Russia’s RS-28 Sarmat super-heavy intercontinental ballistic missile is born to replace the R-36M2 Voevoda intercontinental ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union. This type of weapon is considered Russia’s ace in maintaining nuclear power against rivals.
Russia’s RS-28 Sarmat nuclear super heavy missile will be tested only one launch this year instead of the two planned tests, a military source told Tass on 9/11. 2021. “One test launch will be conducted in December of this year. Five test launches are planned in 2022,” the source said.
According to the original plans, two ICBM Sarmat launches are scheduled for this year from the Plesetsk space center according to the test program framework.
The RS-28 Sarmat is a Russian silo-launched missile system, this intercontinental ballistic missile is powered by liquid propellant propulsion. This missile has been in development since the 2000s to replace ICBM R-36M2 Voyevoda. The missile system weighs 200 tons and has a throw weight of about 10 tons. The RS-28 Sarmat missile can penetrate any current and future missile defense system.
With 15 independently operating warheads equivalent to 50 million tons of explosives, the RS-28 Sarmat is considered the most terrifying nuclear missile ever built. The RS-28 Sarmat ballistic missile will be the core of Russia’s future nuclear deterrent.
Experts say that, if put into service, just one missile of this type can blow up a small country.
This type of strategic intercontinental ballistic missile is one of five new generation strategic weapons introduced by Russian President Vladimir Putin in his State of the Union address in March 2018.
Russia’s new generation RS-28 Sarmat has more than 400 times the destructive power of the atomic bomb that the US dropped on Japan in 1945.
Putin has claimed that Russia has developed a “global ballistic missile” equipped with a nuclear engine that is “unstoppable” and has a practically “unlimited” range. “Russia was and still is the world’s largest nuclear power,” Putin told the audience at the State of the Union address in Moscow. “Other countries only listen to Russia when we develop new weapons systems,” Putin was quoted as saying by Sputnik news agency.
RS-28 Sarmat or SS-X-30 (Satan 2 as NATO calls it) is also a powerful nuclear super missile with the world’s most terrible range today, up to 17,000km.
The RS-28 Sarmat uses “independently directed multi-warhead rewinding technology” (MIRV) to attack, meaning that each warhead it carries can independently strike individual targets. Depending on where it is deployed in the air and how it moves, each warhead can hit a target at great distances.
The RS-28 Sarmat is designed to overcome all current and future missile defense systems to ensure Russia’s strategic nuclear deterrence.
The unique feature of the RS-28 Sarmat nuclear missile is the zigzag flight path that makes interception systems almost “powerless” when dealing with them.