"Under the Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, a US inspection group was shown the Avangard missile system with the hypersonic boost-glide vehicle on the territory of Russia on November 24-26, 2019," the ministry said in a statement.

Russia demonstrated its latest weapon for the purpose of keeping the New START Treaty viable and effective, the statement says.

Avangard hypersonic system

The Avangard is a strategic intercontinental ballistic missile system equipped with a hypersonic boost-glide vehicle. According to open sources, the breakthrough weapon was developed by the Research and Production Association of Machine-Building (the town of Reutov, the Moscow Region) and was tested from 2004. The boost-glide vehicle is capable of flying at over 20 times the speed of sound in the dense layers of the atmosphere, maneuvering by its flight path and its altitude and breaching any anti-missile defense.

The new weapon was unveiled by Russian President Vladimir Putin in his State of the Nation Address to the Federal Assembly on March 1 last year. The Russian leader said at a board meeting of the Defense Ministry in late 2018 that Russia had launched the serial production of Avangard hypersonic missile systems. Putin said at the time that the Avangard, along with Sarmat missiles, Kinzhal and Peresvet missile systems, would boost the potential of the Army and the Navy to reliably ensure Russia’s security for decades to come.