Recovering intact Storm Shadow missiles could help Russia develop strategies to neutralize this Ukrainian weapon system, as well as improve its domestic weapons.
Dmitry Rogozin, head of Russia's "Tsar Wolves" military advisory group, announced on July 6 that the country had recovered a nearly intact Storm Shadow cruise missile after it crashed in a conflict zone in Ukraine.
"The missile has just been delivered to a Russian defense enterprise, allowing them to decode the algorithm and control system and share the information with air defense experts," Rogozin said.
Western military experts believe that Russia could gain significant benefits from the dissection and study of the Storm Shadow missile, now that it has fallen into the hands of the Russian military in its complete form, including its casing, guidance system, and BROACH multi-stage penetrating warhead.
The Storm Shadow/SCALP EG long-range cruise missile, jointly developed by the UK and France, has a maximum speed of 1,000 km/h and is capable of hitting targets at distances of 250-560 km depending on the variant. Each missile costs more than $3 million. The Ukrainian Air Force uses them to attack high-value targets protected by air defenses and located deep within Russian-controlled territory.
"The risk of Storm Shadow missiles being intercepted or malfunctioning and crashing to the ground, then being seized by Russia, was foreseen, and Britain certainly took this into account when supplying them to Kyiv," wrote Tyler Rogoway, an expert on the American military website Warzone.
According to him, this is why Ukraine has adopted many modern measures, including deploying the US-made ADM-160B decoy, to increase the survivability of the Storm Shadow missile on its flight path to the target. "Therefore, it is very worrying that the missile could fall into Russian hands intact," the expert stated.
It is unclear why the Storm Shadow missile fell without exploding, but Rogozin said it was only partially destroyed due to its very flat trajectory and that "it almost landed on the ground." Russian forces dismantled and removed the projectile from the battlefield, despite artillery fire and attempts by Ukrainian reconnaissance teams to intercept it.
According to military experts, the first benefit Russia gained from studying the missile was a thorough understanding of the technical and tactical characteristics of the longest-range cruise missile model that Ukraine received.
The Storm Shadow missile has stealth capabilities, particularly on its front end, to remain hidden from enemy air defense systems. Examining the materials and design principles of the recovered projectile could help Russia determine the missile's specific radar reflectivity, allowing for the development of methods to detect them remotely.
A Russian reporter stands next to a section of the Storm Shadow missile. Photo: 1TV
The Storm Shadow's BROACH warhead is also fitted to the US-made AGM-154 JSOW-C glide bomb. It consists of a primary shaped charge designed to penetrate tank armor, reinforced concrete, and ground, paving the way for the larger explosive warhead to penetrate and inflict maximum damage. This type of warhead enables the Storm Shadow missile to attack and destroy hardened targets, a capability typically only found in larger, laser-guided bombs.
"Russia could also study the rocket engine to gather intelligence. However, the most valuable treasure on the recovered projectile is the electronic equipment, primarily the guidance and targeting systems," Rogoway stated.
Storm Shadow uses inertial navigation, satellite guidance, and terrain matching during its flight to the target, then activates its high-resolution thermal imaging seeker with an automatic target identification (ATR) system.
ATR operates by comparing images captured by the seeker in the final phase with a database loaded before flight. The central computer then confirms the target and controls the missile's descent, potentially targeting even the weakest points. This system operates completely automatically with very high accuracy and requires no human intervention, making it immune to radio jamming methods.
"If the sensor systems, electronic computers, and software on the missile are not completely destroyed, Russia could restore their operation and learn about the operational parameters, target locking procedures, and vulnerabilities of the ATR. This would help Russia find countermeasures and improve its domestic weapons capabilities," the American expert warned.
There are several indications that Russia is taking countermeasures against Storm Shadow and future Western weapons equipped with ATR systems. One of these is painting the bows and sterns of Black Sea Fleet warships black, in order to alter their shape in the eyes of enemy sensors.
The Storm Shadow/SCALP EG cruise missile is mounted under the belly of a French fighter jet. Photo: MBDA
Rogoway argues that the Storm Shadow is a relatively advanced missile, but not the most modern weapon the West currently possesses, and that the fall of one into Russian hands would not change the battlefield situation.
"Nevertheless, studying the complete missile still allowed them to obtain invaluable information that could not be obtained through traditional intelligence methods," the American expert stated.
Rogozin, who led the daring two-day operation under Ukrainian artillery fire to recover the missile, expressed confidence in Russia's achievement. "I hope the research results will help the Russian defense industry find a way to completely neutralize this type of missile," he said.
According to Vu Anh (VNE)
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