Trump: Putin Should Have Ended Ukraine's War, Not Missile Test

JAKARTA - US President Donald Trump said Russian President Vladimir Putin should end the war in Ukraine instead of testing nuclear-powered missiles. The US is called Trump placing nuclear submarines off the coast of Russia.

Putin said on Sunday Russia had successfully tested its nuclear-powered Burevestnik cruise missile, a nuclear-capable weapon Moscow said could penetrate any defense shield, and would soon deploy the weapon.

Asked at Air Force One about the 9M730 Burevestnik (Petrel Badai) test dubbed the SSC-X-9 Skyfall by NATO which Moscow says has flown 14,000 km (8,700 miles), Trump said the US doesn't have to fly that far because they have nuclear submarines off the Russian coast.

"They know we have a nuclear submarine, the greatest in the world, right off their coast, so I mean, the submarine doesn't have to cover 8,000 miles," Trump said.

"I think Putin also doesn't deserve to say that. You should end the war, a war that should have lasted for a week now entering its fourth year, that's what you should have done rather than test the missile," Trump said.

Trump has repeatedly said he wants to end the war in Ukraine, Europe's deadliest war since World War II, although he said reaching peace was more difficult than reaching a ceasefire in Gaza or ending the conflict between India and Pakistan.

Since announcing 9M730 Burevestnik in 2018, Putin has declared the weapon a response to the United States' move to build missile defenses after Washington unilaterally withdrew from the 1972 Anti-Balistic Missile Agreement in 2001, and to expand the NATO military alliance.

"They didn't play with us, and we didn't play with them either," Trump said. "We test the missile all the time," he continued.

Reuters reported from Washington on October 25 that the Trump administration had prepared additional sanctions that could be used to target important Russian economic areas if Putin continued to delay the end of Moscow's war in Ukraine.