Russia Conducts ‘Massive’ Nuclear Missile Firing Exercises Under Putin’s Supervision

Russian President Vladimir Putin today gave the order from Moscow to start exercises with nuclear missiles simulating a “massive attack” by the Russian Army against targets located in a military base on the Kamchatka peninsula, in the far east of Russia, as a response to a hypothetical enemy incursion with atomic weapons.

“Under the leadership of Vladimir Putin, training is being carried out during which the task of launching a massive nuclear attack by the Russian strategic offensive forces in response to an enemy nuclear attack will be carried out,” the top Russian leader was informed on Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. “Good evening, start,” Putin replied. The video of the event was shown by the Rossiya 24 television channel.

According to the Kremlin, in the course of the maneuvers “for the training of land, sea and air strategic deterrence forces, ballistic and cruise missiles were fired in practice” with the capacity to carry atomic warheads, and all of them “successfully achieved their objectives” at the Kura site (Kamchatka).

For his part, the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, General Valeri Gerasimov, explained that the exercises involved «’Yars’ missile systems, the ‘Tula’ submarine of the North Sea Fleet and two bombers. missile carrier ‘Tu-95MS’». According to his report, «an intercontinental ballistic missile ‘Yars’ was launched from the Plesetsk cosmodrome and another rocket ‘Sineva’ from the submarine in the waters of the Barents Sea. The long-range aircraft ‘Tu-95MS’ fired cruise missiles».

Indian and Chinese

This morning, Shoigu held telephone conversations with the defense ministers of India and China, during which, according to the press release, “the parties discussed the situation in Ukraine.” The Russian minister conveyed to them “his concern about possible provocations by Ukraine using a dirty bomb”, accusations that Moscow has not stopped repeating since Sunday and that have even been raised to the UN.

The head of the radiological, chemical and biological protection troops of the Russian Armed Forces, General Igor Kirillov, maintains that the Defense Ministry has information about kyiv’s plans to use a dirty bomb and blames Russia for it. The United States, France, the United Kingdom and NATO have rejected such a possibility, observing rather that it is a tactic by Moscow to use it as a pretext for a new escalation of the conflict in Ukraine.