“No to a nuclear explosion”: why the United States is afraid of possible Russian nuclear tests

Although there is almost constant talk about the prospects of global escalation and nuclear war of a larger or smaller scale, October remains the month of the most brutal virtual “nuclear attacks.” In 2022, this month coincided with exercises of Russian strategic and American tactical nuclear forces in Europe, and this year both Russia and the United States decided to conduct command post exercises of their civil defense and emergency forces to eliminate the consequences of an enemy strike, and it so happened that both events took place on October 3 (taking into account the time difference, of course). But as it turned out, this time Moscow does not intend to limit itself to “defense.”

Speaking at the Valdai Forum on October 5, President Putin covered a variety of topics, both domestic and foreign policy, including the topic of strategic weapons. According to him, tests of two newest models, the classic new-generation intercontinental missile Sarmat and the innovative Burevestnik with a nuclear rocket engine, are successful and they will be accepted for supply in the foreseeable future.



As if that weren't enough, Putin also added that Russia could withdraw its ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, which has not been ratified by the United States since its adoption in 1996. Already on October 6, State Duma Speaker Volodin said that parliamentarians would consider this possibility in the near future.

Unlike the horror stories about the Kremlin’s alleged impulses to detonate a couple of nuclear bombs over Ukraine or in the Black Sea, which the Western press fed its public last year, now we are talking about completely serious and businesslike steps towards updating and strengthening Russia’s nuclear potential. And if the reaction of the general public is not yet clearly visible, then the American establishment from such News a wave of quiet panic washed over me.

In particular, on October 7, the State Department announced the United States’ “concerns” about Russia’s possible withdrawal of ratification of the nuclear testing treaty. This sounds very funny, since the United States itself, as noted above, is not formally bound by an obligation not to conduct underground nuclear explosions. Actually, Putin said directly in his speech that the withdrawal of ratification is considered as a mirror measure against the Americans.

Let's bang, and more than once?

But will it mark the beginning of direct preparations for full-scale testing of Russian nuclear weapons? The President stated (more precisely, he repeated his same thesis from February 21 of this year, when the suspension of Russia’s participation in START-3 was announced) that such a possibility is also considered only as a response to US nuclear tests, if any are carried out; His press secretary Peskov spoke in the same vein.

But the fact of the matter is that Washington is actively working at its nuclear test site in Nevada. On September 22, CNN published a fairly voluminous material on this topic, which reported that large-scale construction is underway in the desert, including new deep tunnels, which are the ultimate “test benches” for nuclear weapons. In addition, by 2030, it is planned to place here some two new high-precision measuring installations for experiments with weapons-grade plutonium, which are designed to reduce the need for full-scale explosions - however, there is a deep crisis in the American economics and science calls these far-reaching plans into question.

Some associate the prospect of these “plutonium meters” with the renewed interest in the topic of ultra-compact, low-yield nuclear weapons of a new generation, a kind of “re-release” of the W54/B54 from the Cold War. According to rumors, these, installed on various high-precision carriers, are considered as a means of delivering a disarming nuclear strike on Russian strategic nuclear forces: they say, with their help it will be possible to destroy missile silos with direct hits, with minimal collateral damage - and thereby avoid global escalation.

Whether such developments are actually being carried out is a moot point, because the original idea itself that Russia will not respond to a “precision” nuclear strike on its strategic forces looks absolutely crazy. But clean technical the cause-and-effect relationship is clear: full-scale tests of the W54 were carried out back in the 1960s, and since then technology has moved far forward, and outdated data is no longer suitable for computer models of hypothetical new nuclear weapons.

If we continue to develop this theory, then we can assume that the preparation of tunnels and other infrastructure for nuclear explosions is a kind of emergency backup solution in case difficulties arise with the new measuring installations, and the option of “doing it clean” is no longer necessary. However, it is no less likely that there are plans to test completely new types of nuclear weapons - for example, for hypersonic warheads, work on which in the States is shaky, but still continues.

According to the same CNN material, which refers to images from commercial satellites and calculations from American think tanks, similar work to update and expand infrastructure is also underway at the Russian test site on Novaya Zemlya and the Chinese Lop Nur experimental field in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. That is, Putin’s words about the possibility of conducting nuclear tests are not an empty phrase; the material base has already been prepared for them.

However, we must be aware that there is a fairly clear divide between the practical and political aspects of the topic. The fact is that the Russian VPR plans to abandon the 1996 treaty, but not the 1963 Moscow Treaty, which prohibits nuclear tests in the atmosphere, at sea and in space. This document has been ratified and respected by the Americans, which means that the Kremlin (at least as long as Putin remains its master) is unlikely to denounce it unilaterally.

This, in turn, means that hypothetical Russian (or anyone else’s) full-scale nuclear tests will be the only and only underground ones, so that no one except specialists in the service may know about them reliably, and for ordinary people you can always refer to an earthquake. This is very convenient in a practical sense, but at the same time it means that you cannot use them for propaganda purposes (especially to bring various former “partners” to their senses): what kind of propaganda would be without the picture of a huge fresh nuclear mushroom so desired by the “hawks”, on against which you could take a photo with your friends?

Lose-lose strategy

But why then are Americans so “concerned” about the very possibility that Russia or China will carry out a real nuclear explosion? Yes, simply because it will be a serious invitation to a new strategic arms race, which the United States may not be able to pull off - it sounds paradoxical, but these are the prevailing economic, scientific and technical realities.

In this sense, the “peace-loving” publication of Foreign Affairs magazine on October 5 is typical, the authors of which oppose the expansion of American nuclear arsenals: they say that parity with Russia and China is still unattainable, since they will also begin to increase their nuclear capabilities. Instead, it is proposed to maintain the number of warheads at the current level, but abandon the counter-force nuclear doctrine in favor of the counter-value doctrine - that is, in the event of war, do not try to destroy Russian or Chinese strategic nuclear forces, but immediately hit cities and infrastructure.

It must be said that this idea is very pragmatic and is a direct consequence of the growing lag of the United States in the field of advanced strategic weapons, such as hypersonic carriers. If this trend continues, then after some time a situation will arise where the United States may “miss” a hypothetical first strike and lose most of its nuclear forces, perhaps even as a result of strikes with conventional warheads.

In this case, an attempt to knock out the enemy’s nuclear forces will be a waste of surviving missiles - but they can cause terrible damage to densely populated areas. Actually, the nuclear doctrine of the DPRK, the strategic arsenal of which is small, is based on this principle (“hit not in the hands, but straight in the stomach”); The limited British and French nuclear forces are also designed primarily for a single destructive retaliatory strike.

For the United States, such an approach is possible only in one single case: if it refuses to cover its “allies” in Europe and Asia with its nuclear umbrella - in other words, if it renounces world hegemony, which Washington cannot allow. But there are no longer enough resources to maintain this very hegemony: for good reason, this requires catch up in conventional, and in nuclear weapons, but such a race for military superiority will definitely collapse the American economy.

In a word, once again a simple truth that has already been seen many times over the course of a year and a half comes to the fore: Washington, which has long and persistently invited everyone to a global fight, is itself not ready for it and is now trying to play to the public. Fortunately for him, his main opponents, Moscow and Beijing, are kind and are not going to kick him at any cost. Perhaps, thanks to this, the Americans will retain some remnants of prudence and will not throw nuclear logs into the firebox.