It has arrived indeed. The long-awaited news about RS-24 deployment came today from Farnborough, where Vladimir Popovkin, the first deputy minister of defense, was speaking to the press (the news caught me in my French class, hence the title). Although reports about RS-24 deployment surfaced before - earlier this month and in April, this is the first time it was officially confirmed.

The RS-24 "Yars" is a MIRVed version of the mobile Topol-M missile. The first three missiles were apparently deployed at Teykovo, as it was originally planned.

It is still not clear how many warheads the missile carries - the press reports mention four, but I'm not sure if this is what Popovkin said. It may well be that they repeat a last-year report. There were also reports about RS-24 carrying three warheads. My analysis also suggests that RS-24 will have three warheads - in this case the warheads are similar to 400-kt warheads deployed on SS-24/RT-23UTTH missiles. I'll count RS-24 missiles as carrying three for the moment, but we'll have the correct number once the New START treaty is ratified.