The world's fastest cruise missile in service — India and Russia's BrahMos is a Mach-3 ramjet weapon that hits ships and land targets from sea, land, air and submarine. India used it in combat against Pakistan in 2025 and now exports it to the Philippines.
Taiwan's "carrier killer" — the ramjet-powered Hsiung Feng III streaks toward enemy ships at around Mach 3, too fast for many defences to react. Fired from warships, coastal batteries and fighter jets, it is a core asymmetric weapon meant to make any Chinese invasion fleet pay a heavy price.
Japan's counterstrike missile — the upgraded Type 12 stretches a once-coastal anti-ship weapon to ~1,000 km, adds stealth shaping, terrain-following and evasive maneuvers, and can hit ships or land targets from ground launchers, ships and aircraft. The spearhead of Tokyo's new strike posture.
Norway's stealth ship-killer — a low-flying, fully passive cruise missile with an imaging-infrared seeker that emits nothing for defenders to detect, weaves around islands and terrain, and is now the West's anti-ship weapon of choice from US Navy ships to Marine truck launchers.
Russia's Mach-2.5 ramjet cruise missile and the Bastion-P coastal batteries that fire it — designed to kill ships, but used relentlessly against Ukrainian land targets because its speed makes it brutally hard to intercept. The parent design of India's BrahMos.
China's ship-and-air-launched anti-ship hypersonic ballistic missile — a "carrier killer" with a maneuvering glide vehicle fired from Type 055 destroyers and H-6N bombers. The core of the A2/AD picture meant to hold US carriers at risk deep in the Pacific.
The US Navy's multi-role interceptor — Standard Missile 6 combines long-range air defense, terminal ballistic-missile defense, and anti-ship strike into one round, and became the first US weapon to down an anti-ship ballistic missile in combat.
Russia’s ship- and coast-launched scramjet-powered hypersonic cruise missile — a carrier-killer with nuclear capability, used sparingly against Ukraine since 2024.
China's pioneering land-based anti-ship ballistic missile — the "carrier killer" that forced the U.S. Navy to rethink its force structure, holding aircraft carriers at risk out to 1,500 km.
Ukraine's indigenous subsonic cruise missile, developed for coastal defense but now a deep-strike land-attack weapon. It sank the Russian cruiser Moskva in 2022 and, in its Long Neptune form, claims a 1,000 km reach.
Russia's mainstay sea- and submarine-launched cruise missile family, covering land-attack and anti-ship roles; first combat use in Syria (2015) and a primary weapon in the war against Ukraine's energy grid.
The BGM-109 Tomahawk is the US Navy’s primary subsonic land-attack cruise missile — a precision stand-off weapon launched from ships and submarines and used in every major US conflict since 1991.
China's expansive military ISR satellite constellation combining optical, radar, and signals intelligence with a NOSS-style naval-surveillance arm to form the space backbone of the PLA's anti-ship missile kill chain.
China's road-mobile, dual‑capable intermediate‑range ballistic missile — able to strike land targets out to Guam and, in its DF‑26B variant, engage moving ships at sea.