Russia successfully tested Sarmat in April amid heavy fighting in Ukraine, raising the prospect of a nuclear confrontation with the West.
Last month, the head of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, warned the West that if they did not “speak politely” to the Kremlin, Russia would target it with Sarmat missiles.
Dmitry Rogozin, who is also a close ally of Putin, described Sarmat as “the most powerful nuclear missile in the world” and boasted that he could shoot down “half the coast of a continent” from an enemy of Russia.
Confrontation by the blockade of Lithuania
The sound of Putin’s sabers came amid a clash with EU member Lithuania, which severely restricted the flow of goods between mainland Russia and its westernmost enclave of Kaliningrad, citing EU sanctions.
A senior ally of Putin told Lithuania on Tuesday that Moscow would respond to its ban on the transit of EU-sanctioned goods to Kaliningrad in such a way that Baltic citizens would feel the pain.
Nikolai Patrushev, a former KGB spy who is now the secretary of the Russian Security Council, said Lithuania’s “hostile” actions showed that Russia could not trust the West, which said it had broken written agreements on Kaliningrad. .
“Russia will certainly respond to these hostile actions,” Patrushev told the state-run RIA news agency.