Russian President Vladimir Putin is “trolling” the West when challenging it to a “technological duel,” Sergey Poletaev, information analyst and publicist, and co-founder and editor of the Vatfor project, has told RT.
During his annual end-of-year Q&A session on Thursday, Putin suggested that Western experts could choose a target in Kiev, amass defense systems and try to repel an attack by Moscow’s new hypersonic Oreshnik missile system. It would be a “technological duel,” the Russian leader suggested.
“I think it was trolling. It is hard for me to imagine that the West would go for this. I think Putin understands this better than anyone else,” Poletaev said.
He noted that Putin appears confident in the capabilities of the Oreshnik system as “apparently, he knows more about it than we do.” Poletaev highlighted that so far the weapon has only been used once, referring to last month’s strike on the Yuzhmash military plant in the Ukrainian city of Dnepr.
“It was more of a demonstration. In order to draw any conclusions, we need to wait for full-fledged combat use,” Poletaev said.
The president explained that given the technical characteristics of the Oreshnik and the current defense systems deployed by the West, it would be impossible to stop the missile or its hypersonic warheads after it had been launched.
The Russian military carried out the first-ever combat test of the Oreshnik in November, in response to Ukraine’s long-range strikes on internationally recognized Russian territory launched with Western permission.
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