RT-15 (SS-14 Scapegoat/Scamp) Russian Medium Range Ballistic Missile
For some unaccountable reason the NATO coordinating committee allocated two names to this weapon: Scapegoat for the missile itself and Scamp for the complete package inside its container riding on a rebuilt IS-3 tank chassis, with eight small road wheels on each side. All previous Soviet mobile missiles have a single code name, and the use of two caused some confusion. To make things more involved, the missile is superficially identical to the two upper stages of SS-13 Savage, a part from small changes to the warhead which Western observers believed to have lower yield. Classed as an IRBM, it in fact has greater range and can be regarded as a mobile land based Polaris A3. Such a weapon can be driven to countless concealed sites all round the Soviet frontier. There were many hundreds of IS-3 chassis available, some of them ex-Frog carriers, and the impossibility of satellite surveillance of so mobile a system results in "unknown" appearing beside Western estimates of the number deployed. Soviet films show the way the "Iron Maiden" container is elevated, opened and lowered back on the carrier which then drives off to control the launch.
Dimensions: Length about 35 feet 5 inches; diameter of first stage 4 feet 7 inches.
Launch weight: In the neighborhood of 26,455 pounds.
Range: About 2,485 miles.
