3M14 Bulava (Mace) SS-N-30 
Engine: three stage solid propellant
Launch mass: 36.8 metric tons
Length: 11.5 m (without warhead), 12,1 m (launch container)
Diameter: 2 m (missile), 2.1 m (launch container)
Speed: hypersonic
Range: 10,000 kilometers
Flying altitude: Quasiballistic
Warhead: up to 6 reentry vehicles and penetration aids ; maximum payload up to 1150 kg
Guidance: inertial, possibly with stellar sensor and/or GLONASS update
Launch platform: pr.955 submarines
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The "Bulava" (Russian: «Ã‘уûðòð», “maceâ€ÂÂÂ) is a Submarine-launched ballistic missile under development in Russia. The Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology is chiefly responsible for the missile's design.
The Bulava carries the NATO reporting name SS-NX-30 and has been assigned the GRAU index 3M30. In international treaties, the common designation RSM-56 is used.
The Bulava design is based on the SS-27 (Topol M), but is both lighter and more sophisticated. The two missiles are expected to have comparable ranges, and similar CEP and warhead configurations.
The Russian military developed Bulava to possess advanced defense capabilities making it nearly impervious to existing missile-defense systems. Among its claimed abilities are: evasive maneuvering, mid-course countermeasures and decoys and a warhead fully shielded against both physical and EMP damage. The Bulava is claimed to be designed to be capable of surviving a nuclear blast at a minimum distance of 500 meters. President Putin has stated that Bulava could penetrate any future anti-missile defence system.
The current version of the Bulava is able to carry up to six MIRV warheads, future variants are expected to carry a maximum of ten. A full-capacity payload requires the forfeiture of all final stage countermeasures and of some shielding.
The missile completed the first stage launch-tests at the end of 2004. It was originally scheduled for completion in late 2006, but is now not expected to enter service until 2008.
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More Info:
On 28 June 2007 Russia successfully tested the new Bulava (SS-NX-30) sea-based ballistic missile after several previous failures. Capt. Igor Dygalo told The Associated Press that the Bulava missile hit its target on the Pacific peninsula of Kamchatka, about 6,700 kilometers (4,200 miles) east of Moscow, after being launched in northern Russia's White Sea from the submarine Dmitry Donskoi, a 941 Akula / TYPHOON class submarine outfited in 2005 as the SS-N-30 Bulava test platform.
The Bulava (SS-NX-30) is the submarine-launched version of Russia’s most advanced missile, the Topol-M (SS-27) solid fuel ICBM. The SS-NX-30 is a derivative of the SS-27, except for a slight decrease in range due to conversion of the design for submarine launch. The SS-27 has is 21.9 meters long, far too large to fit in a typical submarine. The largest previously deployed Russian SLBM was the R-39 / SS-N-20 STURGEON, which was 16 meters long. Russian sources report that the Bulava SS-N-30 ballistic missile can carry ten warheads to a range of 8,000km. Other sources suggest that the Bulava probably might have a range of 10,000 km, and is reportedly features a 550 kT yield nuclear warhead. Apparently up to ten MIRVs can be placed at the cost of offloading warhead shielding and decoys.
The development of a solid-fuel ballistic missile, which was to have replaced the obsolete R-39 (RSM-52) SLBM (NATO reporting name, SS-N-20 Sturgeon), was not completed. The missile's initial three tests were conducted unsuccessfully at a White Sea testing range in the late 1990s. Each time, the missile blew up in mid-air, failing to reach its target. The R-39M SS-N-28 Bark was already in the test stage, when the Navy refused from the missile in favor of the new designer, the Moscow Teplotechnika Institute [Moscow Institute of Heat Technology]. The institute was engaged in ground based Topol missiles and actively lobbied by the Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov.
The creation of D-19UTH missile complex designed for the new nuclear strategic submarines of the Borei-class has been undertaken at GRTs KB named after V. P. Makeev. The D-19UTH launch complex is to replace the D-9 launch complex with RSM-52 ballistic missiles. The new complex will be equipped with a solid-fuel ballistic missile of greater reliability and longer range, capable of being fired from the surface and under-water positions.
