Russian missile troops held drills on one of the disputed Kuril Islands which Japan considers its own territory, the country’s defence ministry stated today. The troops practiced moving and camouflaging their vehicles on Matua island, the statement read out. Soviet troops seized the four islands off Japan’s Hokkaido at the end of World War Two and they have remained in Moscow’s hands, preventing the two countries signing a peace treaty.
Russia also began the third stage of drills to practise the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons, the defence ministry said today. “In accordance with the decision of the president of the Russian Federation, the third stage of the exercise of non-strategic nuclear forces has begun,” the defence ministry stated.
Soldiers from the Southern and Central military districts will train how to deploy dummy warheads for Iskander-M operational and tactical missile systems and covertly moving them to launch sites, the Russian Defence Ministry said.
“The current stage of the exercise is aimed at maintaining the readiness of personnel and equipment of units of combat use of non-strategic nuclear weapons of Russia to perform combat missions,” the ministry said.
Russia held the first stage of the drills in May and ally Belarus joined the second stage of the exercise held in June. Russia says the United States and its European allies are pushing the world to the brink of nuclear confrontation by giving Ukraine billions of dollars worth of weapons, some of which are being used against Russian territory.
Since sending thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24 2022, President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said Russia could use nuclear weapons to defend itself in extreme situations, comments that the West has dismissed as sabre-rattling.
The Russian Navy’s planned exercises involving most of its fleet in the Arctic and Pacific oceans as well as in the Baltic and Caspian seas are also underway. Russia is considered by most military analysts to have the world’s third most powerful navy after those of the United States and China, and Russia has a significant ballistic-missile nuclear submarine fleet. The Russian drills, which include 20,000 personnel and 300 ships, will test the readiness and capabilities of the navy at all levels, the ministry said.
Team Bharatshakti
(With inputs from Reuters)
