"Our task for the next few years will be to secure necessary funding for the SMF, which must be able to face the current level of threats and the global situation," Medvedev said during a visit to the 54th Strategic Missile Division based near the town of Teikovo, about 150 miles (240 km) northeast of Moscow.

At present, Russia deploys Topol-M (NATO reporting name SS-

Ads

27) ballistic missiles as the mainstay of its land-based component of the nuclear triad. As of December 2007, Russia's SMF operated 48 silo-based and three mobile Topol-M missile systems.

The missile, with a range of about 7,000 miles (11,000 km), is said to be immune to any current and future U.S. ABM defense. It is capable of making evasive maneuvers to avoid a kill using terminal phase interceptors, and carries targeting countermeasures and decoys.

It is also shielded against radiation, electromagnetic pulse, nuclear blasts, and is designed to survive a hit from any known form of laser technology.

The first Topol-M mobile missile battalion, equipped with three road-mobile systems, was put on combat duty with the 54th Strategic Missile Division on December 12, 2006.

SMF commander, Col. General Nikolai Solovtsov, who accompanied the president during the visit, said a second missile battalion, equipped with Topol-M mobile ICBMs, would be put on combat duty in the near future and the division would be in full strength by 2010.

Russia puts an average of three mobile and three or four fixed-site Topol-M ballistic missile systems into operation every year.

Solovtsov earlier said that Russia would equip the Topol-M missile systems with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV) in the next two or three years.

At the end of his visit, Medvedev said Russia's Security Council would meet soon to discuss the current status and the future development of the SMF.

TEIKOVO (Ivanovo Region), May 15 (RIA Novosti)