August 20, 2026:
A year ago, the United States approved $825 million for the manufacture and sale of 3,350 ERAM missiles to Ukraine. That was followed by a remarkable development: the U.S. Air Force designed, developed, and put into production a new cruise missile. The AGM-188 Rusty Dagger is a 227-kg cruise missile measuring 2.64 meters long. A 45.4 kg high explosive warhead is sufficient to cause significant damage to targets. Its range is about 1,000 kilometers, and its top speed is about 700 kilometers per hour. Carrying a heavier 230 kg warhead, its range is 450 kilometers. A key aspect of this missile is that it costs about $250,000 each, less than a fifth of a Tomahawk.
Rusty Dagger can be launched from the ground, from F-16s and other combat aircraft as well as from helicopters and ships. The effectiveness of Rusty Dagger has already been demonstrated after Russia reported finding debris from a new cruise missile that turned out to be one of several Rusty Daggers given to Ukraine for combat testing.
Last June, Rusty Dagger manufacturer Zone 5 was given $12 million to develop the capacity to begin mass-producing Rusty Dagger by September 2027. Of that amount, $7.5 million was used to build pre-production missiles, and some of those were later used by Ukraine against Russia. Rusty Dagger is part of the U.S. ERAM Extended Range Attack Munition program. That will supply Ukraine with about 800 missiles by October and another 2,500 during 2027.
This was not the first time such rapid innovation had been seen. Back in 1991, during the hundred-hour war to liberate Kuwait from Iraqi occupation, it took three weeks for the Americans to transform barrels from obsolete 8-inch cannons into GBU-28 two-ton ground-penetrating bombs that were used to demolish an Iraqi military command bunker. The bombs were built to penetrate 50 meters of earth and 5 meters of concrete. American soldiers who arrived at the scene of the GBU-28 attack were amazed at how thoroughly the bombs did their work.
Meanwhile, the USAF said that Rusty Dagger was the first of many rapid development projects that were projected, planned, or underway.