Russia's Reported Nuclear-Powered Space Weapon - What We Know So Far

**Russia's Potential Nuclear-Powered Anti-Satellite Weapon: A Comprehensive Overview**

In recent months, there has been significant speculation and concern regarding Russia's development of a nuclear-powered anti-satellite weapon. This potential threat has sparked debates among experts, policymakers, and the public alike. According to the White House, there is currently no immediate threat to global safety, but the possibility of such advanced technology raises critical questions about space security and the future of satellite-based systems.

**The Emergence of Information**

The information regarding Russia's alleged nuclear-powered anti-satellite weapon came to light through a public statement by Mike Turner, Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. On February 14th, Turner requested that President Biden declassify all relevant intelligence to allow for open discussion on how to respond to this potential threat. This move led to widespread media coverage and a White House press conference, where officials emphasized that while the threat is serious, it is not immediate.

**What Exactly Is Being Discussed?**

Experts suggest that Russia may be developing a nuclear-powered electronic warfare platform or an anti-satellite weapon capable of disabling wide areas of radio communication. This could involve jamming satellites across vast regions, disrupting critical services such as GPS and satellite-based internet. Another possibility is the revival of decades-old concepts, including detonating a nuclear weapon in space, which would have catastrophic consequences for satellites in orbit.

**Historical Context: Nuclear Tests in Space**

The idea of using nuclear weapons in space is not new. As early as 1959, the U.S. tested an anti-satellite missile designed to carry a nuclear warhead. However, due to concerns over the potential fallout and long-term effects, such plans were eventually abandoned. In 1962, the U.S. conducted Operation Fishbowl, detonating a 1.4 Megaton warhead 250 miles above Johnson Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. This test caused significant damage to satellites in orbit and demonstrated the profound impact of nuclear explosions in space.

**Technological Developments and Implications**

The concept of nuclear-powered propulsion systems dates back to the dawn of rocketry, closely tied to the atomic age. While Russia's potential weapon remains classified, it is believed to involve a nuclear reactor to power an electronic warfare platform or anti-satellite device. Such technology would allow for prolonged operations in space, enabling extensive jamming or disruption of satellite communications.

**Vulnerabilities and Risks**

Today's satellites are more robust than those from previous decades but remain vulnerable to such threats. GPS, communication, and weather satellites lack the ability to maneuver or defend themselves, making them critical targets for any anti-satellite capability. The loss of these systems would have severe consequences, affecting everything from military operations to civilian infrastructure.

**Military and Defense Responses**

In response to these emerging threats, the U.S. has increased its focus on space defense. This includes rapid launch capabilities, such as demonstrated in the Vulcan 1.2 mission, where a satellite was deployed within days of receiving orders. Future missions aim to further reduce deployment timelines, highlighting the importance of maintaining a robust and adaptable space presence.

**Ethical and Legal Considerations**

The development and deployment of nuclear-powered anti-satellite weapons raise significant ethical and legal questions. International treaties, such as the Outer Space Treaty, prohibit the placement of nuclear weapons in orbit, but enforcement remains challenging. As nations continue to militarize space, ensuring compliance with existing agreements will be crucial to maintaining global security.

