The Oresnik missile launched on Tuesday apparently took off from Russia's Kapustin Yar rocket base, about 800 kilometers from Dnipro, far away from the intense fighting.
This is the first time an IRBM has been used in combat. The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty ratified by the United States and the Soviet Union in 1988 banned ground-launched IRBMs. The US first pulled out of the treaty in 2019 under the Trump administration, citing non-compliance by Russia. At the time, US officials noted that China, which was not a signatory to the treaty, had more than 1,000 IRBMs in its arsenal.
Putin said that Western air defenses are not capable of destroying the Orashnik missile in flight, although this claim could not be confirmed. He said Russia would warn Ukraine before future similar missile attacks so that civilians could avoid danger areas.
Orasonic missiles attack their targets at a speed of Mach 10, or 2.5 to 3 kilometers per second, Putin said. “Existing air defense systems around the world, including those being developed by the US in Europe, are unable to intercept such missiles.”
A global war?
In perhaps the most chilling part of his remarks, Putin said the conflict in Ukraine is “taking on global dimensions” and said Russia was planning to use missiles against Western countries that supply arms to Ukraine for use against Russian targets. Is entitled to.
“In the event of negotiations escalating, we will respond in a decisive and compassionate manner,” Putin said. “I advise the ruling elites of countries that are planning to use their military forces against Russia to seriously consider this.”
The change in nuclear doctrine authorized by Putin earlier this week also lowers the threshold for Russia's use of nuclear weapons to counter a conventional attack that threatens Russian “territorial integrity.”
It seems that this has already happened. Ukraine launched an invasion of Russia's Kursk region in August and captured more than 1,000 square kilometers of Russian land. Russian forces, aided by North Korean troops, are retaliating in an attempt to retake the area.
Singh described Russia's invitation to North Korean troops as “escalating” and said Putin “could choose to end this war today.”
US officials say Russian forces are suffering about 1,200 deaths or injuries a day in the war. In September, The Wall Street Journal reported that US intelligence sources estimated that one million Ukrainians and Russians had been killed or wounded in the war.
The UN Human Rights Office recently reported that 11,973 civilians, including 622 children, have been killed since the start of the full-scale Russian offensive in February 2022.
“We warned Russia not to do this in 2022 and they did it anyway, so there will be consequences,” Singh said. “But we do not want to see this escalate into a broader regional conflict. “We don’t want war with Russia.”
This story was originally published on Ars Technica,