"Poseidon" Nuclear-armed Underwater Drone

The CIA love to go recover shit... I would store them ready in case there is a decent escalation of problems with the west...during peace time they could sail down to the southern oceans with a few of these things and have them navigate back to Russian ports for testing and practise and could test their own anti sub forces on the way.

Being unmanned these subs could have no air pockets and be made enormously strong so even a nearby depth charge might not destroy them... having internal water jet propulsion meaning no external prop to be damaged... these things could be made to be really really hard to kill... they already are relatively small to start with.... the only vulnerable components will be propulsion and power and of course payload/s...

One of its defence mechanisms could be to drop a small nuke with a lifting balloon to drag it up closer to the surface before it detonates while operating at 1km depth or more... bit of a surprise to forces using active sonar to try to find you

Pretend to put them in containers and place something on the sea floor... something that goes boom if you try to lift it...

There is no benefit to having these things sitting in water... not matter how deep... there is a chance they might develop a fault in their communications system... and what if the standard default if they lose contact is attack...

Nah... way too dangerous... they are building some subs to carry these... and they could stack dozens or more in a single roll on roll off ship or a basic container ship with its own crane to lift and drop them over the side if you need to...

Hell... even a super parachute mechanism... the VDV are experts in that regard.... and roll them out the back of an An-124 for now and Il-106 in the future directly into the middle of the ocean... with parachutes and airbags to retard its fall like they use for landing things on Mars...

30-40 tons perhaps each rolling out the back in a 40-50 degree climb perhaps... could be possible...

They have tons of options...

Hell, in the future they could use these things like an Uber order to deliver important things to certain places around the world securely and by stealth... but even then the risk of one of them being captured and stripped for secrets... it really is not worth it...

Have to agree

Anything sitting on the sea floor is at risk of discovery (which Russia will not realize until too late), or theft (which Russia will realize, but won't be able to prove anything nor even know who really did it themselves)

Any booby-trap nonsense is just going to end up as an extra headache. Booby trap on a nuclear weapon?
What if the failsafes or recovery procedures go wrong, and it self-destructs in its owners faces? What if that CIA or Chinese sub is blown up but it was such a super-secret weapon that other parties weren't forewarned about anything in advance and now have a grudge to settle?

Being in Russian territorial waters means rather nothing. We're talking about subs and deep-sea operations - if they're detected in someone's territorial waters then they've screwed up already.

That's why I'm skeptical about any sort of autonomous sea-bed SLBM or torpedo or whatever. Anything you can't keep an eye on and guard constantly. It's easier just to skip the trouble and keep the weapons equipped on manned subs instead, to be deployed when it's time to actually use them or only a short time before.

This unmanned ships the west and china a developing are even better. Jam their comm system and you are forced by the law of the sea to remove this threat for civilian shipping lanes and bring it to your next harbor.

Actually it could be used as an opportunity for counterspy work... place a launch container for Poseidon on the sea bottom for testing... but don't put anything in it and put it in Russian waters... instead of a booby trap... fill it with recording equipment and sensors to detect approaching vessels so if when the US or other western agency goes to try to look at it or pinch it it transmits very loud signals and releases flares and EM transmissions that alert the Russians to the fact that their secret container containing nothing is being interfered with.

No need to kill anyone, but certainly make them need a nappy change...

Some sort of large container ship with massive cranes that can open up the deck and lift out bundles of Poseidons and lowering them over the side directly into the water any day or night 24/7 but preferably at night in some southern ocean in the middle of nowhere.... but not until the first missiles have been launched and tensions have already escalated to the point where they will definitely be needed... it would make trade with countries in Africa and Central and South America a useful cover to operate these ships in the southern oceans... the cost for HATO to monitor the entire planets oceans will be too costly even for a country printing its own money...

Obviously a few subs will be the official carriers of Poseidon... but they have a lot of cargo ships with large suitable cranes.

From media stunt to propaganda story to weird science project to ''holy shit this is as serious as a hear attack!!!''  

Some choice passages about Poseidon from latest CNN piece, gotta love the change in tone:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/05/europe/russia-arctic-nato-military-intl-cmd/index.html?utm_term=16176191925984f1b1a309302&utm_source=cnn_Five+Things+for+Monday%2C+April+5%2C+2021&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1617619192600&bt_ee=UE7wziGa2kkh94o6gakllXPDYH5U0AwCZxYuurwBF8oPfRly9HhLf3gwmpWmBD1b&bt_user_id&bt_ts=1617619192600

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Weapons experts and Western officials have expressed particular concern about one Russian 'super-weapon,' the Poseidon 2M39 torpedo. Development of the torpedo is moving fast

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Experts agree that the weapon is "very real" and already coming to fruition.

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The Tsirkon and the Poseidon are part of a new generation of weapons pledged by Putin in 2018 as strategic game changers in a fast-changing world.

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At the time US officials scorned the new weapons as technically far-fetched and improbable, yet they appear to be nearing fruition. The Norwegian intelligence chief Stensønes told CNN the Tsirkon as a "new technology, with hypersonic speeds, which makes it hard to defend against."

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It was subsequently partially dismissed by analysts as a 'paper tiger' weapon, meant to terrify with its apocalyptic destructive powers that appear to slip around current treaty requirements, but not to be successfully deployed.

