Russia and weapons of mass destruction
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Russia | |
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| First nuclear weapon test | August 29, 1949 |
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| First fusion weapon test | November 22, 1955 |
| Largest yield test | 50 Mt (October 30, 1961) |
| Peak stockpile | 41,000 warheads (1991) |
| Current stockpile | 6681 total (est.) |
| NPT signatory | Yes (1968, one of five recognized powers) |
Russia possesses one of the largest stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in the world. Russia declared an arsenal of 40,000 tons of chemical weapons in 1997 and is said to have around 6681 nuclear weapons stockpiled in 2005, making its stockpile the largest in the world. The Soviet Union ratified the Geneva Protocol on January 22, 1975 with reservations. The reservations were later dropped on January 18, 2001.
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[edit] Nuclear weapons
| Nuclear weapons | |
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| Nuclear-armed countries | |
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[edit] Nuclear arsenal of Russia
Russia was estimated to have around 6681 active strategic nuclear warheads in its arsenal, and for a total nuclear arsenal of 6681 [1]. Russia also has a large but unknown number of tactical nuclear weapons [1]. Strategic nuclear forces of Russia include [1]:
- Land based Strategic Rocket Forces: 489 missiles carrying up to 1,788 warheads; they employ immobile (silos), like SS-18 Satan, and mobile delivery systems, like SS-27 Topol M.
- Sea based Strategic Fleet: 12 submarines carrying up to 609 warheads; they employ delivery systems like SS-N-30 Bulava.
- Strategic Aviation: 237 bombers(16 Tu-160,63 Tu-95,and 158 Tu-22m) carrying up to 884 Cruise missiles.
[edit] Doctrine of limited nuclear war
According to a Russian military doctrine stated in 2003, tactical nuclear weapons (Strategic Deterrence Forces) could be used to "prevent political pressure against Russia and her allies (Armenia, Belarus, Serbia, Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan)." Thus, the Russian leadership "is officially contemplating a limited nuclear war" [2].
[edit] Nuclear proliferation
After the Korean War, Soviet Union transferred nuclear technology and weapons to the People's Republic of China as an adversary of the United States and NATO According to Ion Mihai Pacepa, "Khrushchev’s nuclear-proliferation process started with Communist China in April 1955, when the new ruler in the Kremlin consented to supply Beijing a sample atomic bomb and to help with its mass production. Subsequently, the Soviet Union built all the essentials of China’s new military nuclear industry" [3].
Russia is one of the five "Nuclear Weapons States" (NWS) under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Russia ratified (as the Soviet Union) in 1968.
Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, a number of Soviet-era nuclear warheads remained on the territories of Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan. Under the terms of the Lisbon Protocol to the NPT, and following the 1995 Trilateral Agreement between Russia, Belarus, and the USA, these were transferred to Russia, leaving Russia as the sole inheritor of the Soviet nuclear arsenal. It is estimated that the USSR had approximately 39,000 nuclear weapons stockpiled at the time of its collapse.
In 2002, the United States and Russia agreed to reduce their stockpiles to not more than 2200 warheads each in the SORT treaty. In 2003, the US rejected Russian proposals to further reduce both nation's nuclear stockpiles to 1500 each. Many say that this refusal was a sign of US aggression and accuse the US of thus leaving the danger of US and Russia's mutual destruction. Russia is actively producing and developing new nuclear weapons. Since 1997 it manufactures Topol-M (SS-27) ICBMs.
Russia refused to discuss reduction of tactical nuclear weapons[2] and allegedly transferred nuclear technology to North Korea [4]
[edit] Biological weapons
Soviet program of biological weapons has been initially developed by the Soviet Ministry of Defense (between 1945 and 1973)[5]
Soviet Union signed the Biological Weapons Convention on April 10, 1972 and ratified the treaty on March 26, 1975. Since then, the program of Biological weapons was run primarily by the "civilian" Biopreparat agency, although it also included numerous facilities run by the Soviet Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Chemical Industry, Ministry of Health, and Soviet Academy of Sciences[5]
According to Ken Alibek, who was deputy-director of Biopreparat, the Soviet biological weapons agency, and who defected to the USA in 1992, weapons were developed in labs in isolated areas of the Soviet Union including mobilization facilities at Omutininsk, Penza and Pokrov and research facilities at Moscow, Stirzhi and Vladimir. These weapons were tested at several facilities most often at "Rebirth Island" (Vozrozhdeniya) in the Aral Sea by firing the weapons into the air above monkeys tied to posts, the monkeys would then be monitored to determine the effects.[5]
In 1993, the story about the Sverdlovsk anthrax leak was published in Russia. The incident occurred when spores of anthrax were accidentally released from a military facility in the city of Sverdlovsk (formerly, and now again, Yekaterinburg) 900 miles east of Moscow on April 2, 1979. The ensuing outbreak of the disease resulted in 94 people becoming infected, 64 of whom died over a period of six weeks. [5]
[edit] Chemical weapons
Russia signed the Chemical Weapons Convention on January 13, 1993 and ratified it on November 5, 1997. Russia declared an arsenal of 40,000 tons of chemical weapons in 1997.
Russia met its treaty obligations by destroying 1% of its chemical agents by the Chemical Weapons Convention's 2002 deadline [2] but requested technical and financial assistance and extensions on the deadlines of 2004 and 2007 due to the environmental challenges of chemical disposal. This extension procedure spelled out in the treaty has been utilized by other countries, including the United States.
Russia has built three chemical weapons destruction plants: at Gorny, at Kambarka, and at the Maradykovsky complex. Four more facilities are still under construction at other locations. Lieutenant General Valery Kapashin reaffirmed in 2007 that Russia would fulfill its obligations under the CWC to destroy all of its chemical weapon stockpiles by 2012[6]; however, U.S. analyses have claimed that neither Russia nor the U.S. will finish operations by that date.[7] Russia's program is financed by Russian funding as well as money from the U.S. and other countries.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b Russia's nuclear capabilities by Adrian Blomfield, Telegraph, 5 June 2007
- ^ a b Russia's Nuclear Policy in the 21st Century Environment - analysis by Dmitri Trenin, IFRI Proliferation Papers n°13, 2005
- ^ Tyrants and the Bomb - by Ion Mihai Pacepa, National Review,October 17, 2006
- ^ Russia secretly offered North Korea nuclear technology - by a Special Correspondent in Pyongyang and Michael Hirst, Telegraph, September 7, 2006.
- ^ a b c d Alibek, K. and S. Handelman. Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World -- Told from Inside by the Man Who Ran it. Delta (2000) ISBN 0-385-33496-6
- ^ RIA Novosti - Russia - Russia will destroy only its own chemical weapons - general
- ^ http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d031031.pdf
[edit] External links
- Abolishing Weapons of Mass Destruction: Addressing Cold War and Other Wartime Legacies in the Twenty-First Century By Mikhail S. Gorbachev
- Russia's Nuclear Policy in the 21st Century Environment - analysis by Dmitri Trenin, IFRI Proliferation Papers n°13, 2005
- Nuclear Threat Initiative on Russia by National Journal
- UK statement on the chemical weapons convention
- 1999 Nuclear stockpile estimate
- Nuclear Notebook: Russian nuclear forces, 2006, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, March/April 2006.
- Nuclear Files.org Current information on nuclear stockpiles in Russia
- Chemical Weapons in Russia: History, Ecology, Politics by Lev Fedorov, Moscow, Center of Ecological Policy of Russia, 27 July 1994
