Russia carried out a test launch this Wednesday (04.20.2022) with the Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile, which was launched from the Plesetsk cosmodrome and reached its destination 6,000 kilometers away at the Kurá range, on the Kamchatka peninsula. It is the “most powerful missile with the longest range in the world,” underlines the statement from the Ministry of Defense.
The launch was broadcast on public television and presided over by the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, who took the opportunity in his speech to issue a warning to those who “try to threaten” his country, stressing that the Sarmat “is capable of overcoming all means anti-missile defense systems”, in addition to having tactical-technical characteristics of the highest level.
He added that the Sarmat is a state-of-the-art weapon that “reliably guarantees Russia’s security from external threats and will make those who in the unrestrained maelstrom of aggressive rhetoric try to threaten our country think twice,” in allusion to the war in Ukraine and the sanctions applied by the West since the beginning of the conflict.
National Production
The Sarmat will enter service with the Russian strategic forces in the Siberian Krasnoyarsk region once the test program is over, replacing the world’s most powerful missile, the RS-20B Voevoda, classified by NATO as SS-18 or Satan. and with a range of 11,000 kilometers. Sarmat “has no analogues in the world and will not have them for a long time. Indeed, it is a unique weapon that will strengthen the military potential of our Armed Forces,” Putin said.
The leader, whose Army has been unable to meet the objectives set for the invasion of Ukraine, stressed that in the manufacture of the Sarmat, which weighs 200 tons, “only domestically produced assemblies, components and parts were used,” in apparent reference to the international sanctions that have limited Russia’s access to materials necessary for the missiles with which it attacks its neighbor.
The Russian leader had presented the Sarmat in society on March 2, 2018, just before his re-election, during a controversial speech on the state of the nation. He then warned the West that the missile has a “virtually unlimited range”, capable of hitting targets “across the North and South Poles”, so the US anti-missile system “will have nothing to do”.
The Pentagon, meanwhile, assured that Russia informed Washington of the launch, which the United States considers a “routine” test that “is not a threat.”
DZC (EFE, AFP)