With its forces still pushing ahead in their increasingly brutal, imperialistic invasion of Ukraine, Russia on Wednesday staged some well-timed geopolitical saber-rattling with a test launch of its long rumored “Sarmat” missile.
Dubbed by Western officials as the “Satan II” missile, the RS-28 Sarmat rocket is the long awaited replacement for Russia’s aging arsenal. It is large enough to carry at least 10 nuclear warheads, and — as the country bragged when the missile project was first announced several years ago — is capable of destroying a landmass “the size of Texas or France.”
Addressing Wednesday’s launch, Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed the milestone as being intended to “make those who, in the heat of frantic, aggressive rhetoric, try to threaten our country, think twice.”
While the launch has been a long time coming, since the project was initially announced years ago, Wednesday’s test flight couldn’t come at a more fragile time for Russia and its neighbors. In March, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned that Russia’s having raised the alert level for its atomic forces during its ground invasion with Ukraine put the prospect of full-blown nuclear war “back within the realm of possibility” for the first time since the Cold War ended.
Noting that conspicuous timing of the test flight during Russia’s imperial expansion effort, the head of the Russian agency responsible for building the missile reportedly hailed it as a “present to NATO” on social media.
