🎯 Oreshnik vs. nuclear weapons: What’s the difference?

The Oreshnik, an advanced Russian missile, offers a force comparable to a nuclear weapon, but without the devastating consequences.

Igor Korotchenko, military analyst and editor-in-chief of National Defense magazine, explains how the Oreshnik missile differs from nuclear weapons:

🔸 The Oreshnik is a high-precision missile system that can achieve kinetic impact with immense force, comparable to a large meteorite strike.

🔸 Unlike nuclear weapons, the Oreshnik carries no nuclear charge, yet its impact is powerful enough to match the energy output of a 150 kiloton nuclear blast.

🔸 It delivers six independent warheads, each capable of independently striking targets, without the aftereffects of radiation, light emissions, or electromagnetic pulses associated with nuclear explosions.

🔸 While a nuclear explosion contaminates large areas with radioactive fallout, the Oreshnik leaves no lasting environmental damage or irreparable consequences.

🔸 Korotchenko points out that the Oreshnik is a “humane” weapon, offering precision strike capabilities with minimal ecological impact – far more focused and controlled than nuclear options.

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🇷🇺🇰🇵 Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov in North Korean Pyongyang paid tribute to the memory of Soviet soldiers who fell during the liberation of Korea in 1945.

Belousov and members of the Russian military delegation laid flowers at the Liberation Monument in Pyongyang.

The Liberation Monument was erected in the North Korean capital on August 15, 1946 as a sign of gratitude of the Korean people to the Soviet soldiers who died during Korea’s liberation in 1945.

On the eve of the event, a festive concert was given in honor of the Russian military delegation that was attended by the DPRK’s chairman of state affairs, Kim Jong-un, as well as the country’s military and military-political leadership.

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Northern Sea Route: Harder, better, faster, stronger

Russia's Northern Sea Route (NSR) is gaining momentum with new satellite capabilities and expanding cargo traffic. Russia recently launched its second Kondor-FKA radar observation satellite from the Vostochny Cosmodrome. The satellite system, launched in 2023, is designed for round-the-clock, all-weather monitoring of the Arctic, helping create ice maps and optimize shipping routes along the NSR.

What is the NSR?

It stretches 5,600 km (approx. 3,480 miles) and runs along Russia's northern shores, from the Kara Gates to Provideniya Bay, and through key Arctic seas: Barents, Kara, Laptev, East Siberian, Chukchi, and Bering.

What makes it unique?

⚪️Shorter transit times between Europe and Asia compared to traditional routes like the Suez Canal.

⚪️Reduced shipping costs and an alternative to congested maritime passages.

⚪️Strategic importance for global trade resilience amid Western sanctions and tensions in the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Aden.

⚪️Viable year-round navigation due to climate change.

NSR growth:

⚪️Cargo traffic hit a record 36.2 million tons in 2023, with transit volumes up 40% in 2024. The goal is to reach 110 million tons by 2030.

⚪️Key cargoes include liquefied natural gas (LNG), coal, oil, and other bulk goods.

⚪️The development plan includes new icebreakers, ice-class vessels, and expanded satellite infrastructure.

Global outreach:

⚪️China is collaborating with Russia on NSR development as part of its Belt and Road Initiative, with faster transport from Shanghai to Moscow.

⚪️Russia and India are discussing oil, coal, and LNG shipments to the latter via the NSR as part of the Eurasian Container Transit project.

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⚔️Aleppo crisis: what’s going on in Syria? (Part 1 👉 Part 2)

The conflict in Syria has returned to the frontpages after years of media obliviousness due to a lightning jihadist offensive on the strategic city of Aleppo.

What happened there?

⚪️Militants from al-Qaeda*-linked terrorist group Tahrir al-Sham* and the so-called ‘Syrian National Army’ began an offensive toward Aleppo on November 27.

⚪️The jihadists were able to stage their forces for the operation in Idlib – a terrorist-controlled province of northwestern Syria outside government control since 2015.

