Ukraine war: What is RS-26 Rubezh, a missile Russia has threatened to strike Kyiv with?
File photo of Russian military personnel in Crimean town of Balaclava.
The ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine will soon mark its third year. Russia has now threatened to strike Ukraine with a massive new missile in revenge for the use of Western weapons against its territory, a report by The Telegraph on Thursday (Nov 20) said.
Citing local media, the report said that the Russian military was preparing to fire the RS-26 Rubezh missiles at Ukraine's capital city of Kyiv.
Earlier on Wednesday the US and a few other Western countries shut down their embassies in Kyiv for security reasons. The closure came a day after Ukraineused American missiles to hit a target inside Russia.
The US later announced that itreopened its embassy late Wednesday.
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What is theRS-26 Rubezh missile?
A report by RBC-Ukraine on Thursday said that theRS-26 Rubezhis a Russian mobile ground-based strategic missile system equipped with an intercontinental ballistic missile.
The RS-26 has been built on the design of the Yars project (RS-24 Yars) with upgraded manoeuvrable warheads designed to penetrate missile defence systems.
The missile can carry a thermonuclear warhead and can also be used with the hypersonic Avangard glide vehicle, the RBC-Ukraine report added.
The first successful test of theRS-26 Rubezh took place in May 2012. The report pointed out that the missile was supposed to enter service in 2015 with a deployment planned two years later.
But in 2018, it was announced that the missile system had beenexcluded from Russia's armament program through 2027.
Citing public sources, the report revealed a few features of the missile- a launch weight of 40-50 tons, a range of up to 6,000 kilometres (Kms), and the warhead-four separate units with a total capacity of 1.2 megatons.
Missile has not been used in combat before
Citing Western missile experts, The Telegraph report on Thursday said that theRS-26 Rubezh has not been used in combat before. The missile is said to fly at five times the speed of sound- making it difficult for Ukraine's US-supplied Patriot missile systems to shoot down.
A Moscow-based newspaper said that Russia was readying to launch the RS-26 missiles from a site in Astrakhan by the Caspian Sea.
(With inputs from agencies)