Russia has successfully tested an underwater nuclear-torpedo powerful enough to “put entire states out of operation”, according to Vladimir Putin. Speaking at an event for Ukraine war veterans last week, the Russian president said “there is nothing like” the Poseidon missile.

What is the weapon?
Russia’s new nuclear submarine, Khabarovsk, is armed with autonomous Poseidon missiles. Said to be 20 metres long and nearly two metres wide, they are capable of travelling up to 6,200 miles at speeds of up to 115mph, deep below the surface of the water.

Experts believe the weapon breaks “most of the traditional nuclear deterrence and classification rules”, said The Guardian. “Launched from a submarine like a torpedo”, the missile is thought to be “able to loiter as an underwater drone” before deploying a nuclear warhead “capable of triggering a radioactive tsunami to render coastal cities uninhabitable”.
Recent estimates indicate a bomb of two megatons, said Naval News – roughly 100 times more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

What did Moscow say?
There’s “nothing like this in the world in terms of the speed and the depth of the movement of this unmanned vehicle”, Putin claimed, and there are “no ways to intercept” it. Defence Minister Andrei Belousov said Khabarovsk and its missiles would “enable” Russia to “successfully secure” its maritime borders and “protect its national interests in various parts of the world’s oceans”.

A report on Russian television boasted that one Poseidon missile could cause enough damage to “plunge Britain into the depths of the sea”, said the Daily Mail.

A new nuclear arms race?
News of the launch prompted Donald Trump to order the US military to restart nuclear tests for the first time in 33 years, although he said the US would do so on “an equal basis” to other countries. As neither China nor Russia has carried out an “actual explosive nuclear test”, Trump “probably” means “reciprocal testing of nuclear-capable missiles”, said The Telegraph.

His announcement still “bolstered concerns” that the world is “sliding into a new nuclear arms race”, said the Financial Times. A return to US testing “would be a highly retrograde step”, providing a premise for other states to ramp up their nuclear weapons programmes, and encouraging non-nuclear states to “pursue their own”.

As the nation once again marks Remembrance Day, “performative poppy wearing” has become “toxic”, said Helen Coffey in The Independent. Anyone “foolish/thoughtless/bold enough” to show their face on television in November without “a scarlet talisman pinned proudly to their chest” faces a “public shaming”.

And the vitriol “hurled at people purely for the absence of a £2 paper flower” has turned the poppy “from a well-meaning show of support into another piece of weaponised propaganda”.

‘Vile abuse’
Prince William has urged young people to wear a poppy because it’s “not just about the past, it’s about shaping who we become in the future” and learning from “the courage of others”.

But others are using a “bastardisation” of the poppy’s meaning for their own ends, said James Ball in The New World. The “policing of who is and who isn’t wearing” them feels “less about solemn thanks and more about the same kind of nationalism” that has seen England and Union Jack flags “hung up in their hundreds from lamp-posts”.

“Spewing vile abuse at others in the name of patriotism” is surely an “insult to the memory” of the fallen soldiers who “fought for freedom of speech”, said Coffey.

‘Divisively politicised’
Some people are opting to wear a pacifist white poppy, but this alternative is also proving controversial. The “vast majority” of the people are “rightly angered by the white poppy” brigade, said Hamish de Bretton-Gordon in The Telegraph. The Peace Pledge Union, which distributes them, “explicitly” supports “de-funding the Armed Forces”, yet white-poppy wearers such as actor Mark Rylance (pictured above) “can only exist in safety because the Armed Forces stand ready to go to war”.

I’m “troubled” by how the poppy has “become divisively politicised”, said military veteran Ian Cumming in The Herald. It “jars” when “people with no experience of service” either “use the poppy as a test of loyalty” or “reject it to make a political point”. Service personnel put themselves at risk “in defence of our way of life” and, in return, we owe them “gratitude, respect and enduring support”. The poppy should be a visual reminder of that, not a “prop for argument and point-scoring”.

“For those of us who have faced the harsh realities of war, Remembrance is not a performance – it’s a promise.” 

Revellers celebrate the start of the Carnival season in the German city of Cologne. The week-long nationwide party, known as the “fifth season”, traditionally begins at 11 minutes past 11 on 11 November.

Ina Fassbender / AFP / Getty Images

Comprising more than 7,000 picture-perfect islands, the Caribbean has almost infinite attractions, with cruises stopping everywhere from Barbados to Cuba. And where better to escape the UK’s chilly winter weather?

Royal Caribbean
Royal Caribbean’s Western Caribbean cruise “blends vibrant culture, sun-soaked landscapes, and easy-going luxury”, said Condé Nast Traveler. Passengers board in Galveston, Texas, before sailing “straight into the heart of the Caribbean”. Departing in January, the five-night itinerary offers ample opportunities to “unwind on white-sand beaches”.  

Explora Journeys
This luxury line, a sister brand to MSC Cruises, is a “relatively new name in Caribbean waters”, said The Telegraph. For a pre-Christmas escape, consider the 14 December departure from Bridgetown, Barbados. The eight-night trip blends the “Gallic chic of French island Martinique” with the “castaway feel of tiny Bequia in the Grenadines”. There’s also a stop in the “so-called Emerald Isle of Montserrat”, famed for its Irish heritage and “volatile” volcano.

Silversea
Silversea’s sparkling new ship Silver Ray offers eight restaurants for onboard dining during an array of luxurious, all-inclusive voyages. Depart from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and enjoy a “wide selection of shore excursions” at each destination, said The Times. In St Kitts and Nevis, adventurous guests can zipline through the rainforest or snorkel amid “volcanic rock formations”.

Disney Cruise
When it comes to family cruising, no one does it better than Disney. Its voyages put “youngsters at the heart of everything”, said The Telegraph. Departing in February from Fort Lauderdale, this five-night sailing features “jungle escapades and jeep safaris”, and visits Disney’s private island, Castaway Cay in the Bahamas, where surprise appearances by Disney characters “ramp up the fun factor”.

The World Bank should focus on poverty, not climate change
Bjørn Lomborg in City A.M.
The US “has told the World Bank to stop obsessing about climate and get back to its core business of ending poverty”, writes the Copenhagen Consensus Center think tank’s Bjørn Lomborg. The UK “should get on board with this commonsense call”. In the world’s poorest regions, “core development investments” such as “improving maternal health” deliver “greater and faster benefits” than climate projects. “Raiding development funds for climate initiatives” is an “affront to human suffering”. 

The BBC Thought It Could Save Itself by Serving the Powerful. It Was Wrong
Steven Methven on Novara Media
The BBC’s “error” in the Donald Trump “edit” controversy has been “messing with the big dogs it customarily serves”, writes Steven Methven. The broadcaster has always prized a “bogus notion” of its impartiality, even when reality “very much has a side”. If “your journalism is less concerned with the truth than pandering to every political faction, no matter how destructive”, please “don’t come crying to me if power hits back when you fail to pander hard enough”. 

There’s nothing uncool about having someone to make you sausage pasta
Gabriella Bennett in The Times
Vogue “has declared it uncool to have a boyfriend,” writes Gabriella Bennett. I’m “about as romantic as a washing machine”, but “I know this cannot be right”.  “Loving and wanting to be loved” shouldn’t feel “like a hangover from old-fashioned times”.  Apparently, it’s “tacky to boast” online “about a soulmate in the era of toxic dating”.  But “I want to see my friends happy” and “to know there’s someone” making them dinner “after a rough day”.