‘Most powerful’: What’s the Sarmat missile Russia has test-launched? 

Russia has tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile as part of its efforts to modernise its nuclear forces, and President Vladimir Putin has hailed the launch just days after his claim that the fighting in Ukraine is nearing an end.

“This is the most powerful missile in the world,” Putin said of the Sarmat missile on Tuesday, adding that the combined power of its individually targeted warheads is more than four times that of any of its Western counterparts.

Putin said the nuclear-armed Sarmat missile will enter combat service at the end of the year. It has been built to replace the ageing Soviet-built Voyevoda.

What is the Sarmat?

The RS-28 Sarmat, called “Satan II” in the West, is an intercontinental ballistic missile – a land-based guided missile designed for the delivery of nuclear weapons with a minimum range of 5,500km (about 3,400 miles).

Putin said on Tuesday that it has a maximum range of more than 35,000km (21,750 miles) – far more than any of its Western counterparts – and claimed it could “penetrate all existing and future antimissile defence systems”.

Western analysts have estimated an actual maximum range of about 18,000km (11,000 miles), however.

The missile has been in development since 2011 and will replace about 40 Soviet-built Voyevoda missiles.

One test in September 2024 reportedly ended in an enormous explosion.

After Tuesday’s test launch, Putin said the Sarmat – one of a slew of new weapons that he unveiled in 2018 with the claim they would render any prospective US missile defences useless – is as powerful as the Voyevoda but with higher precision.

The Sarmat’s maximum payload is 10 tonnes, according to an April 2024 report by the Washington, DC-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) think tank.

The CSIS added that the Sarmat is 35.3 metres (116ft) long and 3 metres (9.8ft) in diameter and weighs 208.1 tonnes.

According to a 2018 report by Russia’s Tass news agency, Putin claimed that the Sarmat reaches high speeds quickly and stops burning its engines sooner than traditional intercontinental ballistic missiles, giving missile defence systems less time and fewer chances to detect it, track it and shoot it down.

What is the RS-28 Sarmat’s actual range?

While Putin claims it has a range of more than 35,000km, Western analysts estimated the Sarmat’s range is closer to 18,000km. The CSIS in an April 2024 report also gave the lower number as its range. Western estimates placed the range of the Voyevoda at 16,000km (about 9,900 miles).

The range claimed by Putin is almost a full lap of the planet. That would mean the missile could theoretically hit nearly any target in the world.

The Russian president also claimed the Sarmat is capable of suborbital flight, which means it could reach outer space but could not travel fast enough to remain there or complete a full revolution around the Earth.

Both of the cited ranges are more than enough to hit any city in the United States from Russian territory and farther. For context, Moscow is 7,500km (4,660 miles) away from New York, and about 9,700km (6,030 miles) away from Phoenix, Arizona.

What other new weapons has Russia unveiled?

Moscow’s newest weapons include the Avangard hypersonic glide vehicle, capable of flying 27 times faster than the speed of sound. The first models have already entered service.

Russia has also commissioned the new nuclear-capable Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile and has used its conventionally armed version twice to strike Ukraine. Oreshnik’s range of up to 5,000km (3,100 miles) means it is capable of reaching any target in Europe.

Putin has also announced Russia is in the “final stages” of development of the nuclear-armed Poseidon underwater drone and the Burevestnik cruise missile, powered by miniature atomic reactors.

Why is Russia unveiling new weapons now?

Putin has described these new weapons as part of a Russian response to a missile shield that Washington developed after its 2001 withdrawal from a Cold War-era US-Soviet pact limiting missile defences.

On Tuesday, the US Congressional Budget Office released an analysis estimating that US President Donald Trump’s plans for a new missile defence system known as the “Golden Dome” will cost $1.2 trillion to build and maintain over the next 20 years.

Russian military planners fear that having such a robust missile shield could tempt Washington to launch a first strike that would knock out most of Moscow’s nuclear arsenal in hopes of intercepting a small number of surviving missiles fired in retaliation.

“We were forced to consider ensuring our strategic security in the face of the new reality and the need to maintain a strategic balance of power and parity,” Putin said.

What is the latest on Russia’s war in Ukraine?

Ukraine has most recently struck gas facilities in southwestern Russia’s Orenburg region, more than 1,500km (932 miles) from the Ukrainian border, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his daily video address on Tuesday evening. This is part of Ukraine’s strategy in recent weeks to target Russia’s energy facilities in a bid to starve it of revenues funding the war.

Zelenskyy said the attack was made in retaliation for Russia’s overnight attacks on Ukraine. “Ukraine has said that we will act symmetrically in response to Russia,” he said.

On Saturday, Putin suggested the war in Ukraine, which began more than four years ago, was nearing its end.

The Kremlin reiterated that claim on Tuesday with spokesperson Dmitry Peskov saying progress made in talks with both the US and Ukraine would soon bring the conflict to a close while cautioning that it was too early to provide specifics.

Since the start of the full-scale Ukraine war in February 2022, Putin has repeatedly reminded the world of the size and power of Russia’s nuclear arsenal in statements seen by the West as attempts to deter it from intervening too strongly on the side of Ukraine.