To: Hawkmoon who wrote (3630 ) 1/31/2004 6:06:06 AM From: GUSTAVE JAEGER Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 3959 If next month you're suddenly stirred out of bed by a big flash or a thunderous mushroom cloud, don't panic!!! It's just a drill:Russia to test nuclear forces AP Saturday January 31, 2004 The Guardian Russia's nuclear forces are preparing for their biggest exercise for more than 20 years, a newspaper reported yesterday. The business daily, Kommersant , said the manoeuvres next month would involve test-firing of ballistic missiles and take almost the entire fleet of Russia's strategic bombers into the air in one day in a simulation of a nuclear conflict. Official comments on the exercise have been sketchy but the chief of Russia's strategic missile forces, Colonel General Nikolai Solovtsov, was quoted as saying that the planned manoeuvres would involve several launches of intercontinental ballistic missiles in various regions of Russia. In the exercise next monthTu-160 bombers are set to test-fire cruise missiles over the northern Atlantic, and other strategic bombers are to conduct flights over Russia's Arctic regions and test-fire missiles at a range near the Caspian Sea in the south, the newspaper said. Russia's strategic forces are also scheduled to launch military satellites from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and Plesetsk launch pad in northern Russia, Kommersant reported. A system warning of an enemy missile attack and a missile defence system protecting Moscow will also be involved in the exercise, which President Vladimir Putin will attend. The newspaper said Moscow had warned Washington about the exercises. "Pre-election manoeuvres" the paper called them.guardian.co.uk