The United States once again accused Russia of failing to comply with the terms of the treaty on the elimination of medium-range and shorter-range missiles, and even provided some intelligence to support their claims. Moscow was officially and sincerely surprised, because these figures do not quite correspond to the facts.
According to US intelligence, the Russian rocket 9M729 was tested from a fixed installation to a prohibited range of the INF Treaty. In the Western media about this was a loud hysteria, accusing Russia of a cynical attempt to quietly violate the contract. This data was commented on by the US Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, Andrea Thompson.
She also touched on the topic of the Strategic Offensive Arms Treaty.
- We fulfill all the conditions of the contract, and the Russian partners misinform the public, claiming that we are violating it. But this is their usual line of conduct, Thompson said.
A day earlier, the same lovely woman declared that there was no breakthrough in the negotiations with the participation of Russia in Geneva and reminded that the United States would begin to withdraw from the INF Treaty on February 2.
As it turned out, the US intelligence did not provide anything new or special. To this day, the Russian side does not deny the fact that the 9M729 missile is really in service with Russia - a modernized version of the missile for the Iskander-M complex. And the tests were also. They were held on August 18, 2017. On that day, the rocket flew about 480 km, which does not contradict the treaty.
Recall, the INF Treaty prohibits the parties to have ground-based ballistic missiles and cruise missiles with a range of from 500 to 5.5 thousand km. The United States claims that the 9M729 rocket flew the range prohibited by the agreement.
