NATO Admiral Explains How the Alliance Should Counter “Oreshnik”

NATO Must Have Long-Range Weapons in Its Arsenal to Respond to the Threat of Russia's New Hypersonic Ballistic Missile “Oreshnik.” This was stated by NATO Commander for Transformation Admiral Pierre Vandieu in an interview with Defense News.

“Stability is the ability to respond. If Russia has the means to strike Europe to a depth of 2,000 km, you need to be able to respond. Deterrence is a way to put pressure on the enemy before he comes to you. He must think about the consequences of his actions before he carries them out. Today we see the exact opposite,” the general said.

Pierre Vandieu emphasized that it will not be possible to protect Europe by creating something like the Israeli Iron Dome.

“You have seen the limits of the Iron Dome in Israel. Given the size of Europe, the idea of ​​getting rid of the threat by creating a European Iron Dome is simply not feasible. It's like batteries for electricity – it just won't happen”.

The admiral added that over the past four to five years, most of the stabilization measures that were created after the Cold War have stopped working. In particular, he mentioned the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, from which the US and Russia withdrew:

“We are back to the issue we saw in the 1980s, when you could have long-range ballistic missiles capable of threatening Europe… Now we are back in a time when such missiles can be freely used.”

Pierre Vandieux stressed that Russian efforts are now directed not only against Ukraine, but also globally against the West, and include space, cyber, ground, underground and hybrid actions.

The admiral also noted that despite the fact that Russia loses an average of 1,000 people per week in Ukraine, “they are good at adapt”.

“We live in a moment when the reaction time has accelerated,” said Vandie.

On Thursday, December 26, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia “if necessary” could again use the Oreshnik medium-range ballistic missile, but “it will not rush.”

For his part, Alexander Lukashenko, at a meeting of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council on December 26, said that he planned to deploy “a dozen” Russian Oreshnik missiles on the territory of Belarus.

On November 21, the Russian Armed Forces struck an area near a defense industry facility in the Dnieper with an experimental medium-range ballistic missile “Oreshnik”.

Russian President Vladimir Putin stated in a video address the day after the attack that the hypersonic ballistic missile “Oreshnik” had not been intercepted:

“There are no means of countering such weapons today. Missiles attack the target at a speed of Mach 10, which is 2.5-3 kilometers per second. Modern air defense systems available in the world and missile defense systems created by the Americans in Europe do not intercept such missiles. This is out of the question.”

As Voice of America reported, this claim is most likely false. While hypersonic weapons pose unique challenges to missile defense, experts and available evidence suggest that Putin's claim is an exaggeration of current technological realities.