USA's "new super weapon": real threat or myth? (PHOTOS, VIDEO)
30.06.2016 - 15:49
There has been an informational wave in the media recently and it was all about a new US supergun. The American military officials claim it would be of great help to “oppose military threat from the East” and by East they mean Russia and China.
One of such articles was Julian E. Barnes’s which was published May 29th in The Wall Street Journal . Its title read «Faster than a speeding bullet: a first look at America’s supergun».
From the beginning of the article it is being made very clear for a reader that this would be not just good new weapon but a superweapon «for which there is little defence» — «a railgun which requires neither gunpowder nor explosive».
«It is powered by electromagnetic rails that accelerate a hardened projectile to staggering velocity—a battlefield meteorite with the power to one day transform military strategy, say supporters, and keep the U.S. ahead of advancing Russian and Chinese weaponry» — the article says.
U.S. Navy Adm. Mat Winter, the head of the Office of Naval Research said that was going to change the way they fight under the circumstances of USA global presence maintaining with declining numbers of Navy ships and land forces. Growing expenses and fixed budgets make it more difficult to maintain large forces in the right places to deter aggression, he says.
«I can’t conceive of a future where we would replicate Cold War forces in Europe,” said Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work, one of the weapon’s chief boosters. «But I could conceive of a set of railguns that would be inexpensive but would have enormous deterrent value. They would have value against airplanes, missiles, tanks, almost anything.”
US Navy railgun fire
«You can’t ignore the fact that Russia has great ability to mass conventional munitions and fire them over great range. We have to be able to fight through those salvos,” said Mr. Work.
Railgun design in the USA
This project which US Navy engineers launched more than a decade ago costed more than 500 million dollars for the American taxpayers.
The Pentagon’s Strategic Capabilities office is investing another $800 million—the largest share for any project—to develop the weapon’s defensive ability, as well as to adapt existing guns to fire the railgun’s high-tech projectiles.
Still it will take not less than another ten years to pass it into service.
According to aticle’s author «the USA have already spent billions of dollars on interceptor-missile based defense systems to shoot down ballistic missiles fired at the U.S. or its allies». America has kept its military dominance over the past quarter-century largely through such precision weaponry as guided missiles and munitions, the aithor says.
But Barnes remarks that this monopoly is about to over. .
«China is perfecting a ship-killing ballistic missile. Russia mostly impressed U.S. military planners with the power and precision of its cruise missiles deployed in Syria».
Due to all these factors the United States “needs new military advance”, — the author concludes.
So Barnes basically claims that the aforementioned program is an attempt of US political and military command to provide US military potential superiority.
However harsh reality makes the supergun look even more illusive.
Russian experts’opinion
Famous Russian scientist, Doctor of Engineering, professor, deputy head of Thermal Physics Institute Yevgeniy Lebedev in his interview to Zvezda TV channel indicates a “substantial problem of this weapon” — it is one-use weapon.
According to him «powerful electromagnetic fields reveal location of military hardware equipped with a railgun, they are impossible to hide even with the help of special protective means.
That is why the very moment it starts shooting will be the moment it is destroyed along with the ship. And it makes no diference if the American shells go 300 kilometers long: the location is already known — who shot and where from. Then our sailors send a cruise missile for the friend who died from railgun shell and that is all».
According to another point of view which belongs to another prominent Russian scientist, one of the leading specialists in the field of electromagnetic weaponry design and research, A.M. of Russian Academy of Missile and Artillery science, Doctor of Engineering Gennadiy Shvetsov the main problem of the railgun is (which cannot be solved by the American engineers by now) fragility of gun barrel — a shell passing through its bore will inevitably make it overheated and the guide rails will be deformed.
With a reference to test results he points out the fact that existing technologies do allow to create shells for railguns with superspeeds but barrel life duration won’t exceed 3–4 shots. According to him «there are some researches aimed at creation of materials and alloys resistent to such overcharge but they are far from success and final stage».
Gennadiy Shvetsov in his interview to Zvezda TV says that such long flight trajectory shot from the so called railgun would require special guidance system which should allow not only precise shell hit but should also be resistent to overcharges and powerful electromagnetic fields impact.
“This is quite a task – separate and huge task demanding additional research” – he says.
It is to be said that the Russian scientists have every right to speak of such weapon’s prospects. Because they stood at the origins of it. They have been developing it for some time with much less funding than their Western colleagues.
