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The Ukrainian General Staff said Ukrainian forces targeted two Russian S-400 anti-aircraft missile batteries and one S-300 anti-aircraft missile battery on the Russian-annexed peninsula between Sunday night and Monday, inflicting heavy damage on at least two of the units.
The type of missile used has not been disclosed, but the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, said: Said It is “probably an ATACMS (a US-made tactical ballistic missile).”
Leading Russian military blogger Leiber said on Monday that Ukraine had attacked Crimea with at least 12 ATACMS missiles.
The S-400 is Russia’s most advanced air defense system, first entering service in 2007, more than 20 years after the ATACMS, which has been in operation since 1986.
Ukraine said none of its missiles were shot down in the attack and mocked Russia’s explanations about the capabilities of its air defences.
“None of the missiles we launched were intercepted by the enemy’s ‘highly effective’ air defenses,” the Ukrainian General Staff said.
The S-400 is Russia’s best
Rajan Menon, director of the grand strategy program at US think tank Defence Priorities, told BI earlier this year that the S-400 was Russia’s “most advanced air defence system”.
But he said its performance in Ukraine has been “mixed” and that Ukraine has been able to make some gains.
Ukraine’s General Staff said on Wednesday it had destroyed another S-400 and another S-300 in Crimea, but gave no details on what was used in the attack.
In September 2020, a rocket was fired from an S-400 missile system at Russia’s Ashluk military base.
Dimitar Dirkov/AFP via Getty Images
The S-400 was developed to counter the US Patriot system, said the head of Rosoboronexport, the state-owned defense company that oversees much of Russia’s military exports. It is called It is the “world’s best long-range air defense system.”
Experts told BI that the system is apparently very capable and feared by Ukraine.
But they said Ukraine’s missiles have proven vulnerable to Russia’s ongoing aggression, and they assessed that Ukraine is using skilled and creative tactics to pursue them.
Last November, the UK Ministry of Defence said Ukraine may have destroyed at least four Russian long-range air defence systems in a single week, with Russian reports saying three of them were S-400s.
A Russian Telegram channel claiming to have sources in Russian police and military agencies said at the time that ATACMS had been used.
Ian Williams, former deputy director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said last year that the S-400 “appears to be struggling against the Storm Shadow,” referring to the missile supplied to Ukraine by Britain and France and first used in 2003.
“It’s clear that Ukrainian missiles are passing through at speeds that pose a real problem for Russia,” Fredrik Mertens, an analyst at the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, told BI.
In 2017, a rehearsal of the S-400 Triumph system was held in Moscow ahead of the anniversary of the end of World War II.
REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov
Meanwhile, George Barros, a Russia analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, told BI this week that things could get even worse for Russia.
He said new authorization from some allies to allow Ukraine to use weapons provided by Western countries to attack Russian military targets would put at risk the S-400 and other air defense systems that were outside Ukraine’s range.
Crimea faces new dangers
Meanwhile, Ukraine said last month it had used a Western-supplied ATACMS to attack the Russian Kerch ferry crossing into Crimea.
Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 before launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that was condemned around the world and is not recognized as Russian territory by most countries.
Ukraine has vowed to retake the area, which Russia is using to attack Ukraine.
Philip Carver, a military analyst specializing in Ukraine issues, said in April that Ukraine was now in a position to use ATACMS to render Crimea “militarily worthless.”
Correction — June 13, 2024: Previous documents had misreported that Ukraine had targeted anti-aircraft forces on Sunday night, reporting that the targets were two Russian S-400 and one S-300 fighter jets, damaging at least two of them. Additionally, the UK Ministry of Defence said in November that Ukraine had likely destroyed at least four Russian long-range air defence systems in a week, but it was Russian reports that identified three of those as S-400s.