Russia develops new intercontinental ballistic missile

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/17/russia-develops-ballistic-missile-sarmat

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Russia will begin deploying a new type of long-range missile in 2018 to replace a cold war standby known in the west as Satan, a military commander said on Tuesday in a signal to the United States that Moscow is improving its nuclear arsenal.

A new intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) called the Sarmat is being developed to supplant the RS-20B Voyevoda, the Interfax news agency quoted the commander of Russia's strategic missile forces, General Sergei Karakayev, as saying.

"We are counting on being armed with this qualitatively new missile system ... by 2018-20," he said.

The Voyevoda, which is known within Nato as the SS-18 Satan, was developed in the 1970s and the missiles are approaching the end of their service life, although some of the ICBMs will remain in service until 2022.

The commander spoke on the anniversary of the creation of thestrategic missile forces in 1959, the military branch in charge of the ICBMs that were the stuff of nightmares in the US during the superpower standoff of the Soviet era.

Meanwhile, the US air force has test-launched an unarmed Minuteman-3 ICBM from California. The missile took off from Vandenberg air force base on Tuesday on a 4,200-mile (6,760km) flight over the Pacific to a target on the Kwajalein atoll.

The US air force global strike command said the test was a success. Major General Jack Weinstein, commander of the US 20th air force, said the test was a demonstration of the nation's nuclear deterrent.

Russia and the US signed the latest of a series of treaties restricting the numbers of ICBMs in 2010, but Moscow has indicated that it will not go further in the near future, citing what it says are potential threats from US weapons systems.

President Vladimir Putin is insistent that Russia must maintain a strong nuclear deterrent, in part because of an anti-missile shield the US is building in Europe, which Moscow says could undermine its security.

A pro-Kremlin newspaper reported on Monday that Moscow had deployed short-range Iskander missiles with a range of hundreds of miles in its western exclave of Kaliningrad, alarming the governments of the neighbouring Baltic states and Poland.

It was unclear whether the Sarmat was the missile that Russia tested in May 2012 and said the plan should improve Russia's ability to foil missile defence systems. The defence ministry did not reveal the name of that missile.

Putin has pledged to spend 23tn roubles (£430bn) by 2020 to upgrade defences, but a crucial strategic missile programme separate to the Sarmat has been plagued by problems.

The Bulava missile had been scheduled to enter service in 2012 but several tests have failed, including an unsuccessful launch in September that prompted the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, to order a new set of tests.

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