[fauxpause_]

The article begins by referring to Russia using Hypersonic missiles against Ukraine, and then goes into detail about what defenses are necessary to defend against these weapons.

It’s a good article. But the reality is that the Russian missiles making headlines don’t meet the specs of the article. Ukraine is shooting them down just fine using decades old technology.

[DiogenesKynikos]

> Ukraine is shooting them down just fine using decades old technology.

It is not publicly known whether this is true.

The Ukrainians claim they shot down 6 of 6 Kinzhal missiles over Kiev in one night with a Patriot battery. In the available videos of the event, all that can be seen is that a few dozen air defense missiles were fired, and that something got through and struck the general location where the air defense battery was.

A very healthy dose of skepticism is warranted about claims made in wartime by interested parties.

[fauxpause_]

Russia arresting the Kinzhal developers for treason (read: failure) tells you all you need to know.

Note also that they purposefully forbid videos of air defenses to avoid showing where air defenses are.

At least one Kinzhal was confirmed shot down earlier before the wave of 6 or so.

[the_af]

> The article begins by referring to Russia using Hypersonic missiles against Ukraine, and then goes into detail about what defenses are necessary to defend against these weapons.

The article explicitly states, one paragraph later than the beginning, that "about half of that is just plain wrong".

The author also explains the hypersonic missiles are nothing new, that they are old tech, and that the real threat would be maneuverable hypersonic missiles, which the Khinzal is not. The Khinzal is ballistic.

So when the author writes of the threat of maneuverable hypersonics, and you say "The non-ballistic variety that Russia claimed was unstoppable [...]", you are both speaking of different kinds of weapons with different capabilities. The Khinzal is old tech for which there are counters. The author is speaking of newer tech for which there are fewer counters.

[fauxpause_]

I don’t agree that the article makes this clear. The article states

> These are specifically designed for ballistic threats, which are common, and their extreme effectiveness is precisely why Russia and China have invested in something else.

And

> Russia used hypersonic missiles against Ukraine” — alarming! The average member of the public, as well as many policymakers, now understand that these things are dangerous because they are just too fast to shoot down. Clearly something needs to be done… (sarcastic)

It really ought to make clear explicitly in the article that the missiles it referred to in the beginning are NOT what it spends the rest of the article discussing.

It confused me at least. Because, without doing further research, I assumed the Kinzhals must not be ballistic because they’re indirectly referenced in an article about maneuverable missiles!