President Vladimir Putin sometimes brags about new and unusual weapons systems. Not all of them exist, nor will they ever exist. But recent controversies remind us that such boasts can become reality. New weapons and technologies often cause arms races, tensions, and instability.
As has been clear for decades, nuclear-armed anti-satellite weapons are a crazy idea. On July 9, 1962, a then-secret US missile test launched a nuclear warhead into space from an atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The 1.4 megaton warhead exploded at an altitude of approximately 400 miles. It caused a street light outage in Hawaii, about 900 miles away, and released a huge plume of high-energy electrons that became trapped in Earth’s magnetic field and damaged at least eight satellites in orbit. The United States and the Soviet Union subsequently agreed in 1963 to ban nuclear tests in the atmosphere and outer space, and in 1967 made it illegal to place nuclear weapons in orbit.
There are currently more than 8,200 satellites in low Earth orbit, many of which are privately owned and operated. A Russian nuclear weapon in space could disrupt everything from global shipping to Ukraine’s combat communications. It would threaten all satellites, including Russia’s.
In a 2018 speech, Putin showed a video of what he described as a nuclear-powered cruise missile that could fly thousands of miles at low altitude without refueling. The missile was reportedly responsible for an explosion at a Russian naval training range in the White Sea in 2019. Last year, Putin announced that development was complete, but little else is known. Another reported new Russian weapon, the Poseidon, is a nuclear-powered underwater drone with a nuclear warhead that could cause panic and fear if deployed in coastal ports.
Meanwhile, China is rapidly and significantly expanding its nuclear arsenal, with the number expected to reach 1,000 nuclear warheads by the end of this decade. (Under the New START agreement, Russia and the United States limit the number of deployed strategic or long-range warheads to 1,550 each by 2026.) China also pursues the development of other types of sophisticated weapons. are doing. In 2007, a ground-launched anti-satellite missile was used to shatter a malfunctioning weather satellite, leaving behind more than 3,000 traceable pieces of space debris, of which more than 2,700 remained in orbit. ing. Most will remain in orbit around Earth for decades, according to the Pentagon. China’s ground-based ASAT system is intended to target low-Earth orbit satellites. In 2021, China/China also conducted the first partial orbit test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile with a hypersonic glide vehicle. If deployed, it would use missiles to deliver bombs to the other side of the world and drop them on sleds at such speeds that it would be impossible to stop them.
The Congressional Strategic Posture Committee said in an October report that with the rise of two nuclear-armed countries, Russia and China, bent on chaos and displacement, the United States faces a “fundamentally different and unprecedented challenge.” “We will soon encounter the world situation,” he concluded. US-led international order. Even though the invasion of Ukraine has depleted Russia’s resources and weakened China’s economy, both countries have the ability and desire to use technology to explore asymmetric weaknesses in the United States, perhaps sparking a new arms race. It looks like there is.
Technology drives an arms race. In the 1970s, the United States and the Soviet Union developed multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRVs). This allows a single missile to carry up to 10 nuclear warheads, each capable of targeting different targets. This dramatically changed the calculus regarding nuclear war. Other U.S. advances were also made rapidly, including precision weapons, low-flying cruise missiles, stealth aircraft, and ultra-high-precision ballistic missiles. Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, finding his economy bogged down by the costs of keeping pace with the United States, turned to a nuclear arms control agreement with President Ronald Reagan. However, almost all of these treaties have expired or been abandoned.
The United States now faces not one but two competitors: Russia and China. Competition with them will be necessary, difficult and costly. Mr. Putin’s war of aggression against Ukraine has made arms control negotiations nearly impossible, Mr. Putin cannot be trusted—and China refuses to talk about limiting its nuclear arsenal. Still, it would be in everyone’s interest to at least extend the New START agreement with Russia beyond 2026 and begin talks with China. In the long term, arms control treaties may be needed again to contain the dangers of not just nuclear weapons, but cyberweapons, disinformation, or something entirely new.