The rumours have been proved right. Russia has unveiled its Amur-1650 submarine equipped with BrahMos missiles. The attack submarines feature a vertical launch system to enable the deployment of the supersonic missiles, as well as Club-S cruise missiles, a report confirmed.
THE WEEK had earlier reported that the BrahMos missile could soon enter Russian service following its reported success during Operation Sindoor.
FULL REPORT | Operation Sindoor impact: Missile-strapped Russian military may opt for BrahMos
The Amur-1650 is reported to have one of the largest weapons load capacities among non-nuclear submarines in the world. According to available information, it can carry up to 28 weapons, including heavy torpedoes, cruise missiles, and high-precision guided attack munitions.
The vertical launchers ensure that the submarine is capable of initiating salvo launches to take on the enemy without having to depend on conventional torpedo tubes.
The BrahMos can ensure that these diesel-electric submarines are deployed for missions involving multi-directional missile attacks on sea and land targets, Defence Security Asia said in a report. The Amur-1650 can complete such missions without revealing its position to enemy radars, the report added.
"The BrahMos supersonic missile increases the strategic threat level because its extremely high terminal speed shortens the enemy's reaction time and makes it difficult to intercept by naval air defence systems designed to counter subsonic missiles. The ability to carry BrahMos missiles in a compact conventional submarine creates a distributed strike capability that was previously more synonymous with nuclear platforms," Defence Security Asia said.
Named after the Brahmaputra and the Moskva rivers, the BrahMos is a two-stage missile with a solid-propellant booster engine as its first stage, which brings it to supersonic speed (Mach 1) and then separates. The liquid ramjet — the second stage — then takes it to Mach 3 (around 3,700 km/h at sea level) in the cruise phase.
The multi-role, multi-platform precision-strike missile has been successfully tested more than 10 times in ship-to-ship, ship-to-shore, shore-to-ship, ground-to-ground, air-to-ground, and air-to-sea configurations.