**Conclusion**

The potential development of a Russian nuclear-powered anti-satellite weapon underscores the growing importance of space as a strategic domain. While immediate threats are not confirmed, the implications for satellite communications, military operations, and international law demand careful consideration and proactive measures. As space technology evolves, so too must the frameworks governing its use to prevent catastrophic consequences for all humanity.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthis is TW the big report was like last month as we're recording this um basically that Russia has a new secret weapon that they could they could blow up satellites or who knows what in space what's going on that we know about like right now can you give us like an overview of what we know well the good news is that according to the White House there's no immediate threat to anyone's safety right they're not saying that this is some kind of weapon that's hanging in the air above us with a nuke ready to come down um there's been a lot of chatter over the past few weeks but from most of the experts it seems like what we're talking about is some sort of nuclear powered anti-satellite weapon maybe a nuclear powered electronic warfare platform um there have been a lot of great reports um that people have done over the last five years to show that a lot of Russian industry has been working on this one particular design of this large nuclear powered electronic warfare satellite and what it could do is kind of disable a wide area of radio communications that can jam satellites across a wide area so that's one potential option or some other kind of active jamming thing more like an active jamming like you know radio frequency jamming that kind of thing although uh to your point there there's also some speculation that maybe Russia's looking to revive the decades old concept of actually detonating a nuclear weapon in space which would be even more catastrophic across a larger area of satellites in orbit now and and this is all still classified it seems like it's kind of like a fluke that we know about it right so how how did that become public in the first place yeah the intelligence itself is classified but on February 14th the chair of the house permanent select committee on intelligence Mike Turner a republican from Ohio he issued a public statement asking President Biden to declassify all the information that that we have on this threat so that we can openly discuss how to respond to it um and there was a lot of back and forth with other congressmen I think the the next day there was a White House Press Conference because it just you know the headlines just exploded the story went crazy wide so that's how we know about it it's all because of you know Mike Turner putting this out there and there's been some speculation that maybe him even leaking that little bit of information might have been somehow politically motivated to drum up military funding to kind of help push Congress towards approving military spending bills but we don't really know that's all speculation okay so like like like spending for Ukraine or or something like that yeah right because you know there there's been a lot of back and forth on whether or not we should continue funding Ukraine at the rate we've been going at and so obviously this big Russian threat that you know might tip Congress in One Direction however in that White House Press Conference we did did learn there is actually intelligence about an actual you know Russian nuclear space weapon okay but again everything's pointing towards it being nuclear powered like a like like a reactor is what you're talking about so you don't want anyone to worry that there's this giant there's there's a movie from the 80s called Defcon 4 or five I'm not sure have you ever seen that movie I don't think so it's absolutely awful it's like one of the worst Sci-Fi movies I've ever seen but but the whole point is it's it's these two guys that are stationed on an orbital platform that just launches nuclear weapons down to the Earth and of course you know it's it's an Apocalypse movie so it all happens and then they crash and everyone's fighting over their their crash spaceship um but that's not what you're talking about it's not like that it's like a something that would it would you would if if it's nuclear powered I guess the point is that it needs a lot of power so that's what they would they would use that for and then they could keep it up there for a long time because nuclear powered stuff lasts a long time uh in yeah yeah you know electronic warfare kind of these non-kinetic means of disabling satellites they do require a lot of power if you want to jam a wide band of radio frequencies over a long period of time it's going to take a lot of energy and so a nuclear reactor could be one way to power something that could stay on orbit for a long time and and really disable Communications across some wide area Russ oh go ahead you know Russia has signaled that it was would like the capability to disable Western satellite constellations because you know starlink uh SpaceX starlink Mega constellation has been used widely throughout Ukraine to provide Battlefield Communications and government Communications for the government of Ukraine we had some statements come out several months ago from the Russian government that it considers even commercial satellites operated by the West as legitimate Targets in Wartime um so this capability the ability to destroy disable or degrade Western satellites is something we know Russia and other nations like China are very actively pursuing to put it in perspective because like you said the White House was very adamant and and the defense department too because there were some briefings uh that we were following there um said many times that it isn't like a current threat like it's not something that's going to happen right now it's not something that's in space right now that we that we know of uh but it's sounds like the ability to knock out or interfere with satellites at a scale that was described by uh by these officials um I mean it sounds like that could be a pretty damaging blow to just how we live you and I are talking right now through through like internet that gets bounced all around through communication satellites or or uh or or when we travel and we use GPS and all of that I mean that that stuff seems like U uh a pretty a pretty large array of vulnerable systems because they don't have any kind of defenses built into them right all these commercial satellites they're just