Britain’s armed forces would be ready to fight Russia “tonight” if Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded another eastern European country, according to a top UK military official has said after Putin warned that new ballistic missiles fired at Ukraine this week cannot be intercepted by any air Defence in the world.
President Vladimir Putin on
Friday said Russia will continue to test the hypersonic ballistic missile known
as “Oreshnik,” which it fired at Ukraine on Thursday.
In a televised meeting with the
leadership of Russia’s defense ministry, Putin claimed the missile could not be
intercepted by air defenses and said Russia will begin serial production of the
new system.
“There are currently no means of countering
such a missile, no means of intercepting it, in the world. And I will emphasize
once again: We will continue testing the latest system,” Putin said.
He said Russia was developing
“several similar systems” for further testing.
“Based on the test results, these weapons will
also go into production. That is, we are developing a whole line of medium- and
shorter-range systems,” he added.
Putin’s comments come a day
after Russia fired the “Oreshnik” missile which contains multiple warheads at
Ukraine’s Dnipro region.
Kyiv initially accused Russia
of firing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) at Ukraine, although
Western officials later said the weapon was an experimental intermediate-range
ballistic missile. According to US and Western officials, the ballistic missile
carried multiple warheads, which may be the first time such a weapon has been
used in war.
Responding Rob Magowan, deputy
chief of the British defense staff, told a parliament defense committee;
“If the British Army was asked
to fight tonight, it would fight tonight. And I don’t think anybody in this
room should be under any illusion that if the Russians invaded Eastern Europe
tonight, then we would meet them in that fight,”
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