hi everyone today we're going to be doing something a little bit different
we're going to be talking about a special anti-aircraft weapon system
designed by the russian military yes you guessed it right the s-400 system
what is s 400
let's start by giving you a brief history the s 400 triumph previously called the S-300PMU-3
is an anti-aircraft weapon system developed by russia's alma central design bureau
as an upgrade of the s-300 family
now it is important to note that the s 400 was solely used by the russian armed forces until 2014
when china purchased the s 400 through a diplomatic government agreement
but since then saudi arabia turkey india and belarus have either acquired or showed strong
interest in getting the s 400 for their own militaries this should come as no surprise as
the economist once described the s-400 as one of the best air defense systems in existence
how successful was the development of the s 400 system
while the development of the s 400 started in the 1980s it was officially announced in january 1993
with successful tests conducted on the 12th of february 1999.
as a result of these initial positive tests the s-400 was due to be deployed by the army in 2001
but when engineers noticed the system had some flaws that needed to be straightened out they
decided to postpone in february 2004 the systems were finally determined to be completed and the
successful interception of a ballistic missile as part of a test of the upgraded 48 and 6dm missile
showed critics that the s400 was finally ready to roll but further delays slowed down the project
then at last in 2007 the s-400 was finally approved for service
along with the 40n6 long-range missile with the possibility of the s-400 triumph and
pansier missile system being integrated into a two-layer defense system
what are the four new missiles that were added to system
the s-400 missile system uses four new missile types in addition to the missiles of the s-300
pmu system the first missile inducted for the system was the 48n6 dm with a powerful propulsion
system the missile can destroy airborne targets within a range of 250 kilometers
the second and third missiles respectively are 9m96e and 9m96e2 medium-range ground-to-air
missiles designed for direct impact the missiles can strike fast-moving targets such as fighter
aircrafts with a high accuracy the maximum range of both missiles is 120 kilometers
the fourth edition is the 40n6 missile which is claimed to have a range of 400 kilometers
and uses active radar to intercept air targets at great distances
so how do these s-400 vehicles operate in coordination
well the 55 k6e command and control system of the s 400 triumph is based on the euro 532301
mobile command post vehicle the fact that the command post is equipped with lcd consoles
means that it can process the air space surveillance data of the individual batteries
as well as control and monitor long-range surveillance radar track airborne threats
prioritize those threats and coordinate with other batteries too
as a bonus the system can also exchange data with other defense systems such as sa-12 s823 and s-300
what is the most important component in s 400 system
definitely the radar this is because the fire control and target tracking radar of the s 400
makes use of the 92 92n6e which is based on the mzkt 7930 8x8 vehicle the 96 l6 cheeseboard 3d
surveillance and tracking radar is optionally carried by the same vehicle when the s 400
battery is deployed autonomously the radar can detect and track aircrafts rotocrafts cruise
missiles guided missiles drones and ballistic rockets with a distance of 600 kilometers and
can simultaneously track up to 300 targets which is really mind-blowing when you think about it
which countries are interested in buying a russian missile system
despite the threat of sanctions by the us countries like saudi arabia qatar algeria morocco
egypt vietnam and iraq are keen to get their hands on the s 400 however the us expects that a handful
of countries will fall to diplomatic pressure china india and turkey have already signed
purchase agreements with the kremlin and china is on its way to receiving the final shipment
of the s400 system will india and the nato ally turkey also receive s 400 system in their defense
ys400 is selling more than the american patriot or th aad systems
well it's simple buying weapons from the us government is complicated and stressful
on the other hand making provisions to buy the s 400 is pretty straightforward with
less export restrictions and less regulation by the kremlin in addition to this russian
weapons are known to be cheaper and do not come attached with extensive maintenance support
why us is afraid of s 400 system
this is an important question it's just competition between the business of military
industrial complex in my opinion the s 400 remains a strong deterrent because of the us's
unwillingness to lose a single jet if it came to a world war ii style conventional battle between
us and russia where both sides go all out all the s 400 would do is shoot down one or two more jets
than an s-200 or s-300 before being destroyed american air superiority will be eliminated
although russian weapons exports were impacted by sanctions between 2014
and 2018 russian weaponry still accounted for 58 of the south asian market during that period
moreover turkey officially confirmed the fears of its nato allies that it had carried
out testing of its controversial russian-made s-400 missile defense system the main concern
of the nato allies is that the s 400 could be used to gather sensitive intelligent
via systems linked to the f-35 stealth fighter the next generation warplane of the alliance
but turkey has vowed to protect his borders despite u.s sanctions
now let's talk about the money
the cheapest package you can get for this is a rocket battalion which will cost you just
over 500 million us dollars don't worry though the package comes with eight rocket launchers
radar and military-grade sensors the targeting computers
the communication equipment the trucks and other vehicles and of course 112 rockets
but remember that if you run out of rockets each additional one will cost you one million dollars
if this seems too expensive remember that a single american patriot battery costs one
billion dollars roughly twice as expensive as the s 400 and the th aad battery cost even more
at about 3 billion roughly 6 times more than the s400 but the story is not finished yet
yes we are talking about the s-500 missile system
the s500 promidy also known as 55 r6m triumphator m the s500 is under development by the almez ante
air defense concern it's expected 2021 for first delivery the s500s will work
in parallel with the s-400s and are planned to together replace the s-300 missile systems
they're going to be deployed around the moscow and central russia areas to intercept and destroy
intercontinental ballistic missiles as well as hypersonic cruise missiles and aircrafts for
air defense against stealth aircraft this defense system will have a proposed range
of 600 kilometers for the anti-ballistic missile and 500 kilometers for air defense
and it has been demonstrated to be able to detect and destruct upwards of 10 ballistic
targets at speeds of up to 18 000 kilometers per hour to a limit of 25 000 kilometers per
hour with a mind-blowing response time of less than 4 seconds this is even more impressive if
you remember that the s 400s have a response time of less than 10 seconds scary isn't it
so you