designed to do the thing that they're built to do yep today's satellites are a little more hardened against radiation than the ones say 60 years ago but to your point yes uh GPS satellites all sorts of telecommunication satellites you know would be entirely vulnerable many of these don't have the ability to change the orbits or maneuver out of the way in any way um it's for those reasons the Pentagon has said in Pentagon leadership has said in in recent months that space is the most vital domain for the US military right now because we depend on it at every level for all the things we just talked about navigation position timing Communications uh early warning for missile launches all all of those things so yeah we if our satellites were taken out if any nation's satellites were taken out they'd be basically blind deaf and dumb to large extent yeah I found yeah and John uh for your records there're on line 43 I did find like a a whole statement from the defense department uh about uh uh uh basically saying that uh space uh well that one was about Hypersonic weapons pardon me it's line 42 is is is the is the is the report that I had found where they were saying that the um space based threats from competitors were like the biggest thing that we have to worry about and that was back in 2022 and that was two years ago so it sounds like it's just heating up Brett from from what you're describing here that's right and you I mean you just have to look at the launch Cadence that the US space force these National Security launches they're going up more often they're going up more rapidly we saw the uh victus Knox Mission last year in which the space force was able to turn around a satellite in a matter of days right they ordered it got it on the rocket sent it up and they want to even increase that uh there's another one coming up in which they want to shorten that window to hours you know well I want to I want to ask about the military actions in space because I have some treaty questions for you uh too but but you brought up a really good point about just the military wrapping up its own actions here to to do surveillance to do uh reconnaissance uh uh and and defense of course we have missile defense satellites which are designed to detect uh uh launches from uh potential um uh what do you want to call them potential adversaries uh but uh but military participation in space that's not new that's been going on right since the dawn of the Space Age it was the first astronauts were purely from military backgrounds uh that we had as well as in Russia and the Soviet Union that's right and you know some experts will argue that the entire space age is entirely a military operation there's a fantastic book that came out last year by bled Bowen called original sin that delves all into this but yeah you know the the original rocket Technologies they were derived from you know uh military missile Technologies and um even the the whole concept of of putting nuclear weapons in space goes back over 60 years so yeah there's what and was that just to put the weapons in space for quick strike or to make stations where we going to Le put them up there and I guess aim them down at Earth from the Moon well well as far as we know it wasn't that nefarious but as far back as 1959 the US tested an anti-satellite missile that was intended to have a nuclear warhead wow now they never did put a nuclear warhead on it but yeah 1959 this goes all the way back to that so you know for 60 years we've known that one of the best ways to take out satellites was with a nuclear detonation in space and back then we didn't have the Precision guided missiles we have today so a big explosion in space was the best way way they had to do it luckily President Eisenhower at the time took a look at it and said you know this isn't a good idea and they scaled back but however just three years later in 1962 as part of what was known as operation Fishbowl US Air Force conducted a test called starfish Prime and uh about Southwest of Hawaii in the middle of the Pacific Ocean over Johnson atol a little series of islands out there they detonated a around a 1.4 Megaton Warhead at an altitude of 250 mil 400 km that's where the space station flies 250 miles up yeah it it was wild when you see pictures and videos of it I mean it it turned night into day it created auroras on the other side of the world on the other hemisphere it um um street lights on the ground below went out and uh it's estimated about a quarter of the satellites that were in orbit at the time time suffered some kind of damage and uh and they did that was only one of five that they did as part of operation Fishbowl five test we'll have they get we'll have they get some links for that so that folks can follow up on that because that is crazy that is crazy so and they did they launch all five of those tests like right one after another or were they like kind of spread out over like a few yeah they were kind of spread out um but they all took place in the span of a couple years right then in the early 1960s and so it's because of those tests that we know a lot about what the effects of daating a nuclear weapon in space would be today mhm it's just it's hard to imagine even contemplating that kind of a test like right now because you can't hide any of that stuff with the types of satellite surveillance that we've got going on uh these days well I actually have uh a lot of questions about if it's even legal to do a lot of this stuff I did have one just a follow up because you mentioned uh early on uh that this potential weapon capability would be nuclear powered rather than um rather than like like a missile or a or a bomb or whatnot um and that seems like it's not new either nuclear reactors in space I mean there were there were some nuclear powered satellites even uh during the um the early days of the Space Race right sure and to go back to the Voyager probes we talked about earlier right these are um radioisotope thermal generators is that what they're called yeah radio which is not quite the same as a nuclear reactor right they they use the heat generated as an isotope a radioactive isotope decays but that you know you can still consider that nuclear powered in a way but uh it seems like what this new Russian capability might be is an actual nuclear reactor okay and you know DARPA is pursuing the DARPA and NASA are pursuing a nuclear powered propulsion system so um you know Russia's not alone in that but yeah the nuclear powered rocket that concept goes back I mean to the dawn of rocketry basically you know cuz the space age was the same as