Russia’s defense minister has visited one of the Soviet Union’s most famous nuclear testing sites as tensions around nuclear weapons simmer at their highest point in decades over the Ukraine war.
Sergei Shoigu, a firm ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, visited the Arctic nuclear testing facilities at Novaya Zemlya, the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement on Saturday.
Shoigu flew over Russia’s Central Training Ground with Alexey Likhachev, the head of the country’s state nuclear company Rosatom, the Russian Defense Ministry added over the weekend.
The Central Training Ground was the site of more than 130 nuclear weapons tests from 1954 until 1990, the ministry said.
Global nuclear tensions soared following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In February 2023, Putin suspended Russia’s participation in the new START Treaty, which puts limits on Moscow’s and Washington’s nuclear arsenals.
In a speech to Russian citizens, the Kremlin leader then said Rosatom should be ready to resume nuclear testing if Washington does so “first.”
“Of course, we will not be the first to do this,” Putin said, according to a Reuters translation. “But if the United States tests, then we will,” he said. “No one must be under any dangerous illusions that global strategic parity can be destroyed.”
In February, a Russian official told state news agency Tass that Novaya Zemlya was “ready” to resume nuclear testing, if need be.
The Central Training Ground is now used for “carrying out of tests of advanced samples of weapons and military equipment,” the Russian Defense Ministry statement said, without specifying further.
The Arctic Archipelago of Novaya Zemlya became a Soviet nuclear test site in the mid-1950s, and was where Soviet scientists detonated the infamous thermonuclear Tsar Bomba in 1961, the largest nuclear weapon ever tested. A moratorium has been in place since the Cold War era, stopping nuclear testing.
In late April, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov brushed off the suggestion that Moscow could resume nuclear testing, saying that, “at the moment, everyone is sticking to the moratorium.”
On the 25th anniversary of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) in early April 2023, the British and French governments said in a joint statement they wished to “express their concern over Russia’s announcement that it will ensure its preparedness to conduct a nuclear test.”
“We reiterate the importance of the CTBT, which Russia has signed and ratified, and of Russia’s compliance with its moratorium on nuclear tests,” London and Paris said.
In mid-June, Putin said tactical nuclear weapons had been moved to Belarus, after the Kremlin said in March the strategic weapons would be sent into the country, which borders Ukraine and Russia.
U.S. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told U.S. lawmakers in May 2023 that it was “very unlikely” Moscow would resort to using nuclear weapons. However, U.S. President Joe Biden described the threat of tactical nuclear weapons deployment as “real” in mid-June.
The Russian Defense Ministry said Shoigu also inspected troops deployed in the Arctic as well as preparations “to defend especially important installations.”
