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Pluto - the First Soviet ABM

In the summer of 1944, the Central Headquarters of the Air Defense Forces developed detailed "Guidelines for Combating Projectile Aircraft." September 22, "Directions ..." were approved by the Military Council of the Red Army Artillery and on September 28 sent to the commander of the fronts, armies, air defense zones, deputy commanders of the artillery of combined arms fronts, to air defense academies and to the interaction headquarters.

Measures to combat airplane-projectiles were formulated in the form of general provisions, applicable to fighter aircraft, anti-aircraft artillery, anti-aircraft machine-gun units, balloon aerobots and VNOS. The main task was to "destroy aircraft-shells in the sector of their flight on the approaches to the defended point". Only the rapid advance of the Red Army to the West destroyed the plans of the leadership of fascist Germany to launch a rocket fire on the territory of the USSR.

Immediately after the end of the war, the Soviet Union began to speed up work on the creation and accumulation of arsenals of fundamentally new types of weapons and military equipment: atomic charges, ballistic missiles, radar, and anti-aircraft guided missiles. To manage these works, an Ad Hoc Committee was set up, which was headed by the then People's Commissar of Internal Affairs, Lavrenti Beria. The first main department of the committee (CCU) was engaged in the development of nuclear weapons, the second (VSU) - missile technology, the third (TSU) - radar equipment and guided missiles and, in particular, anti-aircraft guided missiles (SAM).

The KB-1 design bureau (the KB-1 number speaks for itself - even the main design bureau for the development of nuclear weapons was called KB-11) became the favorite child of the TSU, and perhaps the entire Special Committee, where the development of guided missiles and guidance systems was concentrated. Sergey Beria, the son of the chairman of the committee, was appointed chief engineer of KB-1.

Throughout the country, the best engineers and scientists were recruited in KB-1, including those who were in prisons and camps. They also brought in "trophy" German specialists, exported from Germany. At the initial stage of the KB-1 activity, the role of this "special contingent" was very noticeable and undoubtedly accelerated the progress of scientific and technical developments. Lavrenty Beria did not leave his son and the design office without special care.

In 1946-1951 years. in the Research Institute-4 of the Ministry of Defense and in the Research Institute - 665. engaged in the development and use of ballistic missiles, the first, mostly theoretical, studies were conducted on the possibility of creating missile defense systems from missile attacks. Now it is difficult to say what kind of considerations and events (maybe the war in Korea and the threat of using an atomic bomb) led to the fact that six months after Stalin's death, the seven Marshals of the Soviet Union applied to the CPSU Central Committee with a proposal to consider the issue of creating missile defense. The issue was considered rather quickly, and as a result, these jobs were assigned to KB-1.

Research into the possibility of countering ballistic missiles developed on the basis of the German V-2 cruise missile continued in the USSR in 1945 as part of the Anti-V-2 project at the Vavilov Air Force Academy. The Zhukovsky group of candidate of technical sciences, engineer-colonel G.M. Mozharovsky and research on the subject of "Pluto" in several other research institutes. Moreover, Mozharovsky's project involved the design of the anti-ballistic missile defense system as a whole, and later the creation of a missile defense system in a separate limited area. In December 1949, a preliminary design for the ABM system of a separate region was prepared, which served as the basis for the creation of the first experimental missile defense system.

When constructing the scheme of the project it was supposed that the task of protecting a certain zone from the attack of 20 ballistic missiles of long-range (according to the representations of that time) action should be solved. To this end, the zone defense was supposed to have: 17 radar stations (detection and tracking radar in the far zone (from 1000 to 520 km) and 16 radars with the same task for the near zone. In general, in the interest of organizing an anti-missile defense of one region, 38 detection stations, as well as 44 precision-bearing stations, were required (taking into account the reserve). As a percussion weapon, special "fighter torpedoes" were considered. The report of Mozharovsky's group received a positive assessment at the meeting of the Scientific and Technical Council of the Academy of Artillery Sciences.

The second direction was based on research (the main executor is Kuntsevsky Research Institute-20 of the People's Commissariat of Armaments) to develop a radar with a range of detection from 500 to 2000 km. Despite the great technical difficulties, the preliminary design of "Pluto" was soon prepared. But it turned out to be "unbearable" for the post-war Soviet industry. As a result, at the end of 1946, the work of NII-20 was suspended.

Later studies resumed. In February 1948, a resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR was issued that determined the task of the staff of the state union head research institute No. 88 of the USSR Ministry of Armaments to develop parameters for the system for combating long-range missiles and long-range bombers. The specialists of NII-88, apart from the general conduct of the topic, were also charged with the creation of a special interceptor. The co-executor in the part of radar facilities on the subject "Pluto" was NII-20; another co-inventor, NII-885, developed a control system for the anti-missile system (I-32 project, moderator - Yu.S. Khlebtsevich). The anti-missile control system was noticeably different from Mozharovsky's torpedo-fighter. At the first stage the missile flew by radio commands from the ground, and then the head of the homing began.

In April 1949 materials on the subject "Pluto" were considered at a meeting of one of the special committees under the USSR Council of Ministers with the adoption of the relevant resolution: "the long-range detection of missiles and aircraft is realistic." The prospects of this direction were ascertained, and in the general form further problems were formulated.

In connection with the deployment of the first domestic stationary anti-aircraft missile system "Berkut" (later S-25) around Moscow, all the work on the missile defense project was postponed "indefinitely".