the atomic age right all of these Technologies were being developed kind of at the same time hey if you enjoyed this clip be sure to check out this week in space you can find us on your favorite podcast app or see the link in the description below see you therethis is TW the big report was like last month as we're recording this um basically that Russia has a new secret weapon that they could they could blow up satellites or who knows what in space what's going on that we know about like right now can you give us like an overview of what we know well the good news is that according to the White House there's no immediate threat to anyone's safety right they're not saying that this is some kind of weapon that's hanging in the air above us with a nuke ready to come down um there's been a lot of chatter over the past few weeks but from most of the experts it seems like what we're talking about is some sort of nuclear powered anti-satellite weapon maybe a nuclear powered electronic warfare platform um there have been a lot of great reports um that people have done over the last five years to show that a lot of Russian industry has been working on this one particular design of this large nuclear powered electronic warfare satellite and what it could do is kind of disable a wide area of radio communications that can jam satellites across a wide area so that's one potential option or some other kind of active jamming thing more like an active jamming like you know radio frequency jamming that kind of thing although uh to your point there there's also some speculation that maybe Russia's looking to revive the decades old concept of actually detonating a nuclear weapon in space which would be even more catastrophic across a larger area of satellites in orbit now and and this is all still classified it seems like it's kind of like a fluke that we know about it right so how how did that become public in the first place yeah the intelligence itself is classified but on February 14th the chair of the house permanent select committee on intelligence Mike Turner a republican from Ohio he issued a public statement asking President Biden to declassify all the information that that we have on this threat so that we can openly discuss how to respond to it um and there was a lot of back and forth with other congressmen I think the the next day there was a White House Press Conference because it just you know the headlines just exploded the story went crazy wide so that's how we know about it it's all because of you know Mike Turner putting this out there and there's been some speculation that maybe him even leaking that little bit of information might have been somehow politically motivated to drum up military funding to kind of help push Congress towards approving military spending bills but we don't really know that's all speculation okay so like like like spending for Ukraine or or something like that yeah right because you know there there's been a lot of back and forth on whether or not we should continue funding Ukraine at the rate we've been going at and so obviously this big Russian threat that you know might tip Congress in One Direction however in that White House Press Conference we did did learn there is actually intelligence about an actual you know Russian nuclear space weapon okay but again everything's pointing towards it being nuclear powered like a like like a reactor is what you're talking about so you don't want anyone to worry that there's this giant there's there's a movie from the 80s called Defcon 4 or five I'm not sure have you ever seen that movie I don't think so it's absolutely awful it's like one of the worst Sci-Fi movies I've ever seen but but the whole point is it's it's these two guys that are stationed on an orbital platform that just launches nuclear weapons down to the Earth and of course you know it's it's an Apocalypse movie so it all happens and then they crash and everyone's fighting over their their crash spaceship um but that's not what you're talking about it's not like that it's like a something that would it would you would if if it's nuclear powered I guess the point is that it needs a lot of power so that's what they would they would use that for and then they could keep it up there for a long time because nuclear powered stuff lasts a long time uh in yeah yeah you know electronic warfare kind of these non-kinetic means of disabling satellites they do require a lot of power if you want to jam a wide band of radio frequencies over a long period of time it's going to take a lot of energy and so a nuclear reactor could be one way to power something that could stay on orbit for a long time and and really disable Communications across some wide area Russ oh go ahead you know Russia has signaled that it was would like the capability to disable Western satellite constellations because you know starlink uh SpaceX starlink Mega constellation has been used widely throughout Ukraine to provide Battlefield Communications and government Communications for the government of Ukraine we had some statements come out several months ago from the Russian government that it considers even commercial satellites operated by the West as legitimate Targets in Wartime um so this capability the ability to destroy disable or degrade Western satellites is something we know Russia and other nations like China are very actively pursuing to put it in perspective because like you said the White House was very adamant and and the defense department too because there were some briefings uh that we were following there um said many times that it isn't like a current threat like it's not something that's going to happen right now it's not something that's in space right now that we that we know of uh but it's sounds like the ability to knock out or interfere with satellites at a scale that was described by uh by these officials um I mean it sounds like that could be a pretty damaging blow to just how we live you and I are talking right now through through like internet that gets bounced all around through communication satellites or or uh or or when we travel and we use GPS and all of that I mean that that stuff seems like U uh a pretty a pretty large array of vulnerable systems because they don't have any kind of defenses built into them right all these commercial satellites they're just designed to do the thing that they're built to do yep today's satellites are a little more hardened against radiation than the ones say 60 years ago but to your point yes uh GPS satellites all sorts of telecommunication satellites you know would be entirely vulnerable