The Russian Navy recently took delivery of the world’s longest submarine, setting the stage for a new Cold War on the oceans.
It may be advertised by the manufacturer as a research vessel, but others argue that it is a platform for espionage and possibly nuclear weapons.
As CNN reports, the Belgorod was handed over to the Russian Navy earlier this month in the port of Severodvinsk, according to the country’s largest shipbuilding company, Sevmash Shipyard.
Experts say its design is a modified version of Russia’s Oscar II-class guided missile submarines, made with the goal of eventually housing the world’s first nuclear-powered stealth torpedoes and intelligence-gathering equipment.
American and Russian submarines will hunt each other in the oceans
If the Belgorod can successfully add these new capabilities to the Russian fleet, it could in the next decade set the stage for a return to a Cold War scenario in the oceans, with US and Russian submarines tracking and hunting each other. .
At more than 184 meters long, the Belgorod is the longest submarine today—longer even than the US Navy’s Ohio-class ballistic and guided-missile submarines, which reach 171 meters.
It was built in 2019 and was expected to be delivered to the Russian Navy in 2020 after trials, but these were delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic, Russian state news agency TASS reported.
It is noted that no timetable has been given for the first “sea walk” of the submarine.
The Russian submarine will carry a “mega torpedo”, unique in history
What sets the Belgorod apart from all nuclear-powered submarines in the Russian fleet—or any nuclear submarine in the world—is its mission.
TASS said the submarine will carry the under-development Poseidon nuclear torpedoes, which are designed to be launched from hundreds of miles away and sneak past coastal defenses by traveling along the seabed.
“This nuclear ‘mega torpedo’ is unique in the history of the world. Poseidons are an entirely new class of weapon. They will reshape naval design in both Russia and the West, leading to new requirements and new anti-weapons,” US submarine expert HI Sutton wrote on the Covert Shores website in March.
Both US and Russian officials said the torpedoes could carry multi-megaton warheads, setting off radioactive waves that would render parts of the target’s coastline uninhabitable for decades.
In November 2020, Christopher Ford, then the deputy secretary of state for international security, said that the Poseidons were designed to “flood US coastal cities with radioactive tsunamis”.
A report by the US Congressional Research Service (CRS) in April stated that the Poseidons are intended as retaliatory weapons, designed to strike back at the enemy after a nuclear strike on Russia.
CRS reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin had advertised the
Poseidons in a speech in 2018, saying, “They are quiet, very flexible, and have almost no vulnerabilities that the enemy can exploit.”
If armed with conventional warheads, the Poseidons could be used against targets such as aircraft carrier groups, coastal fortifications and infrastructure,” Putin was quoted as saying.
