The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine officially reported that on the night of August 21, a strike targeted russian S-300 surface-to-air missile system positioned near Novoshakhtinsk, Rostov region, approximately 160 km from the front line.
The report suggests that the strike was carried out by units of the Ukrainian Navy, in coordination with other elements of the Armed Forces. The only known weapon in the Ukrainian Navys arsenal with the necessary range for such a mission is the Neptune missile, which was previously employed to strike russian air defense systems in Crimea in 2023.
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Officially, this missile was used on March 24 of this year to strike captured Konstantin Olshansky large landing ship in Sevastopol. Additionally, according to the report on May 31, several Neptune missiles struck an oil terminal in the Kavkaz port on the russian side of the Kerch Strait.
This pattern of operations indicates that the Ukrainian military has been actively utilizing the Neptune missile to target various objectives, demonstrating its capability to conduct complex strikes.
For instance, the attack on the S-300 system near Novoshakhtinsk would have required navigating through a heavily defended front-line zone and avoiding air defense positions along a complicated route. The purpose of this strike may have been strategic, given the proximity of an oil refinery near Novoshakhtinsk, which was the target of Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes in June 2022. This suggests the possibility of creating a corridor for subsequent UAV strikes.
It is important to note that there is currently no official information regarding the modernization of the Neptune missile for ground strikes. However, adapting an anti-ship missile for such purposes is a complex task that would require the integration of terrain-following systems, TERCOM and DSMAC navigation systems for orientation without satellite navigation, and highly sensitive homing heads.
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