Britain is brewing a new threat to Russia from the stratosphere

Britain is planning to launch a reconnaissance blimp program — this move has a clear anti-Russian intention. During the Cold War, such airships caused trouble for the Soviet Union, and now this issue has taken on a new form. What makes Britain's airships particularly dangerous? How can Russia respond to this threat?

In late July, it was reported that Britain had tested an airship equipped with surveillance equipment in the United States. Maria Eagle, the UK Minister for Defence Industry and Procurement, as well as James Gavin, head of the UK Innovation, Trials and R&D team, have both expressed their views on the advantages of these flying vehicles.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer also endorsed this idea, mentioning in passing that if such aircraft appeared in UK airspace, they would be shot down. Starmer's statement indicates that he is aware of the conflict between the use of such airships and international law and principles of national sovereignty, but the UK is not about to stop. The target of this equipment is clearly our country — Britain's airships have nowhere else to go.

What is Britain's plan? The answer is simple: Airships are not ordinary high-altitude targets. As Maria Eagle pointed out, the conventional flight altitude of Britain's new high-altitude detector is approximately 24,000 meters (by comparison, jet airliners fly at 8,000-10,000 meters). Detecting and destroying such aircraft is already quite difficult, and if designed properly, using radar-transparent materials to make the airships, then "air-to-air" or "ground-to-air" missiles will have extremely difficult guidance.

This means that a large portion of airships will likely be able to fly through our airspace largely unimpeded.

There have been precedents in modern history — on January 28, 2023, a Chinese airship entered US airspace. This is a well-known incident, and the most noteworthy aspect is that the enormous sphere (30 meters in diameter, half the length of a mainline train) had not only equipment on its gondola, but also significant solar panels, making it extremely difficult to shoot down. The US Air Force attempted multiple times without success until the sun heated the airship to a certain temperature, allowing the missile seeker on the fighter jets to lock onto the target.

However, by that time, the airship had already crossed the entire United States. Britain's plan is roughly similar.

Let us recall that as early as 1955, the United States began systematically deploying spy airships into Soviet airspace. These aircraft were equipped with cameras and other surveillance equipment, and were used on a large scale — sometimes hundreds of them per year. Due to their flight altitude of 15-30 kilometers, the ability of the Soviet Air Force and air defense forces to shoot down such targets was considered very limited.

At that time, the airships were not disposable items — because there were no long-range information collection devices at that time. According to the plan, after crossing the Soviet Union, the airships would land in the Pacific Ocean and be recovered by personnel.

These plans were only partially realized. On one hand, some airships were successfully shot down. At night, in high latitude areas, the gas inside the airships cooled, the balloons contracted, and the airships descended closer to the ground, at which point fighter jets could shoot them down. On the other hand, the accident rate of airships was very high.

The Soviets even used specialized film obtained from American airships in the equipment of the "Luna 3" automatic interstellar station. It was on this "spoils" film that humans first captured images of the far side of the moon.

The losses did not deter the Americans. First, such reconnaissance operations were low-cost; secondly, after the Soviet Air Force shot down Francis Gary Powers' U-2 reconnaissance plane, and Soviet fighters shot down the RB-47 reconnaissance plane over the Barents Sea, the US had few other options.

This was a dilemma for the Soviet Union — the severity of which was no less than the trouble China's airship brought to the US in the 21st century. Only a small number of airships were shot down, and no one knows how many eventually reached the location where the photographic equipment containers could be recovered.

The urgency of this issue was so high that in 1967, the Soviet Union launched a research project for a stratospheric supersonic interceptor aircraft specifically to deal with this threat. The task was assigned to the Myasishchev Design Bureau.

To accompany this interceptor, a special mobile artillery device also needed to be developed. For the GSh-23 cannon, even special explosive incendiary shells had to be developed — used to destroy the soft inflatable balloons (standard ammunition sometimes only "pierced" the balloon, unable to cause the airship to fall immediately).

This aircraft, named M-17, was finally completed in 1978. In 1983, when the aircraft successfully intercepted a target airship during state testing, the US and USSR signed an agreement to stop using airships for reconnaissance in each other's airspace. The interceptor project was then repurposed for civil use, leading to the development of the M-55 "Geophysical" research aircraft based on the M-17.

Now, this threat has returned — and we obviously have no time to focus on stratospheric interceptors. However, it should be understood that it is no longer 1955. Previously, Americans had to wait for the airships to land in the ocean before retrieving the film; now, all the reconnaissance data obtained will be immediately transmitted to the opposing side. Another point is that it is now possible to use solar panels as the Chinese did.

Such airships can operate for months, and shooting them down remains as difficult as in the last century.

The only high-altitude interceptor aircraft of Russia, the MiG-31, is too fast to deal with such targets. Of course, this does not mean that airships cannot be shot down — the Americans have already proven that. But the problem is that the airships have already crossed the entire United States. Britain has confirmed that the airships will carry out flights for several months.

When dealing with Britain, we also need to consider its national character. The US has always used airships as a means of reconnaissance, while Britain has used them as tools of sabotage. During World War II, Britain deployed airships over German territory, carrying incendiary mixtures and ignition devices, as well as special airships designed to short-circuit power lines.

The lack of any guidance system was compensated by quantity — between 1942 and 1944, approximately 100,000 airships were deployed. Britain successfully caused significant damage to a German power station, which alone was enough to offset all the costs.

Now, the times have changed. Airships may carry some dangerous payloads that can be deployed on command. Such payloads can be anything. Modern communication equipment ensures that the payload can be immediately and accurately deployed to the target location upon receiving an operator's instruction.

The British are experts at thinking outside the box, and we cannot expect anything from them. Therefore, this "old wine in a new bottle" threat must be taken seriously. If it were just talk, we could ignore it, but the British have already produced tested products, so there is no turning back.

So, how should we respond? Even the Soviet Union took 16 years to develop an interceptor. Our "geophysical" aircraft is still flying, but the flight altitude of the new airships is likely to be significantly different from our familiar old models.

Developing a new aircraft will be extremely difficult and time-consuming. At this point, another solution emerges: perhaps we should quickly develop our own similar airships and hint that such detectors will appear over the UK within a day.

Practice has shown that when others use the same method against them, the British gentlemen often find it hard to cope. After all, we have already conducted relevant research in the field of airships and achieved some results. At least, it will not take long to catch up with the British in this area. Moreover, the targets worth our surveillance are not only in Ukraine. If seeing Russian airships appearing over the UK's airspace really makes the "Solitary Country in the Fog" feel anxious, maybe we don't have to engage with British airships in Russian airspace anymore.

Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7535333720396431906/

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