Russia has successfully tested its new nuclear-capable ‘Doomsday missile’ and has revealed plan to deploy it, the Kremlin said on Tuesday.
Putin said that Russia planned to put the Satan-2 missile, also known as Sarmat, on combat duty by the end of this year.
The intercontinental ballistic missile is a 208-ton, silo-launched ‘apocalypse’ rocket the size of a 14-storey building capable of reaching 15,880mph.
It is designed to deliver nuclear warheads to strike targets thousands of miles away in the US or Europe.
‘It has the ability to penetrate all existing and future anti-missile defence systems,’ Putin said in remarks today.
The missile can travel not only along a ballistic trajectory, but also along a suborbital trajectory, which allows for a range of over 35,000 km.
Sergei Karakayev, leading Russia’s strategic missile forces, confirmed through state media that the recent test demonstrated the weapon’s expected capabilities.
Putin also said that work on the ‘Poseidon’ and ‘Burevestnik’ small nuclear propulsion systems were in its final stages.
The Kremlin’s propaganda machine has repeatedly claimed that the Poseidon could ‘sink’ Britain under ‘radioactive tidal waves’, while the Burevestnik has been dubbed a ‘flying Chernobyl.’
According to local media, the Russian leader noted that the Sarmat is the most powerful missile system in the world.
And the total yield of the warhead delivered by this missile is four times greater than that of any Western analogue.
