On Monday, Russia successfully test launched a Tsirkon (Zircon) hypersonic cruise missile from a submarine for the first time.

"The test firing of the Tsirkon missile from a nuclear submarine was deemed successful," the ministry said.

This is the weapon that President Vladimir Putin has lauded as part of a new generation of unrivalled arms systems. The defence ministry, which earlier tested firing the Tsirkon missile from a warship in July, said that the Severodvinsk submarine had fired the missile while deployed in the Barents Sea and had hit its chosen target.

According to some Western experts, Russia's new generation of weapons is the combination of speed, manoeuvrability and altitude of hypersonic missiles which makes them difficult to track and intercept.

The footage of latest test fired was shot in low quality. Similarly, the footage of launch in July, which showed Russia's advanced new S-500 surface-to-air missile system was appeared to have been deliberately blurred so as to make it harder to examine in detail.

In 2018, Putin in most of his speeches mentioned in array of new hypersonic weapons while saying that they could hit almost any point in the world and evade a U.S.-built missile shield.

Image courtesy: Deccan Herald