Just a week ago, Russia launched the Greater order to Europe From the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine when entering a swarm of drones in the airspace of Poland. Europe’s response was overwhelming, but nobody escaped then that it was produced at the doors of the Zapad 2025the military exercises that Moscow shares with Belarus and that suppose another headache.
How much? For example, the size of a hypersonic missile.
Demonstration of power. Because Russia has sent an unequivocal message of strength within the framework of those joint maneuvers. From the Frigate Admiral Golovko, deployed in the Barents Sea, the nation He has disseminated images of the launch of your hypersonic missile 3m22 Zirconcapable of reaching white 1,000 kilometers and traveling to Mach 9. The projectile successfully hit its goal, According to the Ministry Russian defense, reinforcing the narrative that, despite the enormous losses accumulated in more than three years of war in Ukraine, it continues to have strategic abilities that few rivals can counteract.
He Video showed In addition the participation of hunting Sukhoi Su-34capable of transporting up to eight tons of weapons and covering long distances without replenishment. The inclusion of such high profile armament in an exercise that develops a few kilometers from NATO borders has been interpreted as a calculated provocation rather than a simple defensive trial.
Zircon and his use in Ukraine. The Zircon, along with The Kinzhalis one of the hypersonic missiles that Russia has used in Attacks against Ukraine. Its combination of extreme speed and limited maneuvering capacity makes it a target practically impossible For current air defense systems, generating a sense of vulnerability in both Ukrainian cities and among neighboring countries.
Although its operational deployment remains reduced, the dissemination of its impact on a naval exercise seeks Clear answers. The signal is evident: Russia maintains the initiative in the field of new generation weapons, and wants to demonstrate it right in the perimeter where the alliance concentrates Your most sensitive flank.
Zircon against China and USA. The Russian missile is a naval HCM that, flying low With Scramjetrun high energy terminal profiles suitable against ships and, a priori, certain land targets. His Achilles heel is not so much the missile and the objective beyond the horizon, which requires reliable cueing by satellite/plane/helo/uav.
Faced with this, the Chinese DF-17 Use a hypersonic planner about ballistic booster to overcome defenses with lateral lifting maneuvers (Cross-ngege), while Your DF-27 Expand strategic scope with longer time. For its part, the United States pursues a mix: Hacm (Air-respirate, integration in fighters) for rapid theatrical attacks and CPS (common glide-body with the army) for conventional long-range blows from stealthy maritime platforms.
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Zircon in front of the old continent. Europe accelerates Planning technology (France) and prioritizes interception in planning phase With GPI. In interception, AEGIS/SM-6 It offers the only Western capacity today “On Call” (limited and highly dependent on geometry), while GPI seeks to “paste” the glider when it has not yet descended to its terminal sprint, increasing the successful window.
Be that as it may, in all cases the key is not only the missile: it is the sensor chain, the data link and the decision latency for close the cycle “Find-Fix-Track-Target-Engage-Assass” before the vector cross the non-return threshold.
About drones and how to answer. As we said at the beginning, the launch of the Zircon coincided with an increase in tension after Drones incursions Russians in Poland’s airspace and RomaniaNATO members. On September 10, Warsaw denounced the entrance of at least 19 devices, demolished by allied fighters, in what described as “Unprecedented violation” and “large -scale provocation.” Three days later, a Russian drone was detected in Romanian territory, reviving the alarms.
Poland invoked article 4 of the North Atlantic Treaty, which establishes an urgent consultation mechanism between partners to agree on joint measures. From that debate the Eastern Sentinel operationwhich contemplates the deployment of advanced fighters, antimile defenses and military reinforcements in Eastern Europe. NATO He reacted quicklyaware that the escalation of provocations, although without direct damage, is a direct challenge to its credibility as a safety guarantor.
Provocation or accident. Versions about incursions They have varied. Moscow ensures that the drones had no Poland target and that they could deviate, while Belarus suggests trajectory failures. However, both NATO and the United States consider that they were Deliberate launcheswith the aim of testing allied patience and giving up western responses.
The US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, described the facts of “unacceptable, unfortunate and dangerous.” The contradiction between Russian justifications and the forcefulness of Western reactions reinforces the perception that it was a political pressure trial rather than a technical error.
An unstable scenario. Thus, the combination of exercises Zapad 2025he Zircon launch or drone raids In NATO space They draw a scenario of increasing instability in Eastern Europe. Although Russia and Belarus insist on the defensive nature of their maneuvers, the location of these operations and the nature of the employee armaments transmit the opposite: a willingness to intimidate and demonstrate that the Kremlin retains the ability to challenge NATO on their own borders.
The result points to a new tension cycle, where each military gesture acquires an immediate political reading and where the possibility of unplanned incidents (although with climbing potential) is multiplied dangerously.
Image | Russian Defense Ministry, минобороны рф
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