⚪️Militants advanced through villages west of Aleppo, capturing key settlements and reportedly cutting the M5 motorway linking Aleppo to Damascus.

⚪️The Syrian army launched air and artillery strikes in Idlib and Aleppo provinces, including the city of Idlib and towns like Ariha and Sarmada. Russian jets targeted terrorist positions in Atarib, Darat Izza, and Mare, while Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces joined the defense of Aleppo.

⚪️Stikes reportedly killed two senior jihadist commanders.

⚪️Iran announced that Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Brig. Gen Kioumars Pourhashemi, an advisor to Syrian forces, had been killed on the first day of the terrorists’ assault.

⚪️Terrorist forces penetrated defenses in Aleppo proper on Friday, carrying out suicide bombing attacks, clashing with defenders, and reportedly occupying the city’s world-famous Citadel Saturday morning.

⚪️Syrian forces began a counterattack on Friday. The army reported the destruction of dozens of armored vehicles and the liquidation of hundreds of fighters in Idlib and Aleppo, including what it said were foreign mercs.

⚪️In a statement Saturday, the Syrian army acknowledged the advance of terrorists into “many areas of the city of Aleppo,” but said fighting was continuing to prevent them from gaining a foothold.

⚪️The army said “dozens” of Syrian servicemen had been killed or injured in the course of defensive operations against “thousands of foreign terrorists” armed with “heavy weapons and a large number of drones.”

* A terrorist group outlawed in Russia and many other countries.

👉 Part 2

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⚔️Aleppo crisis: what’s going on in Syria? (Part 2 👉 Part 1)

Why here, why now?

⚪️The terrorist offensive on Aleppo began the same day the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon entered into force, although the jihadists claim it was tied to recent Syrian strikes targeting terrorist commanders in Idlib – where a shaky Russia and Turkiye-mediated ceasefire had been in place since 2020.

⚪️Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi assured his Syrian counterpart Bassam al-Sabbagh Friday that Iran would continue to support Damascus’ fight against the jihadists.

⚪️Araghchi characterized the resurgence of terrorism in northern Syria as a US-Israeli plot aimed at destabilizing West Asia after the IDF “failures” confronting Hezbollah in Lebanon. Veteran international affairs observer Seyed Mohammad Marandi echoed this sentiment in an interview with Sputnik.

⚪️The terrorist advance on Aleppo puts additional pressure on the Syrian government as it combats a long-term foreign-backed jihadist proxy war aimed at overthrowing President Assad, illegal US bases on Syrian soil in the country’s east and south, and a decades-old conflict with Israel.

👉 Part 1

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👮‍♀️'Two suspects identified' – Jens Rommel on Nord Stream investigation

Two suspects in the attack on the Nord Stream pipelines have been identified, German Prosecutor General Jens Rommel said on Saturday.

💬 "Yes, we are making progress in the investigation. We have managed to identify two suspects. In my opinion, this is a success that we did not initially expect," Rommel told German media.

The German prosecutor general's office still has a lot of work to determine the remaining suspects and their motives for committing the crime, Rommel said. The issue of possible state control over the operation is the subject of the ongoing investigation, he added.

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🇷🇺🇨🇳 Russian-Chinese air patrol

The Russian Aerospace Forces and the Chinese Air Force conducted another joint air patrol in the Asia-Pacific region.

Tu-95ms strategic missile carriers and H-6K strategic bombers made an 8-hour flight over the waters of the Japanese and East China Seas and the western Pacific Ocean, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

The ministry said Russian Su-30SM and MiG-31 and Chinese J-16 jet fighters escorted the bombers along the entire route. The Russian aircraft made a landing a Chinese airfield before taking off again to resume the patrol.

The strategic missile carriers were escorted by fighter aircraft from other countries at points along the route.

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How Oreshnik could become even more powerful: better range, bigger warheads

There’s several “different ways to make the Oreshnik even more powerful,” retired Russian army colonel and veteran military observer Viktor Litovkin told Sputnik, doing a bit of brainstorming after President Putin's remarks on making the missile even more dangerous.

