Flying at the edge of space at four times the speed of sound is a new Russian interceptor and it is perhaps the last chance for the legendary Mikoyan Nagulovic bureau to survive since the late 50s soviets and Russian’s have been developing interceptor aircraft to cover their vast territory and respond to any threats to their almost 60 000 kilometer long border interceptors have always had a special status within the soviet and Russian air forces with the legendary mig-25 and its successor the mig-31 being always somewhat of a mystery and a serious threat at to the west but now the time has come for the next generation of interceptors a new jet projected to surpass in speed and maximum altitude of even that of the legendary sr-71 this is the story of the new Russian thunder screaming across the horizon the pack dp Russia is big and a big country has big borders and during the cold war the Soviet Union found it challenging to defend and control their airspace at any one time the us knew this defense was like swiss cheese and developed spy planes like the u2 and sr-71 flying missions’ way behind enemy lines getting all the information and tactical advantage they needed in the cold war so the soviets needed a solution the mig-25 was developed as an answer to the threat of USA supersonic bombers an extremely high altitude flying spy planes like the u2 but after the defection of victor belenko in 1976 the us dissected and analyzed everything they wanted from the mig-25 the soviet union was left holding the bag and was forced to develop a new interceptor but these soviet engineers wouldn't have had to go to such insane lengths and build such a cutting-edge jet to beat the Americans. 

I personally recommend the documentary the fall of the iron curtain a look at the day that the iron curtain fell in berlin that trapped one-half of the city under the Soviet Union thus the MIG-31 was born and became the main interceptor of the union armed with long-range R33 and then at the time state-of-the-art r37 missiles another innovation of the MIG -31 was the huge zestlon radar which was the first ever p-e-s-a radar mounted on a fighter jet with its 400-kilometer range and having missiles that could hit targets up to 300 kilometers away a maximum speed of Mach 2.8 and a server ceiling of 25 kilometers up in the sky the mig-31 was the perfect killing machine against any large target either super or subsonic trying to invade the Russian airspace but this would be the last grand ovation for the firm in recent years the MiG bureau has been experiencing failure after failure on the international market almost stopping their aircraft reduction.

They've had some small orders of modernized mig-29s here and there and a limited run of mig-35 orders for the Russian air force while focusing on modernization and maintenance of current aircraft but all of that may change in the future and the glorious days may yet to come for this historic firm during the late 80s the MiG design bureau decided that something had to be done and actually started working on a new interceptor project planned to replace the legendary mig-31. At the beginning of the 21st century back then it was known simply as is Delia 7.01 and would be the Russian jet of the future the design was abandoned in 1991 due to a lack of funds and instead they opted for several modifications of the Mig-31 platform throughout the years but the engineers there at the MiG bureau could not shake the idea that it was time for a new jet aircraft during the mid-2010s rumors had started to swirl around about a new design but nothing was solely revealed until 2018.

When the first official information about a new interceptor under development it's officially known under fancy name of the pack DP or prospective aviation complex for long range interception or internally simply known as the Isdalia 41 where the supposed MIG-41 designation comes from however take this all with a grain of salt because official designations are only ever given when the aircraft actually enters active service with the Russian air force and this calling card was given by the media it's said that this plane will conceptually be based on the MIG-31 however some of the specs are completely bonkers and questionable one of them being a max speed up to 4.3 for comparison the SR-71 blackbird the fastest military jet in history had a maximum speed of Mach 3.3 and the engineers had to overcome huge problems with materials heating and aircraft construction to achieve that other sources however put the maximum speed at around Mach 3.5 for this new Russian jet which is more reasonable but should still present a serious challenge for the engineers it's planned to have a slightly smaller radar cross section than the current aircraft or in simple words some stealth capabilities which will most likely make sense only from a frontal sphere of the aircraft because the enormous engines needed to power this beast will surely make the engineers do all kinds of sacrifices to the design in order to accommodate them and radar signature from the back or side will definitely be much larger everything else. At this point is pure speculation but what we can assume is that it will either match or surpass the characteristics of the Mig-31 with range and server ceiling which are 3 000 kilometers and 25 000 meters respectively what isn't so far-fetched is the weapons and boy do we have something to discuss here PAC-DP will most likely carry new long-range R37 missiles along with the new king Zhao hypersonic missile which Mig-31s are also equipped with.

Now the interesting part here are the so-called satellite killer missiles which should be also implemented with the new interceptor Russia has been developing a sat missiles for a long time with the latest being the a235 noodle which successfully shot down an old soviet-made satellite cosmos 1408 in 2021 this system is made to work with the famous don 2n radar and will be able to intercept and destroy hypersonic and ballistic nuclear missiles along with the satellites noodle however is a huge missile launch from the ground and Russian’s are developing it primarily for the defense of the Moscow area but we can say with fear certainly that the pak dp will be able to carry asap missiles having in mind that recently MIG-31s were spotted carrying absolutely massive new missiles called BOROVESNIK possible further development of the 79m6 contact missile it's rumored to be an as at weapon working in conjunction with the satellites of the same name which are all covered with a veil of secrecy and a rely mentioned in Russian media and that was obviously a lot of complex Russian words rather than that Russian are also looking into laser weaponry for this new interceptor made either as missile defense or for blinding the enemy sensors in optics a new airborne laser called sokol echelon based on the bereave 860 has been used recently for different applications of high energy beams and for sure both Russia and western countries will make use of this kind of weapons into the future also did you know that during the cold war the Russians were working on an actual laser tank that is right and it is definitely something.

I want to cover in the future here on the channel so if you like the content so far then consider subscribing it is fair to say that the pack DP would be a serious threat in the air both in a defensive and offensive role and with the SU-57 and PAK DEA it would be the backbone of the new Russian air force only time will show us how accurate some of these claims are if this aircraft is faster than THESR-71 but it's great to see that no matter the reason that aircraft engineers are pushing the envelope for creating some of the mightiest birds in the sky.