Russia has test launched its new
hypersonic missile, its ministry of defence has announcement just days after
Vladimir Putin unveiled the nation's deadly arsenal of weapons.
The Russia's ministry of defence announced today that a MiG-31 interceptor jet successfully made a training launch of a hypersonic missile.
A ministry spokesman said: “A MiG-31 fighter crew of the Russian Aerospace Forces made a training launch of a hypersonic missile of the Kinzhal high-precision air missile system in the predetermined area.”
Footage of the missile test shows a pair of MiG-31 aircraft carrying a single Kinzhal, Russian for “dagger”, on their under-fuselage pylons.
The projectile can then be seen detaching from the underside of the warplane before swiftly blasting away.
The test launches come just days after the Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Russia had developed a terrifying array of nuclear weapons that can reach anywhere in the world and are “invulnerable to enemy interception”.
Speaking about today’s launch, the ministry said: "Performance characteristics and time indicators of the Kinzhal high-precision airborne missile system were confirmed during the hypersonic missile launch.
According to the Russian TASS news agency, the ministry said crews of the Kinzhal air system comprising of a MiG-31 interceptor jet and an advanced hypersonic missile made 250 flights from the beginning of 2018.
The Kinzhal system is intended for destruction of surface and waterborne targets.
Last week President Putin boasted to the Russian Federal Assembly that Moscow had developed missiles that no other nation possesses.
Russia’s latest arsenal is said to include a new supersonic weapon that cannot be tracked by anti-missile systems.
Mr Putin also added that Russia now had underwater drones that can carry nuclear warheads are also being tested by the secretive nation.
And the Russian leader said military chiefs had an operational ballistic missile with a limitless range, which he claimed could not be stopped by a US shield, as a video simulation played on a big screen.
And in a thinly veiled threat to the West, the Russian President said: "Russia remained a nuclear power, but no one wanted to listen to us. Listen to us now.”
The announcement marks “a new arms race that will put us under the terror of a new Cold War” an expert has warned as Russia, North Korea, China and United States – all participants in the last Cold War – continue to build up their military arsenal.
Beatrice Fihn, executive director of International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) said: "Putin's statement makes it clear we are in a new arms race that will put us under the terror of a new Cold War, in constant fear of death at any instant.
“While Russia and the US compare the size of their arsenals, the rest of the world is joining a treaty that bans them."
The Russian announcement comes after Dr Paul Miller, who served on the US’s National Security Council (NSC) under former presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama, warned a new rivalry between world powers is brewing.
Dr Miller told the Express.co.uk: “The Cold War was just the continuation of normal great power rivalry and suspicion under the unique conditions of bipolarity and stark ideological rivalry.
“Today there are more great powers, so we have a multipolar rather than bipolar competition. The ideological rivalry has shifted from communism against capitalism to a new contest between authoritarian capitalism against liberal democratic capitalism.”
“There is far more trade between and among the great powers than there was during the Cold War, making all powers more hesitant to risk economically catastrophic conflict. But it also means we are less able to ignore one another or isolate ourselves from one another.
“A war or limited military strike of some kind on the Korean Peninsula is more likely than not. War with Russia is unlikely in the short term."