Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that Russia carried out a strike with a “ballistic missile with a non-nuclear hypersonic warhead” with a medium range on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
It was in response to Ukraine’s use of American and British long-range weapons, Putin said in a televised statement. “Our missilemen called it ‘Oreshnik,’” he added, claiming Ukraine has “no means” to counter the new “Oreshnik” missiles.
The “experimental” Russian missile carried multiple warheads, according to two US officials and one Western official, in what may be the first time such a weapon has been used in war.
Here’s what else you need to know:
Putin’s warning: “We consider ourselves entitled to use our weapons against the military facilities of those countries that allow their weapons to be used against our facilities, and in the event of an escalation of aggressive actions, we will respond just as decisively and in kind,” the Russian leader said, referring to Ukraine’s use of six US-made ATACMS missiles and of British-French Storm Shadow systems. The Pentagon responded by describing Putin’s remarks as “dangerous, reckless rhetoric.”
The US was notified: Russia warned the United States ahead of the launch of its missile through the National Nuclear Risk Reduction Center, the Kremlin and Pentagon said. “The warning was sent in a standing automatic mode 30 minutes before the launch,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.
What to know about the weapon: Known as a Multiple Independently-targetable Reentry Vehicle (MIRV), it carries a series of warheads that can each target a specific location, allowing one ballistic missile to launch a larger attack. MIRVs were developed during the Cold War to permit the delivery of multiple nuclear warheads with a single launch. The Minuteman III, which is the States’ ICBM, is armed with MIRVs. The Russian missile was not armed with nuclear warheads, but it used a weapon designed for nuclear delivery to instead launch conventional weapons.
Kyiv’s reaction: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the new weapon “a clear and severe escalation in the scale and brutality of this war” as the country’s foreign ministry said Kyiv has “the full right under international law to hit any legitimate military targets in the territory of Russia” with long-range missiles. The United Nations described Russia’s use of a new ballistic missile as a “another concerning and worrying development.”
