Thibault Nadal 3:06 p.m., March 19, 2022, modified at 3:10 p.m., March 19, 2022
For the first time, the Russian army said on Saturday that it fired hypersonic missiles into Ukraine.
The particularity of this weapon described as "invincible" by Vladimir Putin is that it is undetectable for conventional anti-aircraft defenses.
A real turning point in this war, analyzes Olivier Kempf at the microphone of Europe 1.
These are the two news of the day on the front of the war in Ukraine.
The Russian army announced on Saturday March 19 that it used "Kinjal" hypersonic missiles on Friday to destroy an underground weapons warehouse in western Ukraine.
Olivier Kempf, director of the strategic cabinet La Vigie, associate researcher at the Foundation for Strategic Research (FRS) confirms on Europe 1 "that this is the first time that these missiles have been used in war circumstances".
Undetectable missiles for anti-aircraft defenses
But above all, he explains the particularity of these missiles: "these are new long-range missiles which not only can move and therefore are very manoeuvrable, but above all very fast, much faster than all the existing missiles", he analyzes. he, explaining that "conventional anti-missile defenses cannot hit them", which he says constitutes "a real technological breakthrough".
>> Find the weekend midday newspaper in podcast and replay here
The other news is that the Russian army has succeeded in entering Mariupol, a strategic city in the east which separates Crimea from Donbass, the two pro-Russian separatist regions.
A major take for Olivier Kempf since it allows Russia to "no longer have this point of resistance and thus continue its maneuvers in the other regions of the country".