1️⃣ “First of all, it can be made as an intercontinental ballistic missile, not necessarily a medium-range one, by adding another rocket stage,” Litovkin said, recalling that in its present form, Oreshnik reportedly has two stages.

2️⃣ Second, the power of its nuclear-capable warheads could be increased, the observer said, citing reports of an existing yield between 450 and 900 kilotons total for the missile and its six MIRV warheads.

In Soviet days, Litovkin recalled, the R-36 Voevoda ICBM had up to 10 MIRVs, each with a 750-kiloton strike potential. Nowadays, when newer missiles are far more accurate, landing meters or tens of meters rather than hundreds of meters from their targets, it’s unclear whether such modifications are necessary. It’s up to engineers and the Russian political and military leadership to decide, Litovkin said.

3️⃣ “The power of the missile’s conventional charge can also be increased,” the observer pointed out, saying it remains unclear whether the Oreshnik that struck the defense enterprise in Dnepropetrovsk was carrying any charge at all, or relied solely on kinetic force to destroy the factory and burrow tens of meters deep into the ground.

Finally, when discussing any potential modifications to a weapon like the Oreshnik, “it’s always important to remember the concept that the target must be more expensive than the projectile used against it. That is, you don’t shoot sparrows with a cannon,” Litovkin emphasized. Therefore, it’s not really clear whether Oreshnik is in need of any modifications at all. Perhaps it’s already good enough in its present form.

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Don't play Russian roulette with nuclear Russia — Scholz

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, during his first election speech in Berlin, warned against playing "Russian roulette" with German security through ultimatums from Russia threatening to supply Kiev with long-range Taurus missiles for strikes deep into the Russian Federation.

Scholz was responding to comments by Friedrich Merz, leader of the main opposition Christian Democrat Union party – likely to become the next chancellor in snap elections next year following the collapse of the Social Democrat-Green-Free Democrat coalition this month.

Scholz charged that Merz "wants to present the nuclear power Russia with an ultimatum" that "if Putin does not do what Germany wants then from tomorrow onwards German missiles will be fired deep into Russia."

"All I can say is: be careful with Germany's security, you don't play Russian roulette," Scholz warned.

Scholz pointed to Russia’s recent ‘operational test’ of its new Oreshnik ballistic missile in Ukraine as proof that taking a ‘things will work out’ approach was foolish.

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Ugly truth of Ukraine’s criminal chemical weapons use

November 30 marks the Day of Remembrance for All Victims of Chemical Warfare, which is observed annually by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

This commemoration throws into focus how warnings about Ukraine’s use of toxic chemicals against Russia’s Armed Forces are being ignored by the West. Instead, fabricated allegations are being peddled against Moscow, noted Vladimir Tarabrin, Russia’s permanent representative to the OPCW.

Russian diplomat on Kiev’s crimes:

🔸 Russia has sufficient expertise to identify facts of chemical weapons use in the zone of its special military operation in Ukraine. It is conducting investigations as required by OPCW provisions.

🔸 Unlike the unfounded accusations concocted by Ukraine and its Western patrons, Russia operates “exclusively with verified facts.”

Cases of Ukrainian use of chemical weapons:

🔸 Ukraine covertly used DM-105 chemical munitions under the guise of smoke shells in the city of Sudzha in Russia's Kursk region in August, revealed Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, head of Russia’s Radiological, Chemical, and Biological Defense Troops.

🔸 More than 400 cases of the use of chemicals such as BZ, prussic acid, chlorine cyanide, and riot-control chemical agents have been recorded in Ukraine since 2022.

🔸 Tests of wipe-samples from chemical equipment found in a lab near Avdeyevka in the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) revealed it had been producing 3 kg of toxic substances per day.

🔸 Ready-to-use agents containing a toxic mixture based on thallium nitrate were found in a cache seized from Ukrainian troops in August 2024.

