Meet Russia’s new hypersonic missile Oreshnik, a super powerful weapon which can hit any country in Europe, Putin says…
Russia-Ukraine war: In a major development that could decide the fate of the Russia-Ukraine war, Moscow has announced that its Oreshnik hypersonic missile is now ready for deployment, with Russian President Vladimir Putin stating that Russia plans to deploy the advanced missile in Belarus before the end of the year.
What did Putin say?
“Preparation is going on and we will probably complete it (deployment of Oreshnik missiles) before the end of the year),” Putin said in Valaam island near St. Petersburg, with Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko by his side. The Russian president said the Oreshnik medium-range ballistic missile has officially inducted into the Russian Army and its deployment sites in Belarus have already been identified.
How powerful is Russia’s Oreshnik hypersonic missile?
The Oreshnik hypersonic missile is a medium-range ballistic missile capable of travelling at speeds of up to Mach 10 (12348 km/h or 10 times the speed of sound), making it highly difficult to track and intercept even for the most advanced air defense systems used by Moscow’s rivals, such as US’ THAAD.
The advanced missile can carry both conventional as well as nuclear warheads, and gives Russia the capability to target any country in Europe, even as many experts claim the new missile is just a reskinned version of Russia’s own Rubezh-26 missile.
Why Russia’s new missile is threat for Europe?
The Russian President also issued a warning to NATO countries, threatening to use the Oreshnik missile against them if the supply of long-range weapons to Ukraine is not halted. “We are warning the West. If Kiev uses NATO-supplied missiles to attack Russia, we will respond even outside Ukraine using systems like Oreshnik,” Putin warned.
Putin claimed that Russian missiles cannot be stopped by Western missile defenses, and asserted that his country has an arsenal of powerful weaponry that even their use in a conventional attack would be as devastating as a nuclear attack.
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