NATO radar is monitoring possible movements of the Russian nuclear submarine K329 Belgorod carrying the super torpedo known as the “weapon of the apocalypse”. The huge structure carries the Poseidon, a projectile that can travel up to 10,000 km underwater and then explodes near shore, causing a radioactive tsunami with waves about 80 meters high.
The military alliance issued a statement to member countries early last month discussing the risks of Russian use of this strategy amid escalating war in Ukraine and threats to the West. According to Italian newspaper La Reppubblica, unofficial sources denounce that the submarine was launched in July and would be submerged in Arctic waters following its possible involvement in the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines.
Technology is one of the priorities of the newgeneration weapons development program approved by Russian President Vladimir Putin, unveiled to great fanfare in 2018. The President has repeatedly asserted that this weapon is “incomparable”.
Belgorod is 184 meters long and 15 meters wide and can move underwater at about 60 km/h. It is estimated that it can last up to four months without having to return to the surface. The Poseidon projectile is 24 meters long and can carry a nuclear warhead of around two megatons.
“It’s like an underwater drone because you can control it remotely,” explains Nelson Ricardo Fernandes da Silva, risk analyst at ARP Consulting. “It’s twice as fast as a normal submarine, so it’s difficult to detect. What it carries as a warhead is more than 100 times that of the Hiroshima bomb,” he described.
Fernandes also reported that the weapon contains cobalt in its formula, which increases nuclear contamination. “Then there would not only be a problem of physical destruction [se utilizado]there would be a yearlong contamination problem that would make fishing and people’s lives impossible,” he warned.
The development of this powerful structure has been part of Russian military projects ever since the United States abandoned the nuclear disarmament treaty with the country. Since then, the Russians have focused on building hypersonic missiles to breach American defenses and making those torpedoes.
Russia has one of the largest submarine fleets in the world. The analyst explained that submarines make it easier for her to get nuclear weapons closer to where she wants to attack. “This torpedo was created because Russia did not believe that it could otherwise be very effective in a nuclear strike,” he said.
Weapons expert HI Sutton has also been studying the Poseidon for years, comparing it to other types of weapons and showing ways to counter this type of threat. “It’s a completely new type of weapon that will force the Western Navy to change its planning and develop new countermeasures,” Sutton told La Reppublica.
Despite NATO warnings, the pundit described in Naval News last year that the threat of the “weapon of the apocalypse” should not be immediate because “it will take a number of years before it is deployed.” “It may take several years before it’s really operational,” he said.
Death of scientists who understand Poseidon
The “weapon of the apocalypse” is so important to Russia that some scientists who spoke about it were arrested and possibly even killed for it. Earlier this month, another Russian scientist accused of treason died, raising suspicions about Vladimir Putin’s government and Russian repression. Valery Mitko was an expert in hydroacoustics and was denounced by the Kremlin for allegedly divulging state secrets to China that could concern the nuclear submarine.
Mitko died under house arrest in St. Petersburg at the age of 81. He is the third Russian expert to die in the past two years after being accused or convicted of treason related to hypersonic weapons technology, the scientist’s lawyer Pervyi Otdel tweeted.
Mitko was accused in 2020 of “supplying materials allegedly containing top secret information to Chinese special services during a visit to this country,” the Kremlin pointed out at the time. State treason is punishable by up to 20 years in prison in Russia. Mitko has been under house arrest for more than two years and would appear in court later this year.
The scientist was among several senior Russian academics who have been arrested in recent years for allegedly collaborating with foreign states. Kremlin critics call this wave of repression a “manifestation of the state’s growing paranoia.”
The network of lawyers and activists defending him highlighted that the scientist had been hospitalized frequently during the two and a half years he spent under house arrest. “He was brought back on a stretcher just days before [de morrer]unable to walk or sit, let alone care for his bedridden wife,” lawyer Pervyi Otdel published.
“Professor Valery Mitko has become another scientist being tortured by Russia’s repressive system,” the lawyer concluded.