The recordWhat this system is, where it comes from, who operates it and which of Vigil’s modules it is relevant to — with the evidence each of those rests on.
Record
Conflict relevance
This is the catalogue's single record for this system. It is relevant to the module below; each module's Force Atlas shows how it is used there.
Battlefield role
Coastal anti-ship denial in the Black Sea, extended since 2024–25 into a domestic long-range land-attack capability free of foreign release restrictions.
Strengths
Fully domestic design and production — targeting and employment decisions are Ukraine's alone; sea-skimming flight profile; the sinking of the Black Sea Fleet flagship is the proof of concept no exercise could provide.
Limitations
Subsonic and interceptable by an alerted, layered defence; production rate is only partly public; anti-ship employment depends on external reconnaissance and targeting data.
Campaign relevance
Derived: a participant organisation in these campaigns carries a typed equipment association with this system. That is not the same as documented use of the system in the campaign itself.
- The Black Sea campaign and the export corridor Since February 2022
via Navy (Documented, high confidence); Coastal Missile & Artillery Forces (Documented, high confidence)
Visual identification
Container-launched cruise missile fired from a 4-canister truck-mounted launcher; in flight a small cruciform-finned missile with a ventral intake — rarely photographed, the launcher is the recognisable element.
Documented conflict use
Publicly credited — and corroborated by US officials — with sinking the cruiser Moskva in April 2022, the war's single most consequential naval loss. Later reported against radar and air-defence sites in Crimea, with extended-range land-attack employment reported from 2025.
Branch & service operators
- Navy Documented
- Coastal Missile & Artillery Forces Documented
Related key events
Sinking of the cruiser Moskva
Ukrainian Neptune anti-ship missiles sink the Black Sea Fleet flagship — corroborated by US officials after initial Russian denial. The largest warship lost in combat since 1945.
Assessed as of2026-06Last reviewed2026-07-11