Russia fired Oreshnik Missile at Ukraine, why it’s serious

Russia on Friday, January 9, said it had fired an Oreshnik hypersonic missile at Ukraine, marking a significant escalation in the nearly three-year-long war. The Kremlin claimed the strike was in retaliation for an alleged Ukrainian drone attack in late 2025 on one of President Vladimir Putin’s residences in Novgorod, northern Russia.Ukraine has denied carrying out any such attack. The CIA too had determined that Ukraine’s drones had not targeted Putin’s house.
President Putin had earlier threatened to deploy the Oreshnik missile — including against what he described as “decision-making centres” in Kyiv — if Ukraine continued to strike Russian territory using long-range Western-supplied weapons. Until now, Moscow had stopped short of acting on that threat.
According to Russian officials, the overnight strike was aimed at Ukraine’s Lviv region in the west of the country, close to the border with NATO member Poland. Kyiv described the attack as a “global threat” and said it required an international response.ALSO READ | Russian strikes knock out power in southeastern Ukraine, says energy ministry

Russia said the missile targeted critical infrastructure, though the full extent of the damage was not immediately clear. Ukrainian authorities were already struggling to restore heating and water supplies to thousands of households following earlier strikes on energy facilities in the Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions.

The escalation comes at a delicate moment diplomatically, with US President Donald Trump attempting to broker a peace deal between Moscow and Kyiv to end a conflict that began with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

What is the Oreshnik missile?

The Oreshnik is an intermediate-range hypersonic ballistic missile that Russia has used against Ukraine only once before, in November 2024.

The missile can carry multiple warheads capable of striking different targets simultaneously — a feature more commonly associated with intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). It is derived from the RS-26 Rubezh, which Russia initially developed as an intercontinental system.

Oreshnik is capable of carrying both nuclear and conventional warheads. Putin has claimed the missile is impossible to intercept and that, even with a conventional payload, its destructive power is comparable to that of a nuclear weapon.

Since 2024, Russia has reportedly moved the Oreshnik into serial production and has also supplied the system to its ally Belarus.

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