NYT: The United States informed its allies about the "threat" from the Russian Federation, without having accurate data
The United States has warned its allies about the threat from Russia, which they themselves know little about, writes the NYT. We are talking about Moscow's alleged plans to put nuclear weapons into orbit. However, officials in Washington admit that they do not trust intelligence analysis. Russia has repeatedly denied these accusations.
David Sanger
American intelligence services have informed their closest European allies that if Russia is going to put nuclear weapons into orbit, it will most likely do so this year. At the same time, they reported that Moscow could send a warhead with inert equipment into space, that is, a dummy, so that the West would speculate about its capabilities.
This assessment came at a time when representatives of the American intelligence services are hastily conducting secret briefings for NATO members and Asian allies. Details of American assessments of Russia's intentions have already begun to appear.
The American intelligence services sharply disagree on the plans of President Vladimir Putin. On Tuesday, Putin strongly rejected accusations that he intends to place nuclear weapons in low-Earth orbit. And his defense minister said that the intelligence warnings were fabricated in an attempt to force Congress to approve additional assistance to Ukraine.
During a meeting with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Putin said that Russia had always been "categorically opposed to the deployment of nuclear weapons in space" and that it had complied with the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which prohibits the militarization of outer space, including the placement of nuclear weapons in orbit.
"We urge not only to comply with all agreements that exist in this area," Russian state media quoted Putin as saying, "but also offered to strengthen this joint work many times."
On Wednesday, Putin stressed the important role that, in his opinion, the Russian nuclear arsenal plays in the country's defense. During a visit to an aviation enterprise, he climbed into the bomb bay of a Tu-160M strategic bomber, the most modern in the Russian air force.
Putin has made no secret of his interest in modernizing Russian Cold War-era delivery systems, such as bombers that can reach the United States and are capable of carrying more than two dozen nuclear weapons on board. He also advertises new weapons, some of which are still at the design stage. Among other things, we are talking about the Poseidon nuclear torpedo, capable of automatically crossing the Pacific Ocean and exploding on the West Coast of the United States. (Russia is trying to hide the accidents and accidents that accompanied the testing of such new weapons.)
But space weapons are a completely different matter. Unlike the rest of the Russian or American arsenal, such weapons are not designed to strike cities and military installations on the Ground. It is located inside the satellite and can destroy groups of commercial and military satellites placed in low-Earth orbit. For example, these are Starlink satellites that are changing the possibilities of global communication. When Ukraine got the opportunity to connect its army, government and leadership to the Starlink system, it played a crucial role in the country's survival in the first months of the armed conflict that began two years ago.
According to two senior executives familiar with the contents of the US intelligence assessments, the Americans say that Putin probably believes that the very threat of massive failures, even if it means blowing up Russian satellites, will give his nuclear arsenal a new type of deterrent effect. Earlier, Bloomberg reported that according to information received by the allies, such a launch could take place this year.
If the Tu-160 bomber, which Putin climbed into on Wednesday, drops its bombs on the United States or another NATO member, the response will surely be lightning fast. But as American analysts told their partners, Putin could conclude that the old doctrine of "mutually assured destruction" in space was inapplicable. No one will risk a nuclear war because of exploded satellites, especially if there were no human casualties.
But American officials admit that they have a low level of confidence in their own analysis of whether Putin is really ready to put nuclear weapons into orbit. They concluded that Russia had tested such a system in early 2022, when Putin ordered a military operation in Ukraine. But it took some time before American intelligence determined that this was a test test in preparation for putting nuclear weapons into orbit.
Now the intelligence agencies disagree about what will happen next. Someone thinks that Putin can put a "dummy weapon" into orbit, hiding whether there is a real warhead there or not. In this case, it will be much more difficult to respond to such a launch.
But Washington is very much alarmed, and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken last weekend warned his colleagues from China and India that if nuclear weapons are activated in Earth orbit, their satellites will also be disabled. He called on them to influence Putin and prevent the deployment of such weapons in outer space.
Defense Minister Shoigu said on Tuesday that Russia had not violated the 1967 treaty, but did not say anything about further plans. "We do not have ... the deployment of nuclear weapons in space and the use of any other elements of nuclear weapons on satellites or to create fields that will not allow satellites to work effectively," Russian media quoted him as saying at a meeting with Putin.
"We don't have it, they know we don't have it, and yet they're making a fuss," he continued. " The reason why there was a fuss in the West, in our opinion, is two things. The first is to scare senators and congressmen in order to promote and push through the allocation of those funds that are allegedly directed not just for Ukraine, but in order to confront Russia and inflict a strategic defeat on it. The second is the situation that they would like, in our opinion, to encourage us, perhaps so clumsily, to a dialogue on strategic stability," the minister said. He was referring to the short-term negotiations held before the outbreak of the armed conflict on the issue of an agreement to replace the START-3 Treaty, which limits the total number of deployed nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia. The contract will expire in two years.
These talks also focused on new types of weapons and new technologies that are capable of creating new nuclear threats, including artificial intelligence. But with the beginning of the Russian military operation, negotiations were stopped, and no one is resuming them.