[Keilar:] Russia's Vladimir Putin is flexing his muscles with a new show of military might, this time in the Arctic. Brian Todd has been looking into that. Brian, tell us, what is Putin up to?
[Brian Todd, Cnn Correspondent:] Brianna, for the first time, Vladimir Putin has test-fired one of his most dangerous missiles in the Arctic. The Russian President is moving fast to dominate that region, and the U.S. has fallen way behind him there, which analysts say puts America in a very precarious position.
[Todd:] Tonight, Vladimir Putin is staging his own version of war games on ice. In newly released video from his military, the Russian strongman is showing off the first test of one of his key missiles in the Arctic, called the TOR-M2DT. Experts say it could target American aircraft from short range.
[Thomas Karako, Director Of The Missile Defense Project, Center For Strategic And International Studies:] These are clearly designed for Arctic type conditions. It's launched out, popped up in the air, and then, of course, it will ignite after that. But this kind of missile is going to go after aircraft and drones and that sort of thing.
[Todd:] The missile is part of Vladimir Putin's vision of dominating the arctic region. He has deployed long-range rockets there. He's built sprawling military bases in the Arctic and once made a show of visiting one, sweeping in on a military transport, traversing a glacier, and hammering at the ice for no apparent reason. Those bases can house hundreds of troops and warplanes, which operate in temperatures that can dip well below zero.
[Michael Kofman, Senior Research Scientist, Cna:] These are really bases set up in perhaps some of the most inhospitable, if not the most inhospitable places, on earth. They're so cold that, you know, short of living on another planet with no oxygen, this is one of the most dangerous and hazardous areas to operate.
[Todd:] But Russian forces pride themselves on being able to operate in the bitter cold, sometimes even training with reindeer. Putin is aggressively navigating the region, even having a Russian flag planted on the Arctic Ocean floor. Analysts say he's got his sights set on enormous oil and gas reserves there, possibly worth trillions of dollars. And he wants to control new lucrative commercial shipping routes through the Arctic, which have opened up recently because of melting ice.
[James Townsend, Transatlantic Security Program Senior Adjunct Senior Fellow, Center For A New American Security:] If you're able to cut the time of transit by ship by weeks, saving lots of money, going from one side of the globe to the other. Russia is present along much of that route, and they are going to be the toll keepers, in a way.
[Todd:] And experts say the U.S. is way behind Putin in the Arctic. Russia has dozens of ice-breaking ships deployed there, they say, but the U.S. has only two, one of which is unreliable. And they say it's time the U.S. sends more military assets into the region.
[Townsend:] We've got to be sending P-8 maritime patrol aircraft up there and watching. We've got to have our satellites up there watching. We've got to have our allies up there Norway, other NATO allies, Sweden, Finland. We all need to be keeping an eye on what the Russians are doing there and making sure that they're not crossing a line.
[Todd:] Now, while military experts caution that the U.S. cannot really afford to get into an arms race with Vladimir Putin in the Arctic, they do worry about what Putin's military supremacy there could lead to. If there is a military conflict with Russia in the future, this latest missile battery could be part of a longer-range Russian strike force that would have the capability of striking the continental United States from the Arctic region Brianna.
[Keilar:] Brian Todd, thank you so much. And coming up, we have breaking news. Officials say Iran has seized at least one oil tanker in what the U.S. military believes was a planned and coordinated operation. A source says U.S. military aircraft are flying cover for an American commercial vessel there in the gulf.