrating enemy air defenses. I haven't run numbers on this but I suspect a two-stage derivative could place a small payload in orbit as well, which would have serious military potential for a number of purposes.
Can and is. Let's talk about rockets.
Leaving aside the fact the ground-launched Iskander tactical ballistic missile is also a hypersonic weapon with a maximum velocity of around Mach 6, and whether Kinzhal is actually an Iskander-derived design or not (Wiki suggests it's somewhat larger and I don't think it's even well-established that it's a non-separating missile like Iskander), it's very elementary rocketry that a missile fired at supersonic speed from the stratosphere is going to be far longer-ranged and faster than one fired from the ground.
How much so? Well, we can expect the Kinzhal's carrier aircraft to release it at around Mach 2 and 60,000 feet, near the service ceiling and maximum speed of a Tu-22M and likely what the MiG-31 can actually achieve with such a large missile hanging off its belly. While this may seem like a long way from hypersonic flight, for a space launcher, this flight regime is functionally halfway to orbit.
At that speed and altitude, a Saturn V had already burned about 40% of its total propellant load and was flying beyond Max-Q (the point of maximum dynamic pressure from drag on the airframe, generally reached around Mach 1.5). To give you an idea of how quickly things progress from there, between this point (at around 90 seconds into flight) and main stage burnout is only another 70 seconds, and in that 70 seconds the rocket will accelerate to approximately Mach 8 and climb to 220,000 feet.
Clearly, launching a missile of equal size from this flight regime rather than from the ground will lead to a vastly higher-speed projectile and with it a much longer range. It's functionally the equivalent of doubling a ground-launched missile's propellant while keeping its size and weight constant.
So, yes, this is something that is easily going to be traveling at "proper" hypersonic velocity in the Mach 10+ range when penetrating enemy air defenses. I haven't run numbers on this but I suspect a two-stage derivative could place a small payload in orbit as well, which would have serious military potential for a number of purposes.
Saturn V data from: web.archive.org/web/2017031314…
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