Russian AAMs. Part 1

In general, the serial Russian air-to-air missiles are divided into 4 families: short-range R-73 (AA-11 'Archer'), median range R-77 (RVV-AE) and R-27 (AA-10 'Alamo') and long range R-33 modifications. All these weapons were developed by the missile design house 'Vympel' and now are manufactured by relative new corporation 'Tactical Missiles Weapon', where 'Vympel' was merged. The upgraded variant of R-33 missile is the 300 km range AA-13 'Arrow' (R-37, K-37, Izdeliye 610 or R-VD), but the fighters with needed radar capability (Su-35) is only entering a serial production.  The same is about 'Novator's KS-172 (RVV-L) missile wich extramally long range (400 km) demand according radar capability. The anti-radiation Kh-31 missile previously has only a limited AWACS-kill capability due to the lack of an active radar. The other kinds of new generation missiles are in active development process in Russia and used to be installed on 5^th gen PAK-FA/FGFA fighter. They are yet to be de-classified.

The long range  R-33E missile is an export variant of the main MiG-31 interceptor weapon (R-33, K-33, 'izdelie 410, AA-9 'Amos'), which is the backbone of the Russian anti-aircraft\anti-cruise missiles system. Having high velocity, 'Agat' 9B-1388 active seeker combined with the semiactive radar midcourse guidance and inertial support, this missile can effectively destroy the incoming 'Tomahawks'. Other fair targets for this class of missiles are enemy bombers. According to the developer information its range is 120 km, target's altitude 0.05 – 25 km, warhead mass 47 kg, launch weight 490 kg, overall dimension 4.15 x 0.9 x 1.1 m.