“Some people in Washington, we know for sure, are already considering the possibility of a natural test of their nuclear weapons. The United States is developing new types of nuclear weapons. There is such information,” said Russian President Vladimir Putin in his speech to the Federal Assembly. Led by “socialbites.ca” broadcast online Events.
“In this case, the Ministry of Defense and Rosatom must ensure readiness to test Russian nuclear weapons. Of course, we won’t be the first to do this. But if the United States tests it, then we will. “No one should be under the dangerous illusions that global strategic parity may be disrupted,” he said.
First of all, let’s remember that the information periodically spread in the Western media that Russia’s nuclear weapons are a “rusty sword” of the Soviet era, which was already dead in the Bose era, and that the missiles produced in the Soviet era were rapidly spreading. outdated. It is periodically stated that complex weapons have lost their original features over time due to various natural reasons and that there are serious doubts about their functioning.
Some Western sources emphasize that nuclear arsenals, unlike conventional bombs and shells, cannot be stored and forgotten until needed. The reason for this is a process that is constantly going on inside nuclear charges, as a result of which the isotopic composition of the charge changes and deteriorates rapidly.
This media emphasizes that the ex-Soviet nuclear weapons for missile warheads have long expired and Moscow does not have the plutonium to make new ones. They cannot be made from ex-Soviet plutonium because, like the plutonium in warheads, its isotopic composition has been irreversibly changed.
The question arises – how to respond to such implications? Similar texts, but strictly scientific? There is every reason to believe that such an answer would be unconvincing to ill-wishers.
In this regard, a unilateral exit from the moratorium on nuclear weapons testing seems quite realistic, regardless of the United States, that is, whether the Pentagon has begun nuclear tests of its own promising warheads.
For example, a batch of nuclear weapons produced in a certain period is taken. Let’s say 152 mm thermonuclear projectiles. One of them explodes on the training ground. Based on the test results, a law is drawn up on both the readiness of this batch of ammunition for combat use, and the extension of its service life. All of the above also applies to other types of warheads – warheads of intercontinental ballistic missiles, airborne free-falling bombs, nuclear mines, nuclear warheads of cruise missiles, etc.
There is probably no other more reliable way to check whether Russia’s nuclear arsenal is ready for combat use. And in this context, any supercritical technology and supercomputer is far from being a full-fledged substitute for real nuclear weapons tests. And this problem is especially related to the development of promising warheads (and, as you know, such warheads are on the way). How can they be adopted without real tests?
The question arises – where will underground tests of nuclear weapons be conducted?
There is such a place in our country. The central nuclear test site of the Russian Federation is located in the Novaya Zemlya archipelago (part of the Arkhangelsk region), between the Barents and Kara seas. It was established in 1954 to test megaton-class nuclear weapons.
Previously, all nuclear weapons explosions in the USSR were carried out at the Semipalatinsk test site. However, after testing the first two-stage thermonuclear bomb RDS-37 with the equivalent of 1.6 megatons of TNT, it turned out that it is no longer safe to detonate nuclear weapons of such power in Semipalatinsk. Glass in residential buildings ejected within a radius of up to 200 km from the epicenter of the explosion.
Until February 27, 1992, the test site in Novaya Zemlya was called the State Central Test Site No. 6 of the USSR Ministry of Defense. Later, its name was changed to the Central training ground of the Russian Federation, and in 1998 it was transferred to the 12th Main Directorate of the Ministry of Defense.
The landfill covers an area of 90.2 thousand square meters. km, 55 thousand square meters of it. km falls ashore. It includes three main sites: Black Bay, the southern shore of the Matochkin Shar Strait, and the D-II Northern Test Site Novaya Zemlya (SIPNZ) on the Sukhoi Nos Peninsula.
The last nuclear explosion at the test site was carried out on October 24, 1990, after which the USSR declared a unilateral moratorium on nuclear weapons testing. Russia also depends on it.
From September 21, 1955 to October 24, 1990, a total of 132 nuclear explosions were carried out on Novaya Zemlya: 87 atmospheres (including 84 air), 1 ground (7 September 1957), 2 surfaces (27 October 1961 and August 22 1962), 3 underwater (21 September 1955, 10 September 1957, 23 September 1961) and 42 underground. This information is provided by TASS.
In conclusion, we can say that the issue of continuing nuclear weapons tests should be translated into practice in the near future. And this must be done without regard to Washington. This is the call of time.
The opinion of the author may not coincide with the opinion of the editors.
Author biography:
Mikhail Mikhailovich Khodarenok is a military observer of socialbites.ca, a retired colonel.
Graduated from the Minsk Higher Engineering Anti-aircraft Missile School (1976),
Air Defense Military Command Academy (1986).
Commander of the S-75 anti-aircraft missile battalion (1980–1983).
Deputy commander of an anti-aircraft missile regiment (1986–1988).
Senior officer of the Main Staff of the Air Defense Forces (1988–1992).
Chief of the General Staff Main Operations Directorate (1992–2000).
Graduate of the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces (1998).
Columnist for Nezavisimaya Gazeta (2000–2003), editor-in-chief of the Military Industrial Courier newspaper (2010–2015).