The M in the missile index stands for "morskoy," or "naval," because the Bulava is, in effect, a derivative of the land-based missile Topol (SS-27). Yuri Solomonov, head of the Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology, the Bulava designer, referring to the size and weight restrictions for sea-launched missiles, said that "here there is no talk of unification because you get two basically different theoretical approaches." Nonetheless, he admits, the designers took as much as they could from the SS-27 because in today's Russia - a far cry from the Soviet era - cost effectiveness also becomes a priority. Human resources made up for scarce financing: people who can design, test, and deploy state-of-the-art missiles appropriately for the little money they receive are certainly worth their weight in gold.
The Moscow Heat Engineering Institute was ordered to develop a new SLBM, i.e. the Bulava. The Yuri Dolgoruky and the world's largest Typhoon-class SSBN, the Dmitry Donskoi, had to be redesigned accordingly. The missile platform, rather than the missile itself, was the main problem. Any Russian, US, French or British SSBN uses special propellant charges, cavitators, when it launches missiles from beneath the waves. These cavitators precede the missile, pushing water aside, thereby enabling the missile to move freely.
It is extremely difficult to identify the appropriate clearance between two physical bodies flying out of the water to ensure that the flames of a powder or another charge do not affect the warhead of another. The point is that several nuclear warheads share one multiple independent re-entry vehicle (MIRV). At the same time, the speeds of these two bodies must be synchronised to the highest degree of accuracy to ensure the clearance is not too great. Moreover, the cavitator must fly aside on the surface and let the missile continue to its target.
The difficulties did not only lie in the technical and technological aspects. The project also failed to receive regular budget allocations at the planned levels. This naturally affected the commissioning of the new strategic systems and the smooth running of the missile-production chain. Nonetheless, the new-generation SLBM was developed in record time, despite the problems besetting the Moscow Heat Engineering Institute and the country's military-industrial sector. Financing began in late 1999.
Moscow initially planned to conduct the first test launch of the Bulava during 2004. Russia successfully conducted surface and underwater pop-up tests of the Bulava missile in 2004. The 2004 tests entailed the launching of a practice round, the goal being to test the launcher that fires the missile from the submarine's silo. The first successful underwater launch was conducted in September 2004 An exact replica of a real Bulava reached a preset altitude after being launched from the submerged world's largest nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine (SSBN), the Dmitry Donskoi.
The first flight test launch was conducted 27 September 2005 from the Dmitry Donskoy nuclear submarine in the Northern Fleet. The missile was launched from the Dmitry Donskoy, a Typhoon class ballistic missile submarine, at 5:22 p.m. Moscow time (1:22 p.m. GMT). "At the estimated elapsed time a dummy warhead hit the designated 'target' at the Kura test site on the Kamchatka Peninsula," a navy spokesman said. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov praised this test of the new Bulava missile system. "We focused financial and administrative resources on designing the fourth-generation Bulava system," Sergei Ivanov said. "The Armed Forces will get these weapons by the end of 2007."
On 21 December 2005 Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said the Bulava ballistic missile had successfully completed its test launch. "The launch has been conducted successfully," Sergei Ivanov said in a report to the Russian President. "The separation of all stages, combat and simulation blocks occurred according to pre-set parameters."
The missile was launched from the submerged Dmitry Donskoy, a Typhoon-class ballistic missile submarine, and successfully hit its dummy target at the Kura test site on the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia's Far East. "What is important is that the submarine was moving [underwater], it was not stationary," the minister said. It is the first test launch of the Bulava missile from a submerged position and the second overall under the trial program.
Ivanov also said the tests of the Bulava missile would continue in 2006. "We are fairly certain that the [Bulava] missile system, and a new submarine to be equipped with it, will be deployed by our navy in 2008," he said [this seems to represent a slight slip from the "end of 2007" reported a few months earlier]. Russia's Borey-class nuclear submarines will be equipped with Bulava missiles. Two submarines are being built at the Sevmash plant in Severodvinsk in the Arkhangelsk Region, in north European Russia.
Older Typhoon Project 941 submarines are also expected to undergo an upgrade for the new Bulavas
