The record What this system is, where it comes from, who operates it and which of Vigil’s modules it is relevant to — with the evidence each of those rests on.
Record
Conflict relevance
This is the catalogue's single record for this system. It is relevant to the module below; each module's Force Atlas shows how it is used there.
Operators
Russia: Fired from Black Sea Fleet frigates, corvettes and Improved Kilo submarines and from the Caspian Flotilla; the carriers are the naval half of the strike campaign against Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure.
Battlefield role
Long-range land attack from ships and submarines against fixed targets deep in Ukraine: energy infrastructure, air bases, cities and defence industry, fired in combined salvos with air-launched Kh-101 missiles and Shahed drones to saturate air defences.
Strengths
Long range and a subsonic, low-altitude profile from carriers at sea that are hard to pre-empt; a launch capacity that Ukraine cannot strike in port without the naval-drone and missile campaign it has built; and continuing production, with missiles made in 2026 identified in debris.
Limitations
Dependence on a small number of carriers in the Black Sea and the Caspian, which Ukraine has attacked — the Sub Sea Baby strike on a Kalibr-carrying submarine at Novorossiysk in December 2025 is the most recent documented instance; a subsonic missile that Ukrainian air defence intercepts at high rates when it is engaged; and production that depends on imported components documented in debris. Production and stock figures are not public.
Campaign relevance
Derived: a participant organisation in these campaigns carries a typed equipment association with this system. That is not the same as documented use of the system in the campaign itself.
- The Black Sea campaign and the export corridor Since February 2022
via Black Sea Fleet (Documented, high confidence)
- The Ukrainian deep-strike campaign Since 2022
via Black Sea Fleet (Documented, high confidence)
Visual identification
A cylindrical missile with pop-out wings, launched vertically from ship cells or from a submarine's torpedo tubes; seldom seen except in Russian ministry launch footage and in Ukrainian debris images.
Documented conflict use
In documented use against Ukraine since the first day of the full-scale invasion, throughout the 2022–23 energy campaign and in every large combined strike since; the Ukrainian Air Force reports the type in its per-strike accounting. Its carriers have been the object of Ukraine's Black Sea campaign — the Sevastopol strikes of 2023, the withdrawal of the fleet to Novorossiysk, and the December 2025 underwater-drone strike on a Kalibr-armed submarine there. Launch counts and stocks are not reproduced here.
Documented formations
- Black Sea Fleet Documented · high confidence
Assessed as of — 2025-12 Last reviewed — 2026-09-28