The R-15 (Р-15) was a
submarine-launched ballistic missile
A submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) is a ballistic missile capable of being launched from Ballistic missile submarine, submarines. Modern variants usually deliver multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRVs), each of which ...
(SLBM) design from the
Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
during the
Cold War
The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
. The R-15 was a project to develop an SLBM for the D-3 missile system with the capability to be launched while submerged. The development was authorized for
OKB-586
The ''Pivdenne'' Design Office (), located in Dnipro, Ukraine, is a designer of satellites and rockets, and formerly of Soviet Union, Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), established by Mikhail Yangel. During the Soviet era, the bu ...
in
Dnipro
Dnipro is Ukraine's fourth-largest city, with about one million inhabitants. It is located in the eastern part of Ukraine, southeast of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on the Dnieper River, Dnipro River, from which it takes its name. Dnipro is t ...
petrovsk, Ukraine, on 20 March 1958 and cancelled before testing in December 1958.
Development
The Soviet Union's
nuclear submarine
A nuclear submarine is a submarine powered by a nuclear reactor, but not necessarily nuclear-armed.
Nuclear submarines have considerable performance advantages over "conventional" (typically diesel-electric) submarines. Nuclear propulsion ...
project began the middle of the 1950s and focused on attaching
nuclear warheads to a variety of delivery systems. The Soviet military required the Navy to use nuclear weapons to enhance the effectiveness of naval operation against large ships, naval bases, groups of ships, or other strategic targets. The decree also gave OKB-586, a Russian design office, the task to create the R-15 missile for the D-3 on March 20, 1958. The R-15 missile was planned to have a range of 1,000 kilometers and the design required improvements from the D-1 and D-2 systems. The missile was planned to launch directly from the launch tube unlike the D-1 and D-2, which had to be raised.
The R-15 missile was designed for a nuclear submarine in 1958. The Special Design Bureau No. 143(SKB-143) began to design the Project 639 submarine that would use three R-15 missiles.
While another design bureau in 1958, Central Design Bureau No. 16, worked on
Project V-629 that would use the R-15. Project V-629 designed a diesel submarine that would keep a single R-15 missile on board. Most of the design projects would be halted because the missile's size and weight would not meet performance specifications. The work on the D-3 missile system and the accompanying submarines designs were canceled during December 1958.
See also
*
List of missiles
Below is a list of missiles, sorted alphabetically into large categories and subcategories by name and purpose.
Other missile lists
Types of missiles:
* Conventional guided missiles
** Air-to-air missile
** Air-to-surface missile
** Anti-radia ...
References
R-015
Cold War missiles of the Soviet Union
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