WASHINGTON (Chatnewstv.com) — Russia claimed Sunday to have successfully tested an experimental weapon, a nuclear-powered cruise missile with a nearly unlimited range that Russian officials say could evade American missile defenses and strike targets globally.
Russian President Vladimir Putin asserted that the Burevestnik—meaning “storm petrel” in Russian, and code-named “Skyfall” by NATO—was “indeed a unique weapon that no other country possesses.”
The development quickly drew international concern, including from President Donald Trump, who said Monday it was “inappropriate” to be conducting such tests when Moscow should be focusing on peace talks with Ukraine.
Western Skepticism and Safety Concerns
Many Western experts, however, have questioned the strategic value of the missile, arguing that it does not offer capabilities Russia does not already possess and raising serious safety concerns about its miniature reactor.
Pavel Podvig, a senior researcher at the U.N. Institute for Disarmament Research, was quoted by NBC News as saying the main reason the technology hasn’t been developed by others is that “it doesn’t really have any use.”
The weapon is instead “largely political,” said Podvig, who runs the Russian Nuclear Forces Project. “It was important for the Kremlin, I think, that this is unique and something no one else has done before.”
The Burevestnik uses a reactor—a “miniature nuclear power plant”—to heat air, powering a ramjet engine that could theoretically keep it airborne for days, according to a 2019 report by the Nuclear Threat Initiative, an American nonprofit group. The U.S. and Soviet Union abandoned similar projects during the Cold War due to safety risks, including the potential for a radiation catastrophe.
Those fears were realized in 2019, when an offshore explosion in the Russian Arctic killed five scientists and spiked radiation levels in a nearby city. Experts and the U.S. government later concluded the incident was likely a failed Burevestnik test.
Test Details and U.S. Response
The test was announced in a video released Sunday showing Putin, in camouflage fatigues, receiving a report from Gen. Valery Gerasimov, Russia’s chief of the general staff.
Gerasimov said the missile had flown for 15 hours and covered 8,700 miles during a test last Tuesday, a record that he called short of its limit. He spoke of its “assured accuracy against highly protected targets at any range” and said it had “a high capability to evade missile-defense and air-defense systems.”
President Trump dismissed the need for such range, pointing out that other means of nuclear delivery exist.
“We have a nuclear submarine, the greatest in the world, right off their shores,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One. So a missile “doesn’t have to go 8,000 miles,” he added.
“We test missiles all the time,” Trump said. “They’re not playing games with us, and we’re not playing games with them either.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov responded to the criticism Monday, saying Moscow saw no reason why the test would “strain relations between Moscow and Washington.”
“Ensuring security is a vital issue for Russia, especially given the militaristic sentiment we are currently hearing primarily from Europeans,” Peskov said during his daily news briefing. “Despite all our openness to establishing a dialogue with the United States, Russia, first of all, and the president of Russia, is guided by our own national interests.”
