The Kh-22 (; AS-4 'Kitchen') is a large, long-range anti-ship missile developed by MKB Raduga in the Soviet Union. It was designed for use against aircraft carriers and carrier battle groups, with either a conventional or nuclear warhead. Kh-32 is the upgraded conventional/nuclear variant of Kh-22 and was accepted to service in 2016, it features an improved rocket motor and a new seeker head. Development After analyzing World War II naval battles and encounters in the late 1940s and early 1950s, Soviet military thinkers concluded that the era of large seaborne battles was over, and that stand-off attacks would be the way to neutralize and incapacitate large battle groups without having to field a similar force against them. Substituting cruise missiles for air attacks, Soviet Air Forces and Soviet Naval Aviation commanders set about converting their heavy bombers to raketonosets, or missile carriers, which could be launched against approaching enemy fleets from coastal or island airfields. The Kh-22 (Complex 22) weapon was developed by the Raduga design bureau and used to arm the Tupolev Tu-22M. Design The Kh-22 uses a Tumansky liquid-fuel rocket engine, fueled with TG-02 (Tonka-250) and IRFNA (inhibited red fuming nitric acid), giving it a maximum speed of Mach 4.6 and a range of up to . It can be launched in either high-altitude or low-altitude mode. In high-altitude mode, it climbs to an altitude of and makes a high-speed dive into the target, with a terminal speed of about Mach 4.6. In low-altitude mode, it climbs to and makes a shallow dive at about Mach 3.5. The missile is guided by a gyroscope-stabilized autopilot in conjunction with a radio altimeter. Soviet tests revealed that when a shaped charge warhead weighing was used in the missile, the resulting hole measured in diameter, in area, and was deep. By August 2016, Russia was finalizing the trials of the Kh-32 cruise missile, a derivative of the Kh-22. Designed for use by the Tu-22M3 bomber, the missile is designed to climb to to the stratosphere after launch, transition to level flight, then perform a steep dive to the target. The cruise missile version is also designed to target enemy ships, as well as radars, and "radio-contrast targets" like bridges, military bases, electric power plants, and others. The Kh-32 has an inertial navigation system and radar homing head, making it independent of GPS/GLONASS navigation satellites. Presumably, it has a range of