> Despite the Russian claims that the missile is on 'combat alert', since its 2022 flight test, it has experienced four failed tests, the most recent on 21 September 2024
We have the short opportunity window, when Satana stopped to work and Sarmat is not working yet.
I think it'd be a pretty big mistake to interpret "it needs servicing every ten years" as "it stops working immediately after that", and similarly a mistake to think the Russians can't accomplish at least some of that maintenance themselves. One can run a car without oil changes for quite a while before the problems add up.
Even one nuke is a big threat for a non-nuclear country, but Russia is not the only one with nukes, so number of well maintained nukes in service is important, if RF want to win a war with nukes. It will be pretty dumb for RF to strike FIRST with expired nukes.
Because Japan had exactly zero nukes to send back at the US.
Russia has 2000. What percentage of them are you willing to gamble are working? Are 10% of them working? That's 200 US cities.
So, no. We are absolutely not going to follow your logic. There is too much chance that they have enough nukes working to make us infinitely regret a nuclear exchange.
> Despite the Russian claims that the missile is on 'combat alert', since its 2022 flight test, it has experienced four failed tests, the most recent on 21 September 2024
We have the short opportunity window, when Satana stopped to work and Sarmat is not working yet.