Talk:Russia and weapons of mass destruction/Archive 1

old
Deadline extension for further deadlines? How can there be more than one deadline in advance? Get-back-world-respect 02:28, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Try reading the convention. The deadline is 2007, with each country able to get one 5-year extension if they apply for it before April, 2006. So the absolute final deadline is 2012 although no one thinks Russia can make it even with EU and US help and the US is sure it can make it because of environmental lawsuits at disposal locations. Not to mention that the US officially accused Russia of developing three-component chemical weapons to avoid chemicals restricted by the Convention. Rmhermen 15:20, Apr 22, 2004 (UTC)
 * Extension on further deadlines is actually correct as they requested extension of both the 2004 and 2007 deadlines. Rmhermen 15:22, Apr 22, 2004 (UTC)
 * So why don't you just write this? And why do you include the 1% without reliable reference nor up to date information? Get-back-world-respect 15:43, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Look of the Page
Is the page supposed to have so much empty space, or did this occur by mistake? If there is a way to fix this, could someone please do so, for the article looks very awkward with all the random spacing that it currently has. Thanx in advance, Homologeo 05:22, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Neutral POV
The article states that: "Russia reluctantly signed the Chemical Weapons Convention". Is that a neutral POV at all? --JohnRubin 12:40, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * You are right. Corrected.Biophys 16:18, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Topol
I think that words like "which US air defence is unable to destroy" are useless, since US shield is not capable to destroy MIRV warhead or even warhead launched from beforehand unknown location, why are we even mentioning it with Topol?
 * Good question. Rmhermen 05:35, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Russia's nuclear capabilities - no RR warring please
Several anonymous users curently revert each other with regard to Russia's nuclear capabilities. But this is just a matter of sourcing. This most recent source tells:

"Russia has the world’s largest stockpile of nuclear weapons, with an estimated total of 16,000 warheads, of which 7,200 are believed to be operational.

The Soviet Union had an estimated total of 35,000 warheads. The Americans have 9,960 warheads of which 5,735 are operational. Russia’s nuclear weapons can be fired from land-based silos, submarines and bomber planes.

This “nuclear triad”, as it is known, comprises Strategic Rocket Forces (land based): 489 missiles capable of carrying up to 1,788 warheads Strategic Fleet (sea based): 12 submarines capable of carrying up to 609 warheads Strategic Aviation Units: 79 bombers capable of carrying up to 884 Cruise missiles.

Under the Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reductions (SORT), better known as the Moscow Treaty, signed in 2002, the United States and Russia have agreed to limit their arsenal to 1,700-2,200 operational warheads by 2012. The treaty sets no limits on the size of reserve stockpiles, however.

Russia tested its latest generation of Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, the RS-24, last month."

This source gives "approximately" 20,000 (rather than 16,000) warheads and explains that ~7,000 are only operational strategic weapons, whereas there is no accurate count of tactical nuclear weapons".  "It is estimated that Russia has between 735 and 1,365 metric tons (t) of weapons grade-equivalent highly enriched uranium (HEU) and between 106 and 156 t of military-use plutonium."

Do you think this information is wrong for some reason? Please tell.Biophys 19:29, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I see. Russian version of this article makes a reference to this site:, which is created by someone who calls himself "Pavel Podvig". It provides different numbers. Any ideas who this "Podvig" is? I suggest to stick to most reliable sources.Biophys 19:54, 23 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I got it. There is no contradiction here. This Podvig says: "741 strategic delivery platforms, which can carry up to 3281 nuclear warheads." Probably, it means that "3281" is a single load of these systems.Biophys 20:02, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

POV title
This title has a POV overtone, as if the author didn't like the fact that Russia has the weapons. Anyone want to try Russia and nuclear weapons or Nuclear weapons in Russia or Nuclear proliferation in Russia? The Evil Spartan 01:18, 25 August 2007 (UTC)


 * We have around 10-15 articles of this type : France and weapons of mass destruction, Germany, North Korea, etc. Does not seem to be POV at all. Something like Nuclear weapons of Russia or Russian program of nuclear weapons (does it include Soviet program of nuclear weapons?) can be created in addition to this article to describe situation in more detail.Biophys 01:47, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I wonder if they all shouldn't be renamed. Although I can't point to exactly why, it just seems to be WP:WEASELy in the titles. The Evil Spartan 01:58, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
 * We also have article and a category Weapons of mass destruction. This is well established terminology and tradition to combine chemical, biological and nuclear weapons into the same category. The usual rationale: each type of this weapons can theoretically destroy the entire human kind, which of course was disputed by some scientists, even with regard to nuclear weapons.Biophys 02:12, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
 * As about "proliferation", this should be included here. See for example, . This is huge topic and it is very poorly described in WP.Biophys 05:11, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Contradiction
The US WMOD article indicates the US Nuclear arsenal is 7K ready and 3K reserve, contradicting the prominent statement here that the 5K ready and 3.4K reserve of Russia are the largest. 74.78.162.229 (talk) 04:01, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

russia dosnt own more then the u.s --71.71.2.33 (talk) 14:03, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Russia 6,600 active; U.S. 5,400 active; therefore Russia has more. Both countries are reducing stockpiles though so up-to-date numbers need to be compared. Rmhermen (talk) 14:32, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

russian START monitoring site
In correspondence to russian START monitoring site http://russianforces.org/ As of January 2009, the Russian strategic forces included 678 strategic delivery platforms, which can carry up to 3081 nuclear warheads. The Strategic Rocket Forces have 426 operational missile systems of four types that can carry 1586 warheads. The strategic fleet includes 14 strategic missile submarines. Their 173 missiles can carry 611 nuclear warheads. Strategic aviation bomber force consists of 79 bombers that can carry up to 884 long-range cruise missiles. In January 2009 the space-based tier of the early warning system included five satellites that appear operational--three on highly elliptical orbits and two on a geostationary orbit.Gnomsovet (talk) 22:12, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Contradictory sources about stockpiles
There are contradictory sources about the size of American and Russian nuclear stockpiles. According to many sources, the US has more nuclear warheads than Russia. I added these sources to the lead. Offliner (talk) 08:26, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

