The chimps with nukes may have more than we think they have.
Are the Russians cheating on New Start by hiding mobile and tunnel-based ICBMs?
In September 2020, state-run RT (formerly Russia Today) published an article that appears to reveal a program for cheating with regard to the limit in the New START Treaty on deployed warheads by means of covert deployment of mobile ICBMs. Since RT published the article in Russian but not in English, it was not intended for Western consumption. It was translated by the Teller Report, which does many original translations from Russian language media. The article stated, “Russian troops operate new ICBMs in mine and mobile versions. Different types of ICBMs have their own advantages. For example, mines are certainly better protected from being hit by cruise missiles or other air attacks. The rocket is located at a considerable depth and is protected by reinforced concrete caps, said Alexei Podberezkin, director of the Center for Military-Political Research at MGIMO, in a conversation with RT.” "Mines" is not a reference to silo launchers, which are referred to in the article as "stationary launchers." “Mines” with “reinforce[d] concrete caps” are apparently a hard and deeply buried facility, which we call tunnel facilities with blast doors.
The obvious answer is of course they are. The Russians and Soviets before them have a history of that.
And Russia has a lot of incentive to cheat because of the weakness of their conventional military.
We have to consider that maybe Russia's ICBM force was not immune to the massive deterioration of the Soviet military since 1991. Could those hidden ICBMs be the fraction that the Russians think actually work and consider the open silo-based missiles as essentially decoys to absorb incoming strikes without harming Russia's real ICBM nuclear deterrent force?
And maybe the Russians are really looking at China and not at NATO as the real threat to Russian territorial integrity. Perhaps a hint of sanity is visible with that kind of realization.
To add more uncertainty in trying to piece together what is going on, could America be cooperating with Russia to conceal those missiles because we both know the Russian ICBM force is a paper tiger and damn well know that China is a threat to both America and Russia?
Beats me what is going on. But it comforts me to hold out hope that the Russians aren't as bizarrely and pointlessly hostile to NATO as they appear; and that they actually know that China is the real threat to Russia. And maybe America is very quietly working with Russia to hide their necessary appeasement of China--for now.
