Russia Flexes Muscles With Missile Testing

The Russian president boarded the Northern Fleet submarine Arkhangelsk and headed for the Barents Sea, where he will oversee the launch of a powerful missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead from deep beneath the northern sea, possibly as early as today.

Military officials said several ground-based ballistic missiles, air-launched cruise missiles and a military satellite also would be test-fired in the coming days as part of an operation clearly designed to remind the world that Russia remains a nuclear superpower.

"We should by no means behave in a way that makes the world fear us," Putin said last week. "The world should see our military power as an element of strategic security."

He said Russia has not held military exercises on such a scale in recent years due to lack of financing and preparedness, but pledged that the nuclear war games would not be the last.

"During Soviet times, the very factor of the Soviet Union, its power -- primarily that of its nuclear forces -- was a serious stabilizing factor, the one balancing power in the world," Putin said. "We need to maintain this power, and we will do it."

Worried over North Atlantic Treaty Organization expansion into Poland and the Baltics, Russia in recent months has adopted an increasingly firm military tone.

This month, Defense Minister Sergei B. Ivanov even hinted that Russia might be prepared to withdraw from the Conventional Forces in Europe pact, the continent's principal conventional arms control agreement, in response to what Russia sees as the West's failure to consider its concerns over enlargement of the alliance.

Moscow analysts say the military posturing reflects a Kremlin that is ready to adopt a tougher line toward the U.S. and the European Union. Many Russians believe their nation has little to show for the more conciliatory policies of Putin's first four years as president.

With Putin aiming for reelection next month, he no doubt is mindful that a majority of Russians in recent opinion polls say their greatest wish is to see their nation restored to its former status as a superpower. In a statement to his regional campaign managers last week, Putin echoed a similar sentiment, lamenting the demise of the Soviet Union as "a national tragedy on an enormous scale."