Originally designed to allow submarines to launch strategic strikes against ground targets, the P-5 was withdrawn from service in 1965. During the mid-1950s the Soviet premier
Nikita Khrushchev demanded priority on the development of submarine-launched anti-ship cruise missiles to counter American
aircraft carriers. The P-6 missile was mounted on submarines, surface ships (as the P-35), and coastal defence batteries.
The Lake Inari incident On 28 December 1984 a SS-N-3 missile used as a target by the Soviet Navy strayed over the Finnish border and crashed into
Lake Inari. A Finnish early warning radar at
Rovaniemi and a close-range radar at
Kaamanen picked it up, and two
Saab 35 Draken fighters were dispatched, but were unable to find anything. A few days later, a reindeer herder found a plastic cover of the electronics compartment, and unable to identify it, brought it to a Border Guard post. Finnish military analysts recognized it as a
MiG component. The missile was a modified version fitted with avionics taken from MiG for remote control. The missile had punched itself through the lake ice, thus the crash site was easily identifiable, and the Finnish military soon lifted the missile from the lake for analysis. The likely cause was loss of radio contact between the operator and the missile. Although the cause for the accident was mundane, it came at an unfortunate time, just before an international conference on
cruise missiles, and there was much speculation whether it was a Soviet show of force.
Russo-Ukrainian War coastal defence launching SS-N-3 Shaddock In 18 January 2024, photos showing the wreckage of a P-35B or a 3M44 Progress missile (either shot down by Ukrainian air defenses or crashed after experiencing some sort of failure) were circulated through social media. Given the economic sanctions against Russia and the
Ukrainian Navy lack of large warships, the Russians have launched anti-ship missiles against ground targets in Ukraine. According to
The War Zone, the missile could have been launched either from the
Object 100 fixed launcher or a TEL based in
Crimea. ==Operators==