Iran may have developed an intercontinental ballistic missile that poses a threat to the US - media outlet

Iran, according to local media, has developed its own intercontinental ballistic missile called Khorramshahr-5, which can reach the US territory, Defense Express reported.

It is worth paying attention to the characteristics of the new missile. According to Iranian sources, Khorramshahr-5 has a range of up to 12,000 kilometres, reaches a speed of about Mach 16 and is equipped with a warhead weighing approximately 2 tonnes," the publication writes.

Defence Express notes that Iran already possesses the Khorramshahr-4 medium-range ballistic missile, which can be considered a simplified version of the intercontinental missile.

This model has a design with divided warheads, which are more like submunitions and are not equipped with their own guidance systems. Khorramshahr-4 carries a warhead consisting of about 20 such submunitions, which open at an altitude of about 7 kilometres and spread out to a radius of up to 8 kilometres - the authors of the material.

It is noted that in June this year Iran has already used Khorramshahr-4 to launch on the territory of Israel during the 12-day conflict. Experts point out that Khorramshahr-4 by design resembles modern intercontinental ballistic missiles, although it lacks a number of important components, such as a guidance system for each individual warhead, and also has a limited range - about 4,000 kilometres.

Analysts point out that if the Khorramshahr-5 missile does exist, it was probably designed to deliver a nuclear charge directly to the territory of the United States.

After the events of the 12-day war in June this year, Iran may have reconsidered its position and is now preparing for the possibility of striking directly at US territory," the publication writes.

The Khorramshahr series missiles are a further development of North Korea's BM-25 Musudan (Hwasong-10), based on the Soviet R-27 missile. The first variant of the Iranian missile was tested in 2017 with a range of about 2,000 km and a differentiable payload of 1.8 tonnes.