“The Kremlin fired a new intermediate-range ballistic missile at Ukraine on Thursday in response to Kyiv’s use this week of American and British missiles capable of striking deeper into Russia,” President Vladimir Putin said.
West Can’t Stop Russia, Claims Vladimir Putin
“The Kremlin fired a new intermediate-range ballistic missile at Ukraine on Thursday in response to Kyiv’s use this week of American and British missiles capable of striking deeper into Russia,” President Vladimir Putin said. Russia fired an intermediate-range ballistic missile, not an ICBM, during an attack on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro on Thursday, a US official told Reuters, contradicting the official account from Ukraine.
In a televised address to the country, the Russian President warned that U.S. air defense systems would be powerless to stop the new missile, which he said flies at ten times the speed of sound and which he called the Oreshnik — Russian for hazelnut tree. He also said it could be used to attack any Ukrainian ally whose missiles are used to attack Russia.
The UK government issued a statement condemning Vladimir Putin for escalating the conflict in Ukraine by using a ballistic missile with a range of “several thousand kilometres” against the city of Dnipro. President Putin stated that the country was entitled to use their weapons against those who supplied weapons to Ukraine to hit targets in Russia. He added that countries which would be targeted would be given advance warnings to evacuate to safety.
“In response to the use of American and British long-range weapons on November 21 of this year, the Russian armed forces launched a combined strike on one of the facilities of the Ukrainian defence industry,” he said of the attack on Dnipro.
His comments are aimed at the UK and the US, who as allies of Ukraine, have allowed their Storm Shadow missiles and ATACMS weapons, respectively, to be used to fire at targets in Russia. The missile’s range far outstrips that of newly authorised US and British supplied weapons. The distance from Moscow to London is around 2,500km, suggesting the range of the new missile could threaten the UK. Russian military claimed that they had shot down two British-made Storm Shadow missiles, after receiving reports that debris from the weapons had been discovered in the country’s Kursk region, where Ukraine has launched an incursion.
Vladimir Putin’s Chilling New Nuclear Doctrine
Titled “Basic Principles of State Policy on Nuclear Deterrence“, Vladimir Putin approved changes to the nuclear doctrine, chilling rules by which the country would now use its atomic arsenal. The big change in the doctrine now says that an attack from a non-nuclear state backed by a nuclear state will be viewed by Russia as a joint attack on it. Although the new changes were proposed in September, the document was approved only on Tuesday – which was coincidentally the 1,000th day of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
However, Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s Foreign Minister has said that “we strongly are in favour of doing everything to not allow nuclear war to happen”. Russia has signed a declaration at the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro along with the other countries, about which Lavrov said, “clearly said we want to move towards a world free of nuclear weapons“.
