US threatens to ‘take out’ new Russian cruise missile system if it becomes operational
Washington claims once the system works, Moscow could launch a nuclear strike in Europe with little or no notice
The US envoy to Nato on Tuesday warned that Russia must stop development of new missiles that could carry nuclear warheads and threatened to “take out” the system if it comes online.
Nato claims that the 9M729 system contravenes the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, or INF. The cold war-era pact bans an entire class of weapons – all land-based cruise missiles with a range from 500 to 5,500km (310-3,410 miles), and the alliance says the Russian system fits into that category.
“It is time now for Russia to come to the table and stop the violations,” US Ambassador Kay Bailey Hutchison told reporters in Brussels, on the eve of a meeting of US Defence Secretary James Mattis and his counterparts at the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.
She said that if the system “became capable of delivering”, the US “would then be looking at the capability to take out a missile that could hit any of our countries in Europe and hit America”.
Russia has not provided any credible answers on this new missile
The US ambassador made an “absolutely irresponsible statement”, the Interfax news service cited the Russian Foreign Ministry as saying.