Putin Sees Successful Missile Launch

[CHIMO]

After spending the night on a warship beyond the Polar Circle, President Vladimir Putin observed the successful launch of a ballistic missile from a submarine during naval maneuvers Wednesday on the Barents Sea and told reporters that Russia could use cruise missiles to fight terrorists.

Putin, flanked by Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov, stood on board of the Pyotr Veliky cruiser to watch the Sineva missile blast out of the water and vanish into the gray sky after being launched by the submerged nuclear submarine Yekaterinburg near the Kola Peninsula. Exactly 28 minutes later, the missile completed its flight across the country and hit a designated range on the Kamchatka Peninsula -- much to the joy of Navy commanders.

While singling out the cruise missile and the successful Sineva launch, Putin also praised the overall increase in combat readiness across the armed forces and said the defense budget would continue to grow -- but not exceed 2.6 percent to 2.7 percent of gross domestic product. Putin, whose second term ends in 2008, said part of the money would go toward modernizing the armed forces beyond 2015.

In a clear reference to U.S. deliberations over lowering the threshold for use of nuclear weapons, Putin said Russia was opposed "to this dangerous trend in the minds of certain politicians and military men."

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2005/08/18/010.html

[ConcernedCanuk]

1. Putin was letting sumone know he has long-range precision weapons, no?

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From the posted Article

"The high-precision conventional missile has a range of 2,000 kilometers and Tuesday's launch was one of the final tests before its deployment . . . "

now,

Where ARE those US bases in Iraq ? . . .

hmmmm?

and for those that know more than me,

how much is involved to change the warhead from conventional to nuclear?

cuz I believe if the USSA gets frantic here, they won't be restricting themselves to conventional weapons