Russia’s Tu-160 Supersonic Bomber Has a Very Special Way of Attacking Its Target

The National Interest Staff

Developed during the closing stages of the Cold War, the Mach 2.05 capable Tupolev Tu-160 [4] Blackjack was the Soviet Union’s ultimate strategic bomber.

The requirement for the Tu-160 emerged from a 1972 Soviet competition to develop a Mach 2.3 capable strategic bomber that would be Moscow’s response to the Rockwell InternationalB-1A Lancer. [5] While President Jimmy Carter would eventually cancel the high speed, high altitude B-1A (though President Ronald Reagan resurrected the low altitude—but much slower Mach 1.25 capable—B-1B during the 1980s [6]) in favor of the Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit [7] stealth bomber, the Soviet Union would continue to develop the Tu-160.

The Tu-160 made its first flight on December 18, 1981, with production starting in 1984 at the Kazan Aircraft Production Association in central Russia. The jet entered service in April 1987 with the 184th Guards Heavy Bomber Regiment at Pryluky in what was then the Ukrainian Soviet Social Republic just as Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev were negotiating the end of the Cold War. In the end, 36 Tu-160 bombers were produced (including nine test aircraft) before the December 26, 1991, collapse of the Soviet Union.

Recommended:How China Plans to Win a War Against the U.S. Navy[8]

Recommended:How the Air Force Would Destroy North Korea[9]

Recommended:10 Reasons No Nation Wants to Fight Israel[10]

The majority—19 aircraft—of the operational Tu-160s were stationed in Ukraine when the Soviet Union collapsed while the remainder were in Russia. The Ukrainian aircraft were quickly grounded due to a lack of spare parts and the majority of the bombers were later destroyed under the Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Agreement starting in 1998. However, Moscow and Kiev eventually reached a deal to transfer the eight surviving Tu-160s to Russia, bringing the total in Russian service to 15 jets. However, one of the jets crashed on September 18, 2003, temporarily reducing the fleet to 14 until the Kazan plant completed two additional airframes that had been in the factory since before the Soviet collapse.