Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

to host U.S. BMD facilities, Russia would “have to take
appropriate action.” He explained that:
I cannot rule out that should the country’s militarypolitical
leadership make such a decision, some of our
ICBMs could be targeted at missile defense sites in
Poland and the Czech Republic, and subsequently at
other such facilities. 39
Similarly, Deputy Chief of the General Staff Colonel
General Anatoli Nogovitsyn warned that the Polish
decision “cannot go unpunished.” 40 He added that
it was now “100 percent” certain Poland would be a
priority target of the Russian military in a future war
with NATO. 41
In his first state of the nation address before both
houses of the Russian parliament, President Dmitry
Medvedev said that Russia would, “if necessary,”
deploy short-range Iskander missile systems in Kaliningrad
“to neutralize if necessary the anti-ballistic
missile system in Europe.” 42 Kaliningrad, a Baltic Sea
port which lies between NATO members Lithuania
and Poland, hosts a major Russian military base. Medvedev
also stated that Russian electronic equipment
would jam the U.S. systems and that he had cancelled
plans to dismantle three Russian missile regiments deployed
in western Russia. The Iskander-M surface-tosurface
missile has a declared range of slightly under
500 km (300 miles), which allows it to escape the prohibition
in the INF Treaty. If deployed in the Kaliningrad
region, the missile could allow Russia to target all
of Poland and also territory in eastern Germany and
the Czech Republic. 43 Each missile can carry several
warheads. The Iskander has been tested with a conventional
payload but could carry a nuclear warhead,
though the Russian Government has not indicated
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