Russia has launched extensive exercises of its nuclear forces featuring test fire missile launches in a simulation of a retaliatory strike. President Putin attributed the decision to begin drills to “the emergence of new external threats and risks”, adding that “it is important to have modern and constantly ready-to-use strategic forces”. The exercises included the test-fire of a Yars intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) from the Plesetsk launch pad on the Kamchatka Peninsula, and other ICBMs from the Novomoskovsk and Knyaz Oleg nuclear submarines. The military also carried out practice l…