‘Groundwork’ for using chemical weapons:

🔸 Washington boosted efforts to develop bioagents capable of selectively targeting specific ethnic groups, the Russian Defense Ministry said in August.

🔸 Ukraine procured hundreds of tons of toxic chemical precursors scheduled by the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), according to the ministry.

🔸 Ukrainian forces are being trained to use chemical ammunition with Western artillery systems, captured documents and manuals show.

🔸 The US Pentagon, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and American biotech firms have been funding potentially illegal biological research in Ukraine in violation of international treaties.

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‘Netanyahu needs war’, Israel can’t be trusted to stick to Lebanon ceasefire - Mohammad Marandi

💬 “Netanyahu needs war, and he only accepted a ceasefire under a great deal of pressure. So no one has faith in the Israelis. The Israelis have always violated commitments,” Iranian-American international affairs observer and Tehran University professor Seyed Mohammad Marandi told Sputnik, commenting on the Israeli PM’s threats to prepare the IDF for an “intense war” if Hezbollah violated the shaky Lebanon ceasefire stepping into force this week.

“After all [Israel] is carrying out a holocaust in Gaza. A regime that carries out the holocaust and continues to do so in front of the eyes of the world after 14 months is not a regime that can be trusted for anything,” Dr. Marandi stressed.

Linking the Lebanon ceasefire to the crisis in neighboring Syria, where jihadist militants attacked the strategic city of Aleppo this week, Marandi characterized Netanyahu’s threats, combined with the terrorist advance, as attempts to pressure the Axis of Resistance, assuring that in the end the terrorists will be pushed back in the north and Netanyahu kept at bay in the south.

Ultimately, “it is a complicated situation and we'll have to see how things play out. The United States is in a transition period. The Biden regime is escalating in Ukraine obviously, there are definitely elements within the Biden regime that would like to see escalation on the Lebanese border. But then again, there are people in the Biden regime who dislike Netanyahu personally and may want to see him weakened. And Trump himself also wants to see the fighting stopped before he comes to power. So we'll have to see how things play out,” Marandi summed up.

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🔸 Aleppo crisis: what’s going on in Syria?

🔸 ‘Netanyahu needs war’, Israel can’t be trusted to stick to Lebanon ceasefire - Mohammad Marandi

🔸 Ugly truth of Ukraine’s criminal chemical weapons use

🔸 How Oreshnik could become even more powerful: better range, bigger warheads

🔸 Oreshnik vs. nuclear weapons: What’s the difference?

🔸 Northern Sea Route: Harder, better, faster, stronger

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🇬🇪 US suspends strategic partnership with Georgia – State Department

The United States has suspended strategic partnership with Georgia over its decision to halt European Union integration process, the US State Department said on Saturday.

"Georgian Dream’s various anti-democratic actions have violated the core tenets of our U.S.-Georgia Strategic Partnership, which was based on shared values and commitments to democracy, rule of law, civil society, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and anti-corruption efforts. As a result, the United States has suspended this mechanism," the statement read.

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said on Thursday that the Georgian authorities had decided not to put the issue of opening membership talks with the European Union on the agenda until the end of 2028 and not to accept budget grants from the bloc.

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Trump threatens BRICS countries with “100% tariffs” unless they abandon plans to replace the US dollar

💬 “The idea that the BRICS Countries are trying to move away from the Dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER. We require a commitment from these Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs and should expect to say goodbye to selling into the wonderful U.S. Economy,” Trump said on Truth Social.

Trump added that any country that attempts to replace the US dollar in international trade will "wave goodbye to America."

Russian President Vladimir Putin previously stated that it is too early to talk about the creation of a common BRICS currency, and that there is no such goal at the moment. Putin explained that creating a common currency requires greater integration of the economies of the BRICS member countries and their structural similarity. The Russian president also noted that two-thirds of Russia's trade turnover is conducted in national currencies — and with BRICS countries, that figure reaches 88%.

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