UK warns over Russia's nuclear-powered cruise missile

MY TIMES STORY NOT IN THE PAPER TODAY: A British intelligence chief has warned of the future threat posed by a Russian experimental nuclear-armed cruise missile designed to fly at under the speed of sound around the Earth for years. “Moscow is testing a subsonic nuclear-powered cruise missile system which has global reach and would allow attack from unexpected directions, “Lieutenant-General Jim Hockenhull, chief of defence intelligence, said. General Hockenhull appeared to be referring to the SSC-X-9 Skyfall, first revealed by President Putin in 2018. The cruise missile is to be powered by a mini nuclear reactor, potentially giving it almost limitless range and endurance. One of the experimental missiles exploded in August 2019, killing seven people, at a military base in Nyonoksa in north-west Russia, indicating that the programme was suffering from significant technological challenges.However, General Hockenhull warned that such a missile would give the Russians a “near-indefinite loiter time”, posing a constant threat. Russia’s development of this novel ever-present missile system is one of the future threats being taken into account in the UK government’s security and defence review which is due to be published in November. General Hockenhull said the nature of warfare was changing rapidly in ways that would challenge the West to keep pace with adversaries “who do not play by the rules”. In his 2018 speech Mr Putin said the cruise missile powered “by a small-sized superpower nuclear power plant” would be “low flying and barely noticeable” with an “unpredictable trajectory”. The cruise missile, called Skyfall by Nato. has a claimed in-service date of 2025. It was high on a list of several new weapon systems announced by the Russian leader in 2018. Douglas Barrie, senior fellow for military aerospace at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, cast doubt on Mr Putin’s new “wonder weapon”. “Of all the new Russian weapons the one I thought the least likely to enter service was the nuclear-powered cruise missile,” he said. “The view from the US community is that the Russians are struggling to make this work,” Mr Barrie said. “For a missile to be able to loiter for years, I find it hard to believe simply because if there is anything mechanical that relies on oil, that’s going to go wrong at some point however good the nuclear reactor is,” he said. The Ministry of Defence’s intelligence chief was speaking at a media briefing at RAF Wyton in Cambridgeshire, where the UK’s hub for the five-nation Five Eyes intelligence organisation is located. The other members of the exclusive intelligence club are the US, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. About 700 analysts from all five countries are housed at RAF Wyton.