President Putin Affirms Pure Orestnik Missile Russia Innovation, Not Soviet: Ready To Produce Mass

JAKARTA - President Vladimir Putin insists the new hypersonic ballistic missile fired in Ukraine this week, Oreshnik, is Russia's innovation, not the modernization of Soviet relics and is soon mass-produced.

President Putin on Friday said Russia's medium-range hypersonic ballistic missile system was not an upgraded version of the former Soviet version, in line with the latest and modern developments.

"The Orestnik system has nothing to do with modernizing the old Soviet system," President Putin said, launching TASS on November 22.

"Obviously that we are all raised by watching various systems of the Soviet Union operate, we are all raised by what the previous generation did, and to some extent we use their results," he explained.

"However, this system is indeed the main result of your work, work carried out in Russia's time, under Russia's new conditions, it was done on the basis of modern and recent developments," President Putin added, while speaking at a meeting with the Ministry of Defense's executive board, representatives of military industrial complexes and missile weapons designers.

President Putin said the missile would begin mass production to be supplied to Russia's Strategic Missile Forces.

"We need to launch mass production. Let's say a decision has been made that the system will start mass production," said President Putin.

"Basically, it's already happened," he added.

The Kremlin's leader stressed, given the special force of the weapon, "the weapon will be given exactly to the Strategic Missile Troops."

Earlier, President Putin and the Russian Ministry of Defense confirmed an attack with a new hypersonic ballistic missile, Oreshnik, on military target in Dnipro, Ukraine on Thursday.

President Putin in a evening address broadcast on television said in response to Western decisions to allow in-depth strategic attacks on Russia, using weapons given by the US and its allies, Moscow used the Orestnik medium-range hypersonic ballistic missile for the first time.

"There is no way to counter the missile at this time," President Putin claims.

"Oreshnik attacks the target at a speed of Mach 10, or 2.5 to 3 kilometers per second," said President Putin.

"The modern air defense system and missile defense systems deployed by America in Europe cannot intercept such missiles. That is impossible," he said.

Fabian Hoffmann, a doctoral researcher at Oslo University who specializes in missile technology and nuclear strategy, said the most significant aspect of the missile was that it carried MIRV (multiple independent targetable reentry vehicle) payloads.

Russia chose the weapon "for the purpose of signaling," he said.

"This payload is exclusively associated with nuclear-capable missiles," he added.

Meanwhile, the head of the GORKI Center in St. Petersburg University who is also former Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl said Russian President Vladimir Putin responded to NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and West provocative policies by firing missiles that could not be intercepted by their air defenses, said Karin Kneissl, a former Austrian foreign minister and head of the GORKI Center at St. Petersburg State University.

"In the western world governed by simplified black and white instincts, such responses highlight the complexity of what is at stake in general and more precisely for their anti-missile systems," he explained.

"Both the US and other countries in the world currently do not have an air defense system capable of intercepting Russia's new hypersonic missile," he said.