Agence France-Presse, Russia will be ready to deploy new Iskander intercontinental missiles within three years as a response to a planned U.S. missile defense system, a top Russian general said on Sept. 6.
Tests on the missiles “could take up to three years,” General Nikolai Solovtsov, commander of Russia’s strategic armed forces, was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying.
After that “the security of the country and its allies will be assured until the middle of the 21st century,” he added, following a first successful test on the Iskander missile earlier this year.
In February, Solovtsov threatened to point missiles at two bases planned by the United States in the Czech Republic and Poland to host a radar and interceptor missiles.
Solovtsov said on Sept. 6 that it was necessary to upgrade Russia’s strategic forces as a “response measure” against U.S. plans to deploy part of a missile defense system in Europe.
