Russia is preparing military countermeasures in response to the planned American deployment of longer-range missiles in Germany, the Russian deputy foreign minister said on Thursday, adding that the U.S. move was “destructive to regional safety and strategic stability.”
“Without nerves, without emotions, we will develop a military response, first of all, to this new game,” the deputy minister, Sergei A. Ryabkov, told Interfax, a Russian news agency.
In a separate comment published by the Russian Foreign Ministry, Mr. Ryabkov said that Moscow had anticipated the decision and that Russia had started preparing “compensating countermeasures” in advance.
In a joint statement, the United States and Germany said Washington would begin “episodic deployments” of the missiles in Germany in 2026, including those that are “significantly longer range” than the ones currently deployed throughout Europe.
The statement said that the periodic deployments would be preparation for “an enduring stationing of these capabilities in the future.” Ultimately, the weapons will include nonnuclear SM-6 missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles and developmental hypersonic weapons, the statement said.
The move had echoes of the Cold War, when Moscow and Washington undertook competing missile deployments, with American allies in Europe caught in between.
The news about the coming missile deployments in Germany was made during a NATO summit in Washington, where the alliance also announced that an American missile defense base in Poland capable of intercepting ballistic missiles was “mission ready” after years of development.
For years, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia has cited the American deployment of missile infrastructure in Europe as an aggressive move aimed at containing Moscow’s capabilities.
At the end of June, Mr. Putin said at a meeting with security officials that Russia should relaunch production of ground-based nuclear-capable missiles of shorter and intermediate range.
Speaking about the NATO summit, the Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, said on Thursday that tensions were “escalating on the European continent” and that Moscow saw the deployment of NATO infrastructure closer to its border as “a very serious threat.”
“All of this will require us to take thoughtful, coordinated, effective responses to deter NATO, to counteract NATO,” Mr. Peskov told journalists, according to Interfax.
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