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Work on Avangard complex comparable to USSR nuclear project — Putin

The Russian leader recalled that the US withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 forced Russia to start developing hypersonic weapons

© Aleksey Druzhinin/Presidential press service/TASS

NOVO-OGARYOVO, September 19. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin compared the work of Russian gunsmiths on the development of the Avangard hypersonic missiles with the scale of the USSR's nuclear project, Putin said on Saturday during a video conference on the Gunsmith Day with an engineer - designer of rocket and and space technology Gerbert Efremov.

"The results of your work can hardly be overestimated. You not only stood at the origins of this technological idea, but you are its author. In modern conditions, the embodiment of your idea for our country is undoubtedly comparable to the implementation of the Soviet Union's nuclear and missile projects, which were carried out by outstanding Soviet scientists Kurchatov and Korolev," Putin said.

The Russian leader recalled that the US withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 forced Russia to start developing hypersonic weapons. "We had to create these weapons in response to the US deploying strategic missile defense system, which in the future would be able to actually neutralize, nullify our entire nuclear potential," Putin said.

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