Russia vows ‘military response’ to US missile deployments in Germany

Russia is preparing military countermeasures in response to the planned U.S. deployment of longer-range, ground-based missiles in Germany, the Russian deputy foreign minister said Thursday, adding that the U.S. move was “destructive to regional safety and strategic stability.”

“Without nerves, without emotions, we will develop a military response, first of all, to this new game,” the deputy minister, Sergei A. Ryabkov, told Interfax, a Russian news agency.

In a statement published by the Russian Foreign Ministry, Ryabkov said that Moscow had anticipated the decision and had started preparing “compensating countermeasures” in advance.

In a joint statement, the United States and Germany said Washington would begin “episodic deployments” of the missiles in Germany in 2026, including those that are “significantly longer range” than the ones currently deployed throughout Europe.

The statement said that the periodic deployments would be preparation for “an enduring stationing of these capabilities in the future.” Ultimately, the weapons will include SM-6 missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles and developmental hypersonic weapons, the statement said.

“What we are deploying to Germany is a defensive capability like many other defensive capabilities we have deployed across the alliance, across the decades,” Jake Sullivan, the White House national security adviser, told reporters Thursday, referring to the 32 nations of NATO. “So more Russian saber rattling obviously is not going to deter us from doing what we think is necessary to keep the alliance as strong as possible.”

“And beyond that, we’ll have our opportunities to understand better what the Russian position is on this, and we will respond,” he added.

The party of Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany said the move was needed to deter and contain Russia. “In view of the modernization of the Russian nuclear arsenal and Russia’s aggressive policy, which threatens Germany’s and Europe’s security, this is the right thing to do,” Nils Schmid, a party spokesperson, said in an email.

According to a U.S. military official, the weapons will include a new launcher called Typhon, which is a modified 40-foot shipping container that can conceal up to four missiles that rotate upward to fire. The official, who was not authorized to publicly discuss details of the planned deployment, spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The U.S. Army began working on Typhon soon after the United States withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 2019.

In April, the Army sent a battery of Typhon launchers to the Philippines.

The hypersonic missiles that the Pentagon is testing are fired from a different kind of mobile launcher. They are designed to fly much farther than Tomahawk and at speeds in excess of five times the speed of sound.

Christoph Heusgen, chair of the Munich Security Conference, commended the missile decision.

“This is the only language that Russia understands,” Heusgen, who was foreign and security policy adviser under Chancellor Angela Merkel, said in an interview.

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