Russia’s Viktor Leonov spotted off the coast of Charleston
She’s at it again- the Russian Signals intelligence ship Viktor Leonov is trolling the waters around US Navy bases once more, marking her return since being last tracked in March 2018. From the article appearing in the Washington Times:
U.S. officials have said the mission of the Leonov is to gather intelligence on nuclear missile submarines and other Navy facilities.
Interest by U.S. intelligence in the Russian ship has increased since Russian President Vladimir Putin revealed in March 2018 that one of several superweapons being developed by Moscow is a high-speed underwater drone code-named Kanyon by the Pentagon that will be armed with a very large nuclear warhead.
The Leonov is likely conducting operations related to future use of the Kanyon, known as the Status-6 in Russia, that will be capable of destroying entire ports and harbors.
The Leonov, one of the aging Vishnya-class, was purpose built for collecting Signals Intelligence as well as other special missions, such as conducting electronic warfare. While the article speculates that the Leonov is collecting information on the possible future use of Status-6, its more likely that its business as usual collecting anything they can on the current rotation of the SSBN fleet. The ship has been operating in and out of Havana since 2015.
Status-6 on the other hand is an interesting note in the article. Being brought to light a few years ago, the project is to equip a submerged drone with a medium yield nuclear warhead. While its been said that the strategy behind the weapon is to attack harbors, it would make more tactical sense to use such a weapon to attack the Carrier Battle Group.
Share This Story, Choose Your Platform!
About the Author: admin
3 Comments
Comments are closed.
Related Posts
GUNS N GEAR
I expect nothing less from my enemy. What I view the possible failure and definitive learning event is that it got there and has been there a while before we knew.
WOLVERINES
Battle groups are easy to kill ..
This drone thing is interesting though .. no nuke needed .. drive it it and use it to photo (etc) from underwater .. no human losses possible.
Drive it in and do other (once only done by) submarine activities from a safe distance.
Very hard to detect and even harder to catch / destroy.
Nuke torpedo’s aren’t a new idea .. and if this is a (slow torpedo) drone than you could just drive it in and let it set (on the bottom) for years before you use it.
Having been a US Navy Submariner I can tell you .. you’d rather sink’em in the harbor than deal with’em in the open ocean.
This is an intel haul .. and PR stunt.
“Status-6” was the Developmental Program, if i read the (machine-translated) Russian articles, “Kanyon” is the Deployed Device. According to the published Russian data (which like all Milspec capabilities is Not what it can do) the Kanyon is more of an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle than a “Torpedo”, although it can carry a Warhead and be Launched from a Carrier Submarine. It is Nuclear-Powered (unlimited Range) with Speed and Depth capabilities ‘reported’ to be over 100 Km/Hr and in excess of 1,000 Meters Depth. Most of the Articles I have seen about it also mention that is designed to carry a modern Version of the “Tsar Bomba” the 100 FKK’N MEGATON Warhead designed in the 1960’s. In conjunction with that, I read that the Russian Academy of Physics (not really their version of DARPA but in the National Defense Establishment) had ‘recommended’ that this Weapon be used to Blast Down the Continental Shelf off the U.S. Coasts, to create a Tsunami Effect that could send Mile-High Waves onshore….
Lots of Scary Stuff to Find, if you spend Time looking for it on non- U.S. websites.
p.s there is video of the Tsar Bomba test. and it was ‘de-rated’ to 55 megatons, by order of the physicist in charge of the test, removing the ‘booster charge’ so the plane crew that dropped it wouldn’t be killed by the blast.