File image.
Russian air defense systems are capable of defeating Taurus cruise missiles, Igor Korotchenko, military expert and editor-in-chief of the National Defense magazine, told TASS on May 30.
The Taurus KEPD 350 is a Swedish-German low-observable, air-launched cruise missile that is manufactured in Germany by Taurus Systems.
The missile utilizes a GPS-aided inertial navigation system backed by a terrain contour matching system. The same thermographic camera used for terrain navigation helps the missile home on its target during final approach using image matching.
The double 500-kilogram warhead of the missile features a precharge and initial penetrating charge that are designed to defeat hardened underground targets.
Korotchenko acknowledged that the Taurus is “a difficult target, but said that Russian air defense systems, namely the Buk-M2/M3, S-300V4 and S-400, possess the capabilities to “detect and successfully destroy this type of targets.”
Buk-M3 medium-range air defense systems have demonstrated their capability to destroy various air-launched targets, including cruise missiles, in the zone of the special military operation, he told TASS, stressing that the ability to “detect and engage these targets are available.”
Click to see full-size image.
Korotchenko noted, however, that the military potentials of Ukraine “should be taken very seriously, especially in a large-scale strike.”
“Proceeding from this, we state that the delivery of Taurus cruise missiles to Ukrainian armed forces poses the risks of the conflict’s major escalation compared to the current situation,” he said.
Earlier this week, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said again that he did not rule out the delivery of Taurus missiles to Ukraine.
Merz said on May 26 that Germany would lift range restrictions on the weapons that Berlin and its allies were supplying to Kiev. He noted that the United States, Great Britain and France had made a similar decision.
At a joint press conference with Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky in Berlin on May 28, Merz affirmed again that there were no longer any range limits on weapons supplied to Kiev for delivering strikes on Russian territory.
The Taurus is comparable to the Anglo-French Storm Shadow air-launched cruise missile, which the United Kingdom, France and Italy supplied to Ukraine last year. Ukraine reportedly received an export version of the Storm Shadow with the range downgraded from 560 kilometers to just 250.
There is no downgraded version of the Taurus, which means Germany will either supply Ukraine with the original version that can in theory reach the Russian capital, Moscow, and the Crimean Bridge, or spend time and effort to cut down the range of the missile.
The Storm Shadow failed to give Ukraine any advantage. The Taurus is highly unlikely to do any better. The Russian military will likely use the same tactics it developed to counter Storm Shadow against the Taurus, which includes targeting carrier warplanes from long ranges, using systems like the S-300V4 and S-400, as well as attempting to jam and intercept the missile on the medium and short ranges with systems like the Buk-M2/M3.
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