Russia's military tested two new missile systems Tuesday, and First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov hinted the country may try to end a 1987 US-Russian treaty banning intermediate- range missiles, according to dpa. Moscow tested for the first time both its RS-24 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and the short-range, high-precision winged Iskander-M rocket system, Russian news agencies said. "A new operational-tactical complex and strategic complex, which are able to overcome any existing and future missile defence shields have appeared," Ivanov, considered a potential successor to President Vladimir Putin, said in remarks run by Itar-Tass. Ivanov was referring to elements of a proposed US shield that Washington wants to base in Poland the Czech Republic. The US says the shield is to defend against Iranian or North Korean threats, but Russia says it is the real target. Earlier in the day, Putin had said after a meeting with Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates that the US shield would turn Europe into a "tinderbox and fill it with new types of weapons."
