According to Russian media reports on November 11, Russian President Vladimir Putin held a special meeting with senior defense and other government officials on the same day to discuss the modernization of Russia’s nuclear command and control infrastructure. During the meeting, Putin revealed that the work of a new strengthened strategic command post is about to be completed. In this regard, the US media war zone website speculated that this may be a new type of bunker buried deep in the ground, capable of resisting the attack of ground penetrating bombs.
Putin, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, and the Chief of the Russian Army’s General Staff General Valery Gerasimov attended the meeting. He stated at the meeting that he would authorize nuclear retaliation only if other countries carry out nuclear strikes on Russia. This so-called "no first use of nuclear weapons" policy statement seems to be different from the official statements made in recent years.
Putin said at the meeting on November 11: “It is clear that Russia’s Trinity nuclear warfare capabilities directly depend on the stability, effectiveness and reliability of these systems. In the past few years, we have done a lot of work. In order to keep all command forces of our strategic nuclear forces at the highest possible level.” He specifically pointed out that the multiple “fixed and mobile command posts” used throughout the country have been improved. Especially in terms of information support, monitoring and situation analysis. All command posts can receive comprehensive updates in real time and use this information to assess the situation and make correct decisions.
Putin said that all equipment, hardware and communication systems of the Russian nuclear power control system will be upgraded regularly, but it is still as simple and reliable as the Kalashnikov rifle. Kalashnikov’s iconic AK-47 assault rifle and its later variants and derivatives are known for their reliability under the harshest conditions. He also revealed that an absolutely safe facility to control strategic nuclear forces is nearing completion, and it will have a very high safety margin.
The American War Zone website believes that it is not completely clear from these comments that Putin is talking about a brand-new facility or a renovation, improvement or expansion of existing facilities. He may be talking about a nuclear war command base buried deep in some kind of underground bunker. It is understood that there are already two locations in Russia that fit this description, one is located in the Kosvinsky Kamen base in the northern Ural Mountains, and the other is located in the Yamanta Mountain base in the Southern Ural Mountains. The construction of these two locations
both started in the late 1970s. In the face of modern nuclear weapons, bunkers buried deep in the ground are the best defense facilities that mankind can build. Therefore, both the Soviet Union and the United States invested a lot of money in such bunker facilities during the Cold War. For example, Kosvinsky Kamen is believed to be buried under hard granite about 300 meters thick. It may also be related to the automatic nuclear command and control system PERIMETER first developed during the Soviet era. For a long time, this system has been described as a doomsday machine that can fully automatically launch Russian intercontinental ballistic missiles in retaliation after a nuclear strike.
David Hoffman, a senior U.S. journalist who specializes in nuclear weapons, believes that Russia has not adopted an automated system like PERIMETER, but has adopted manual intervention. The Russian launch personnel monitored three status lights in a very deep, extremely solid, spherical-shaped underground bunker in the Kosvinsky Kamen base. When the first light is on, it means that they have received "pre-authorization" for launch, and the second light is on, which means that the senior Soviet leader has been completely "beheaded." The third light means that the base will be hit by a nuclear attack.
If all three lights are on, the personnel on duty will start the launch of intercontinental ballistic missiles through a secure communication network, including ballistic missile rockets carrying the launcher, in order to broadcast remote broadcast launch codes to personnel in other silo facilities . According to reports, the Soviet Union first opened this nuclear warfare system in 1984. According to reports, as of 2011, at least part of the system is still operating in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
It is worth noting that the construction of the Kosvinsky Carmen base was not announced as complete until 1996. The building is often compared with the famous Cheyenne Mountain base of the US Air Force in terms of form and function. It is worth noting that the B61-11 nuclear bunker bomb was introduced by the US military in 1997. It is generally believed that the timing of the introduction of this weapon is to complete the Russian bunker complex.Worker’s direct response. Bruce Blair, a nuclear weapon expert who once served as an intercontinental ballistic missile launch control officer, believes: "Kosvinsky is regarded by the American target setter as the crown jewel of Russia’s wartime nuclear command system because it can use very low frequency radio signals to wear Through communication with distant Russian strategic forces through the granite mountain range, Kosvinsky’s construction was completed, restoring Russia’s confidence in the ability to carry out retaliatory strikes against other major powers.”
Little is known about another Yamanta mountain base in Russia. . According to reports, the facility is located at least partly under a 1,000-meter-thick quartz rock, with a huge area comparable to the central city of Washington, the capital of the United States, about 1,000 square kilometers. The complex is located in Mezhgorjeny, which is called a closed town in Russia, where only authorized individuals can live and work.
It is believed that this facility is mainly a so-called government refuge for the top Russian leadership to work during any type of major crisis, similar to the U.S. Army’s Raven Rock complex, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Mount Weather Emergency Operation center. Crow Rock is often described as the underground Pentagon, and Mount Weatherer aims to provide the highest civilian leadership of the US government with a solid location to carry out operations. Blair believes that the Yaman Taoshan base is not so much a command post, as it is a shelter, because the facility is equipped with ordinary radio and it is difficult to penetrate quartzite.
The Russians have been tight-lipped about this complex, and as of 1996, its construction is still in progress, at least to some extent. This project has been described by current and former Russian officials as a variety of uses, including mines, Russian treasure storage, food storage areas, nuclear material dumps, and nuclear bunkers for Russian leaders. This base was reportedly abandoned in 1998. This raises the question of whether work there will be resumed later and whether this is the new facility Putin may have mentioned in his speech.
Of course, Putin is probably describing another previously unknown location. Over the years, the United States has been advancing extensive nuclear modernization, including the new B61-12 nuclear gravity bomb, which is said to be capable of striking underground fortresses. The Trump administration of the United States also announced in 2018 that it would maintain a combat stock of B83-1 nuclear bombs. This 1.2 million-ton equivalent nuclear bomb has also been used to strike particularly strong underground facilities. The U.S. Air Force also owns the GBU-57/B large ground penetrating bomb, which is a conventional bomb weighing 1.4 tons and is designed to strike deeply buried targets. At the same time, the United States is actively seeking a variety of conventional hypersonic weapons to strike time-sensitive targets, such as the daily activities of senior civilian and military leaders of various countries.
It is understood that there are at least two underground bunker complexes in Moscow, one under the Kremlin and the other in the suburbs, similar to the underground bunker in Washington, D.C., but the depth of these underground bunker is far less than that of Kosvinsky Kamen and Ya The underground bunker of Mantao Mountain. In 2016, there was also a report that Russia was building "dozens" of new bunkers in the Kremlin and other places to support its nuclear command and control infrastructure.
