The Pentagon announced today, Wednesday, that it has successfully tested the "Minotman 3" intercontinental missile with a new system, in order to update this type of old surface-to-air missiles.
The missile was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California and passed 6,760 km over the Pacific Ocean before it landed at sea near the Marshall Islands, the Air Force said in a statement.
The US Air Force explained that the experiment was for the purpose of development and not a routine experience, as happened on the second of last October.
The missile that was launched was not armed, but it can be equipped with a new type of nuclear warhead.
"The Minoteman 3 program is out of date, and modernization programs like this are essential to ensuring that our country has an effective nuclear deterrent capability," Colonel Umar Colbert, in charge of the experiments, said in a statement.
This missile is the only surface-to-air missile in the US nuclear arsenal since 2005, and it is placed on launchers spread over three US military bases in Wyoming, North Dakota, and Montana.
The Air Force said that this experiment was planned months ago and does not constitute "a response or reaction to the events of the world or tension in the region," but it comes the day after Washington announced the deployment of a weak nuclear weapon for the first time on a submarine.