USA has more
Analysts cannot calculate number of Russian, U.S. nuclear warheads

''Russian analysts are at a loss over a report by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) on Russian-American nuclear parity recently published in Washington. The data on the two countries' nuclear capability differ, which could seriously complicate the drafting of a new strategic arms reduction treaty. According to the FAS, the United States has 2,700 deployed nuclear warheads and 2,500 in reserve, while Russia has 4,830 and 3,500, respectively. Russian military analysts question these calculations. Alexander Khramchikhin, an analyst at the Institute of Political and Military Analysis, said'' Russia has 3,100 nuclear warheads while the U.S. has 5,700.

Source:. Offliner (talk) 17:00, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Dubious!?
"Russia possesses one of the largest stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in the world." Why is this statement disputed? Of course there is arguable ambiguity on whether the USA or Russia has a larger stockpile of WMDs (specifically about nuclear weapons on this page I gather). But I should think that most people would agree that Russia would possess one of the largest (I didn't say the largest or not) stockpiles of WMDs since the Soviet Union was one of the founding fathers of modern WMDs, and surely they would still retain vast numbers of Cold War stocks

Mid-2007 source [8] (Blomfield/Telegraph)
...- not very new - gives a number of 3.281 strategic warheads. I wonder how someone can read more than 6.000 strategic warheads out of this particular source. --129.187.244.28 (talk) 08:37, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Wrong numbers
According to the "Federation of American Scientists" the numbers here are completely false. http://www.fas.org/programs/ssp/nukes/nuclearweapons/nukestatus.html It is a reliable source compare to the sources mentioned in the article. Fix it pls. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.147.15.188 (talk) 23:10, 21 December 2009 (UTC)


 * And the FASists have released their 2011 guide: http://www.fas.org/blog/ssp/2011/05/russia2011.php Hcobb (talk) 04:52, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Unclear statement ?
"Sea based Strategic Fleet: 12 submarines carrying up to 609 warheads; they should be able to employ, in a near future, delivery systems like SS-N-30 Bulava." This imo suggest that they "should be able to employ, in a near future, delivery systems". In fact they are deploying capable system for decades, SS-N-30 Bulava is just upgrade of current missiles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.40.109.248 (talk) 23:12, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Nuke numbers
The United States and weapons of mass destruction, states that USA has 300 more nukes than Russia, and a total of 5113 nukes. yet this page states that Russia has over 12000, nukes. Which is correct? Or am I misunderstanding the statements? --15:37, 11 July 2012 (UTC)Anurag2k12 (talk)
 * There is a very complicated system of counting nukes - active, reserve, withdrawn, being disassembled, multi-warhead systems counted singly or separately, delivery systems counted as weapons under some treaties, etc. Complex political considerations are involved. You need to compare estimates which count the same way. Rmhermen (talk) 15:45, 11 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Then which figures should I take? I wanna know who has more warheads. Anurag2k12 (talk) 15:59, 11 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Never mind I found the figure I wanted. Anurag2k12 (talk) 16:00, 11 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Most recent data - "With 1,643 nuclear warheads deployed, Moscow has reversed 14 years of U.S. superiority, and now has one more warhead in the field than the Pentagon, according to a U.S. State Department report." My very best wishes (talk) 18:09, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

Novichok agents
Those guys are kinda fictitious and in article's context claim looks like accusation of nonfulfilment of Convention by Russia (and without any reliable sources of information), so I propose to remove this part. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.253.17.134 (talk) 14:15, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * We have an article on Novichok agent. You should bring your concerns to that talk page first. Rmhermen (talk) 15:45, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I read it and its discussion, also I see it was proposed for deletion, and actually I don't care about Novichok's article but particularly this one contains kinda offensive accusation which bothers me. Well, even if Novichok existed (for what there is not much evidence), what makes people think that "...Russia is expected to be in possession..."? If there was at least something, then other countries participating in Convention would make their claims. I don't propose to remove article about Novichok (as well about phlogiston, for example), but unfounded accusations from this article, that's why I wrote here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.86.230.83 (talk) 16:28, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Neither the U.S. nor Russia fufilled their treaty obligations because neither eliminated their declared stockpile. The question of Novichok agernts is that the aren't part of the declared scheduled chemicals in the Treaty. Rmhermen (talk) 17:04, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, as to Novichok, the whole problem with it is that for some reason no one cares about it (neither USA, Russia, UN, OPCW etc). Is this a great conspiracy? I doubt it. More probably, the whole thing is negligible or doesn't exist at all. I'm not going to argue about it. My point here is that there is no evidence that Russia deliberately violate conventions which is what Wikipedia claims (or gently hints at least) in this article. I still don't get your point: do you think claim in article has firm foundation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.86.230.83 (talk) 17:46, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * The article doesn't claim that novichok agents violate the treaty. Rmhermen (talk) 01:45, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
 * "...Russia is expected to be in possession..." is clearly someone's opinion and not a commonly shared point of view. I'm going to remove this part of article if you (or someone else) don't provide reliable sources of this statement. Or, alternatively, if you want to keep reference to Novichok here, rewrite according to Wikipedia policy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.253.30.244 (talk) 06:21, 10 September 2013 (UTC)