many of these don't have the ability to change the orbits or maneuver out of the way in any way um it's for those reasons the Pentagon has said in Pentagon leadership has said in in recent months that space is the most vital domain for the US military right now because we depend on it at every level for all the things we just talked about navigation position timing Communications uh early warning for missile launches all all of those things so yeah we if our satellites were taken out if any nation's satellites were taken out they'd be basically blind deaf and dumb to large extent yeah I found yeah and John uh for your records there're on line 43 I did find like a a whole statement from the defense department uh about uh uh uh basically saying that uh space uh well that one was about Hypersonic weapons pardon me it's line 42 is is is the is the is the report that I had found where they were saying that the um space based threats from competitors were like the biggest thing that we have to worry about and that was back in 2022 and that was two years ago so it sounds like it's just heating up Brett from from what you're describing here that's right and you I mean you just have to look at the launch Cadence that the US space force these National Security launches they're going up more often they're going up more rapidly we saw the uh victus Knox Mission last year in which the space force was able to turn around a satellite in a matter of days right they ordered it got it on the rocket sent it up and they want to even increase that uh there's another one coming up in which they want to shorten that window to hours you know well I want to I want to ask about the military actions in space because I have some treaty questions for you uh too but but you brought up a really good point about just the military wrapping up its own actions here to to do surveillance to do uh reconnaissance uh uh and and defense of course we have missile defense satellites which are designed to detect uh uh launches from uh potential um uh what do you want to call them potential adversaries uh but uh but military participation in space that's not new that's been going on right since the dawn of the Space Age it was the first astronauts were purely from military backgrounds uh that we had as well as in Russia and the Soviet Union that's right and you know some experts will argue that the entire space age is entirely a military operation there's a fantastic book that came out last year by bled Bowen called original sin that delves all into this but yeah you know the the original rocket Technologies they were derived from you know uh military missile Technologies and um even the the whole concept of of putting nuclear weapons in space goes back over 60 years so yeah there's what and was that just to put the weapons in space for quick strike or to make stations where we going to Le put them up there and I guess aim them down at Earth from the Moon well well as far as we know it wasn't that nefarious but as far back as 1959 the US tested an anti-satellite missile that was intended to have a nuclear warhead wow now they never did put a nuclear warhead on it but yeah 1959 this goes all the way back to that so you know for 60 years we've known that one of the best ways to take out satellites was with a nuclear detonation in space and back then we didn't have the Precision guided missiles we have today so a big explosion in space was the best way way they had to do it luckily President Eisenhower at the time took a look at it and said you know this isn't a good idea and they scaled back but however just three years later in 1962 as part of what was known as operation Fishbowl US Air Force conducted a test called starfish Prime and uh about Southwest of Hawaii in the middle of the Pacific Ocean over Johnson atol a little series of islands out there they detonated a around a 1.4 Megaton Warhead at an altitude of 250 mil 400 km that's where the space station flies 250 miles up yeah it it was wild when you see pictures and videos of it I mean it it turned night into day it created auroras on the other side of the world on the other hemisphere it um um street lights on the ground below went out and uh it's estimated about a quarter of the satellites that were in orbit at the time time suffered some kind of damage and uh and they did that was only one of five that they did as part of operation Fishbowl five test we'll have they get we'll have they get some links for that so that folks can follow up on that because that is crazy that is crazy so and they did they launch all five of those tests like right one after another or were they like kind of spread out over like a few yeah they were kind of spread out um but they all took place in the span of a couple years right then in the early 1960s and so it's because of those tests that we know a lot about what the effects of daating a nuclear weapon in space would be today mhm it's just it's hard to imagine even contemplating that kind of a test like right now because you can't hide any of that stuff with the types of satellite surveillance that we've got going on uh these days well I actually have uh a lot of questions about if it's even legal to do a lot of this stuff I did have one just a follow up because you mentioned uh early on uh that this potential weapon capability would be nuclear powered rather than um rather than like like a missile or a or a bomb or whatnot um and that seems like it's not new either nuclear reactors in space I mean there were there were some nuclear powered satellites even uh during the um the early days of the Space Race right sure and to go back to the Voyager probes we talked about earlier right these are um radioisotope thermal generators is that what they're called yeah radio which is not quite the same as a nuclear reactor right they they use the heat generated as an isotope a radioactive isotope decays but that you know you can still consider that nuclear powered in a way but uh it seems like what this new Russian capability might be is an actual nuclear reactor okay and you know DARPA is pursuing the DARPA and NASA are pursuing a nuclear powered propulsion system so um you know Russia's not alone in that but yeah the nuclear powered rocket that concept goes back I mean to the dawn of rocketry basically you know cuz the space age was the same as the atomic age right all of these Technologies were being developed kind of at the same time hey if you enjoyed this clip be sure to check out this week in space you can find us on your favorite podcast app or see the link in the description below see you there\n"