Russia has begun training with the Yars intercontinental ballistic missile system and several thousand soldiers, possibly a new attempt by Moscow to demonstrate its nuclear power, writes Reuters.

• “A total of more than 3,000 servicemen and about 300 pieces of equipment are involved in these exercises,” the Russian Ministry of Defense reported on Telegram.

The Omsk Strategic Missile Command Center and the headquarters and command base in Novosobirsk, where the Yars intercontinental ballistic missile complexes are located, are taking part in the exercises.

During the exercise, the Yars mobile complexes will perform maneuvers in three regions of Russia, the ministry said, without specifying which regions.

In the course of the exercise, a number of camouflage measures will also be practiced, as well as countermeasures against modern aerial reconnaissance in cooperation with units and units of the Central Military District and the Aerospace Forces, the Ministry of Defense in Moscow said.

What is the Yars mobile intercontinental ballistic missile system.

There are several confirmed tactical and technical characteristics of the Yars mobile intercontinental ballistic missile systems, which would have a range of 12,000 km, writes Reuters.

According to military bloggers, the systems are capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads that can be independently targeted and can be mounted on a truck or deployed in silos.

In December, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that the Russian army had loaded the Yars intercontinental ballistic missile into a launch shaft in the Kaluga region.

The Ministry of Defense of Moscow released a video on the occasion of this event on the eve of the Russian Strategic Missile Forces Day.

• “This operation is important because it will allow one more ballistic missile to be put into combat service, as it was planned,” the commander of the “Kozelsk” missile complex, Oleksiy Sokolov, said at the time, TASS reports.
• “The motherland will receive another sample of nuclear weapons, which will allow solving any strategic-level tasks,” the commander of the “Kozelsky” missile complex, Oleksiy Sokolov, also stated in a video released by the ministry.

Since the start of the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russia has conducted numerous military exercises on its own or with other countries such as China or South Africa. He has also stepped up military training with Belarus, which borders Russia and Ukraine, holding a series of multilateral exercises over the past year.

In addition, at the end of last week, Vladimir Putin announced the decision to deploy tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus. Belarus has argued that the decision to deploy Russian tactical nuclear weapons was in response to Western sanctions and, it says, military buildups by NATO member states near its borders.

US President Joe Biden expressed concern over the decision, although the United States says it sees no indication that Russia is preparing to use tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine.