How Trophy Storm Shadow Can 'Greatly Simplify' Russian Military's Work in Ukraine

Britain began sending Storm Shadow cruise missiles to Ukraine in May, with Kiev using them to attack Russian troops and civilian infrastructure. On Thursday, Russian forces captured a Storm Shadow intact. Sputnik spoke to military experts to find out why the $3 million trophy may significantly assist Russia in its military operation.

Russian forces’ capture of a Storm Shadow might be of little use to Russian rocket scientists working on next-gen missiles, but may prove invaluable to those studying ways to defeat the state-of-the-art British/French cruise missile using interceptor missiles and electronic warfare, two of Russia’s top military observers have told Sputnik.

“Having the missile fall into our hands will undoubtedly allow us to become very closely acquainted with its strengths and weaknesses, or more precisely, to identify its weaknesses to determine how to counter it more effectively than we did before,” Vladislav Shurygin, a veteran Russian military expert and retired Army captain specializing in modern warfare, said.

“Now it will become clear what weapons can affect them, what electronic warfare means can affect them, which ones don’t, which frequencies they can be jammed at, which ones not,” Shurygin said, noting that essentially, Russia has received a basic blueprint for the weapon.

The missile’s technical specs in and of themselves aren’t so important, says Military Russia portal founder Dmitry Kornev, who pointed out that Russia’s rocket scientists have already created some of the most advanced missile designs around, and are unlikely to “find any unexpected know-how” here.

Kornev agrees with Shurygin’s assessment on the captured Storm Shadow’s importance, saying that dissecting the missile could uncover a host of weaknesses, allowing Russian engineers to determine the optimal direction from which to strike the cruise missile with an interceptor, for example.

“The very fact that we are capable of shooting down these missiles is already encouraging, because this is a modern missile, nearly invisible to radar, very dangerous in terms of combat effectiveness. It has a large, powerful warhead, and is highly accurate, unfortunately. And as we have already seen, it can cause serious damage,” Kornev stressed.

What Forced the Missile Down, and Why Did It Survive?

Shurygin emphasized the significance of capturing the missile, given that ordinarily, cruise missiles like the Storm Shadow have a self-destruct mechanism onboard designed specifically to prevent them from being taken intact.

There is a variety of possibilities to explain what happened to the missile, from getting knocked off course by Russian defenses to a technical defect from the factory, to the loss of power by its engine, the observer said. It’s also essentially impossible to tell at this stage whose error caused the missile’s loss intact – the manufacturer or the Ukrainian troops who launched it, he added.

“We cannot say anything on this subject. The missile could have been poorly prepared, poorly manufactured, stored incorrectly, and there are 200 other possible reasons. Only when it is dismantled will it become clear why it did not work” as intended, Shurygin said.

Kornev agrees, noting that all military equipment, has a certain rate of failure, and that the Storm Shadow may have been shot down, or fallen due to a technical malfunction.

“It’s difficult to say judging by the debris what exactly happened. The missile is almost intact, there are no traces of damage on it. So there is the possibility that it simply failed, due, for example, to a faulty radio altimeter, losing altitude and crashing into the ground,” Kornev said.

At the same time, Shurygin warned against becoming overoptimistic or cocky from the find, pointing out that there have been plenty of examples in history where capturing a weapon doesn’t necessarily result in it losing its deadliness.

“I will remind you that we captured our first Tiger tank in the winter of 1942-1943. After that Tigers were well used in the Battle of Kursk, and after that remained a very fearsome weapon until the very end of the war,” Shurygin stressed.

Storm Shadows are a 1.3 ton, 5.1 meter long, 0.4 meter diameter cruise missile with a 450 kg tandem warhead designed to penetrate heavy fortifications, destroy industrial facilities and railway junctions, columns of vehicles and troops, and in their anti-ship variant, enemy vessels.

The Storm Shadow’s export version has a range of up to 250 km, while its domestic variant can fly up to 560 km. The UK, which was estimated to possess between 700 and 1,000 Storm Shadows before deliveries to Kiev began in May, has used them extensively in aid of London’s aggressive foreign policy, debuting them during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, using them to bomb Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya into submission in 2011, and targeting Syria with them in 2018 after a false-flag chemical attack by Syrian rebels.

Ukraine has used its Storm Shadows to attack civilian infrastructure in the Donbass, and the Chongar Bridge connecting Crimea to Kherson.

Russia has a range of systems theoretically capable of targeting Storm Shadows, including the S-400 and S-300 air defense systems, plus Buk-M3 and Buk-M2 launchers operating in tandem at shorter ranges.