The Novator 9M729 is a cruise missile designed by

NPO Novator NPO Novator (Novator Design Bureau, OKB Novator, OKB Lyulyev; russian: Опытное конструкторское бюро «Новатор» им. Люльева Л. В.) is a Russian company that designs long-range anti-aircraft missiles. It ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. It was responsible for

Mike Pompeo Michael Richard Pompeo (; born December 30, 1963) is an American politician, diplomat, and businessman who served under President Donald Trump as director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 2017 to 2018 and as the 70th United State ...

's denunciation of the INF Treaty in August 2019.

History

The missile now known as 9M729 was subject to the

Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty, formally the Treaty Between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the Elimination of Their Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Range Missiles; / ДРСМ� ...

signed in December 1987 and had been tested. Six launchers with 84 missiles were deployed at the Missile/Launcher Storage in Jelgava (

Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic The Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic (Latvian SSR), also known as Soviet Latvia or simply Latvia, was a federated republic within the Soviet Union, and formally one of its 16 (later 15) constituent republics. The Latvian Soviet Socialist Rep ...

) and had been destroyed by November 1990. In early 2017, US officials and analyst

Jeffrey Lewis Jeffrey Lewis (born November 20, 1975) is an American singer-songwriter and comic book artist. Early life Lewis was born in New York City and grew up on the Lower East Side. He attended State University of New York at Purchase, graduating in ...

asserted that Russia was violating the INF through the deployment of the 9M728 (SSC-X-7) and 9M729 ( SSC-X-8) missiles as part of the

Iskander missile system The 9K720 Iskander (russian: «Искандер»; NATO reporting name SS-26 Stone) is a mobile short-range ballistic missile system produced and deployed by the Russian military. The missile systems () are to replace the obsolete OTR-21 ''Toc ...

. These are widely reported as variants of the earlier SS-C-4. According to U.S officials, two missile battalions equipped with SSC-8 were deployed as of 14 February 2017 in violation of the INF treaty. Each battalion consists of 4 launchers, each launcher supplied with six potentially nuclear-tipped cruise missiles. One battalion is allegedly located at Kapustin Yar near Volgograd; the other's location is unknown at this time. The German newspaper '' Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung'' argued in February 2019 that in addition to two known locations where missiles and battalions are stationed – at a launch pad at Kapustin Yar, in southern Russia, and

Yekaterinburg Yekaterinburg ( ; rus, Екатеринбург, p=jɪkətʲɪrʲɪnˈburk), alternatively romanized as Ekaterinburg and formerly known as Sverdlovsk ( rus, Свердло́вск, , svʲɪrˈdlofsk, 1924–1991), is a city and the administra ...

– there would be two other places equipped with these missiles: Mozdok in North Ossetia and Shuya near Moscow. Each of the four battalions would have four-axle TELs, each carrying four missiles. This adds to 64 SSC-8 missiles in Russia's possession, which can be armed with conventional or nuclear warheads. In December 2017 it was revealed that Novator's product the 9M729 cruise missile was believed by the

US National Security Council The United States National Security Council (NSC) is the principal forum used by the President of the United States for consideration of national security, military, and foreign policy matters. Based in the White House, it is part of the Execut ...

to be in violation of the 1987

Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty, formally the Treaty Between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the Elimination of Their Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Range Missiles; / ДРСМ� ...

. In October 2018 it was responsible for the US denunciation of the INF Treaty.

Description

It may use the

Transporter erector launcher A transporter erector launcher (TEL) is a missile vehicle with an integrated tractor unit that can carry, elevate to firing position and launch one or more missiles. History Such vehicles exist for both surface-to-air missiles and surface-to-su ...

(TEL) of the 9K720 Iskander missile system. Other reports have six missiles carried on the MAZ 543 launcher of the R-17 (SS-1 '

Scud A Scud missile is one of a series of tactical ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It was exported widely to both Second World, Second and Third World, Third World countries. The term comes from the NATO reporti ...

B'). The 9M729 is thought to be a land-based variant of the Novator Kalibr cruise missile used by the Russian Navy. This type of missile has a range of 2,350 kilometers. With a conventional warhead of 500 kilograms, the range is 2,000 kilometers.

References

Bibliography

*{{citation , url=http://www.lanl.gov/history/hbombon/pdf/00416713.pdf , title=A Guide to the Nuclear Arms Control Treaties LA-UR-99-3173 , first=David B. , last=Thomson , publisher=Los Alamos National Laboratory , date=July 1999 Surface-to-surface missiles Post–Cold War weapons of Russia NPO Novator products Nuclear cruise missiles of Russia Military equipment introduced in the 2010s Military equipment of the Russian invasion of Ukraine