Thread by @TrentTelenko

People haven't paid anywhere near enough attention to this development⬇️

Russian cruise missile production is now like their tank production.

Russia is living off of Cold War stockpiles that are thinner & thinner as time goes on, & harder to resuscitate.

Attrition🧵
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https://twitter.com/GrandpaRoy2/status/1858445122037538875

The spokesman of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, Andriy Yusov has stated that Russia's military-industrial complex can produce 40-50 Kh-101 cruise missiles every month.

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unian.ua/weapons/skilki…

The question that @GrandpaRoy2 photo raises is exactly how much of that X-101 production rate is being assembled using recycled Kh-55/55SM missile components?

"More than zero" was confirmed from that photo...but exactly how many?

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While - perhaps - Ukrainian intelligence knows, I have never been able to find hard numbers on the Soviet warstock of nuclear armed Kh-55 in English language open source press.

It is usually loosely estimated at "in the thousands."

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How many Kh-55/55SM engines were salvaged for other weapons like the X-101?

How many salvaged Russian Kh-55/55SM engines were sent to Iran and from there on to the Houthi's to fire at Saudi Arabia, Israel and Western maritime shipping?

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In my DCMA career, I've worked in aviation back shops refurbishing 35 year old JT3D turbojet engines.

A 40 year old Kh-55/55SM turbofan pulled out of storage will need to be deeply overhauled to be viable.

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This overhaul evolution is still easier than building a new engine, but still takes effort and more importantly skilled labor.

Russia has a real demographic crisis with late Cold War skilled & experienced industrial labor in 2024: a 20 something in 1989 is a 60 something now.
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One of the experts I consulted to about that that @GrandpaRoy2 photo sent me the following:

"Since last year they have been mixing in 40 year old Kh-55 and Kh-55SM warstock replacing the nukes with ballast so the unburned 1,000 lb of T10 synthetic fuel** is the warhead.

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Likely Kh-55/55SM that are too far gone to be refurbished are being stripped for parts. HUR says 40-50 ALCMs are being built per month but they evidently are not coping."

** T-10 is a high energy cruise missile fuel similar in concept to JP-10.


9/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JP-10_(fu…

There were also numerous reports, either late 2022 or 2023, when large percentages of X/Kh-101s were falling out of the sky after launch.

My recollection is that it was something like ~30%.

There was no follow-up in the open Western or Ukrainian sources...

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...on whether these failures were due to turbofans that did not starts or autopilots that died.

Ukrainian intelligence estimated only 300 X/Kh-101 were in the Russian inventory before the last mass attack.

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ukrinform.net/rubric-ato/392…

"Shaving with Occam's razor" says the use of long out of production R-95-300 removed from Kh-55 or Kh-55SM missiles in "new" X/Kh-101 confirms the degradation of Russian weapons production.

The exact causes of this degradation are unknown, but possibilities include:

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1. Shortage of components due to sanctions;
2. Ukrainian strikes on Russian military-industrial complex facilities;
3. Attempts to increase production by simplifying technologies.

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Whatever the causes, Russian X/Kh-101 cruise missile production seems to be degrading per the combat attrition equations Frederick Lanchester because it is using limited ex-Soviet stocks of R-95-300 engines.

Lanchester is smiling.

14/14 End

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