The Russian Navy is now armed with the longest known submarine in the world, a submarine that could eclipse the submarine power of any other country, including the United States.
The Belgorod, which was delivered to the Russian Navy on July 8 in the White Sea port of Severodvinks, according to shipbuilder Sevmash Shipyard, is a submarine measuring 608 feet in length, some 39 feet longer than the U.S. Navy Ohio-class submarines, the largest such vessels in the U.S. naval fleet.
Russian officials have said the gargantuan submarine will be used for research purposes, but naval experts suspect the vessel could one day be turned into an instrument of war and espionage.
Experts believe the Belgorod could one day be fitted with the world’s first nuclear stealth torpedoes, as well as spy gear, challenging the US submarine fleet and sparking a tense spy showdown between the two countries, in a replay dangerous from the cold. War.
How does the Belgorod compare to American submarines?
The US Navy’s Ohio-class nuclear-powered submarine has been widely considered one of the most advanced – and one of the deadliest – of any submarine in the world.
They are slightly smaller than the announced new Columbia class, which is expected to be 560 feet long and 42 feet wide, but the Ohio class submarines are more heavily armed as they were originally designed to carry four launch tubes. torpedoes and up to 24 Trident nuclear tubes. -spiked ballistic missiles.
The United States built 18 Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs) between 1976 and 1997. In 2002, four of these SSBNs were converted to cruise missile submarines, also known as missile submarines Guided or SSGN.
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For submarine expert and author HI Sutton, the Navy’s Ohio-class SSGN is the most advanced submarine in the world, according to a list he compiled in 2020.
Sutton wrote that the Ohio-class SSGN can carry up to a maximum of 176 cruise missiles in its torpedo room, a number which he says qualifies the submarine as “the undisputed king of ship-loading.” weapons”. Under normal circumstances, the Ohio-class SSGN carries up to 154 Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles.
“The more torpedoes and missiles a sub carries, the more targets it can attack,” Sutton said.
But how does the king of underwater weapons compare to the Belgorod?
According to the Russian state news agency TASS, the new Russian submarine will be armed with the Poseidon, the largest torpedo ever developed in the world.
“It’s about twice the size of submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and thirty times the size of an ordinary ‘heavy’ torpedo,” suton said in a recent post analyzing the Russian submarine.
“It’s a giant torpedo that can hit coastal towns with devastating results. Compared to an intercontinental ballistic missile, it’s very slow, but possibly unstoppable,” Sutton writes.
The submarine analyst called the Poseidon “unique in the history of the world” and interpreted the weapon as a diversification of Russian nuclear deterrence that could prove very dangerous for the United States and anyone else s would oppose the way of Moscow.
“Its lack of dependence on satellites and the fact that it literally runs under missile defenses makes it a slow but inevitable death,” Sutton wrote.
According to a US Congressional Research Service (CRS) report in April, the Belgorod is capable of carrying up to eight Poseidons.
But Sutton said the Poseidon system “is not ready” to launch from Belgorod. The secret ribs The analyst believes that the Belgorod will likely be used as an intelligence-gathering platform, an opinion shared by other experts.