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Yet a series of developments in the Arctic -- including, according to Russian media reports, the testing of up to three Russian submarines designed to carry the stealth weapon, which has been suggested to be 20 meters long -- have now led analysts to consider the project real and active.

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Manash Pratim Boruah, a submarine expert at Jane's Fighting Ships, said: "The reality of the weapon is clear. You can absolutely see development around the torpedo, which is happening.

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Katarzyna Zysk, professor of international relations at the state-run Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies, said the Poseidon was "getting quite real," given the level of infrastructure development and testing of submarines to carry the torpedo.
"It is absolutely a project that will be used to scare, as a negotiation card in the future, perhaps in arms control talks," Zysk said. "But in order to do so, it has to be credible. This seems to be real."......
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Wow.... Poseidon is real?

Who'd of thunk it? I just assumed they built the Sarov testbed for no reason. Or that they completed the 949 Belgorod as a greatly enlarged special services boat just for the hoot of it... And that the Kharbarovsk is just being built cuz Sevmash had a spare slot in the boat house and didn't know what else to put in it...

Seriously, the dumb-fuck nature of these self-denoted "experts" is simply hilarious. These incompetents draw 6-figure salaries from their comfortable nooks within the establishment-funded NGOs and don't need to produce anything except specious waffle designed the please the ear-holes of their well-heeled benefactors. We should be surprised when these clowns get it so wrong so often?

The problem with a I don't believe it till I see it attitude is that by the time you believe it it is already in service and operational, which leaves you scrambling for a suitable response...

HATO knew about Calibre for years and years but dismissed it because you need decent C4IR to use such a weapon... having a 2,500km range land attack cruise missile means nothing if you can't find targets for it and don't have it widely deployed.

And they wont put those on corvettes because there is no way a corvette could find suitable targets 2,500km away...

GarryB wrote:The problem with a I don't believe it till I see it attitude is that by the time you believe it it is already in service and operational, which leaves you scrambling for a suitable response...

HATO knew about Calibre for years and years but dismissed it because you need decent C4IR to use such a weapon... having a 2,500km range land attack cruise missile means nothing if you can't find targets for it and don't have it widely deployed.

And they wont put those on corvettes because there is no way a corvette could find suitable targets 2,500km away...

Plenty of high value immobile targets without the need for C4IR. Specially if you put nuks inside those kalibr.

Just like Poseidon doesn't need it. Cities don't move. You can launch it from a base in russia and it will work. But it doesn't change the balance of force like a US general said, russian ICBM can't be stopped anyway so Poseidon will target cities that have been destroyed 2 days before.

Isos wrote:...Plenty of high value immobile targets without the need for C4IR. Specially if you put nuks inside those kalibr.

Just like Poseidon doesn't need it. Cities don't move. You can launch it from a base in russia and it will work. But it doesn't change the balance of force like a US general said, russian ICBM can't be stopped anyway so Poseidon will target cities that have been destroyed 2 days before.

Poseidon, Avangard and other stuff was sent into development after George W. ordered AMB shied to be made

We know today that ABM shield turned out to be nothingburger but back then when USA said they would make something nobody doubted not even for a second that it would be made on time and would perform up to specs

So now Russia has answers to a problem that USA never managed to make and just decided to roll with it

Isos wrote:Just like Poseidon doesn't need it. Cities don't move. You can launch it from a base in russia and it will work. But it doesn't change the balance of force like a US general said, russian ICBM can't be stopped anyway so Poseidon will target cities that have been destroyed 2 days before.

People are focusing on Poseidon as a "doomsday" counter-force or 2nd strike weapon, but I think it has enormous potential as a carrier killer.  In the event of USN aggression against Russia, the CVNs are the Achilles heel, and taking them out is still the key to neutralizing (or just dissuading) the seppos.

The Poseidon being nuclear propelled is hardly an issue IMHO if its targets are going to be nuke-propelled enemy warships.  Sinking a USN flatop is going to risk nuclear release and contamination, so if the tactical situation is dire enough to warrant taking out one (or more), then adding a little extra radiation from a breached UUV propulsion module is hardly of any real concern.

If Poseidon is quiet (no reason to think it won't be) it could be launched from a safe vantage point well out of reach of a CBGs ASW cordon.  It cruises deep and quiet while unravelling a long ULF array or antenna wire to pick up course correction, and uses passive sensors when it nears its prey.  Once close enough and with a firm lock on a CVN it fires up its reactor to max and discards stealth as it makes a 100kt beeline @ 1km depth to take out the target.  A 1000kg HE warhead exploding under the hull of even a Ford-class white elephant... errr..  "super" carrier  will take it out of service, even if it doesn't sink outright.

Even the spectre of such an attack will keep the Murkan brass up all night with a cold sweat.

Big_Gazza wrote:People are focusing on Poseidon as a "doomsday" counter-force or 2nd strike weapon, but I think it has enormous potential as a carrier killer. In the event of USN aggression against Russia, the CVNs are the Achilles heel...

If there is a war between USA and Russia those CVNs would be getting a salvo of nuclear tipped missiles within minutes and that would be it for them

People keep forgetting that even small naval nuke is still 25 Hiroshimas, they don't even need to hit anything they just need to go off on general vicinity

Poseidon is a city killer, nothing more, to use it against anything else is slow and pointless

PapaDragon wrote:

Big_Gazza wrote:People are focusing on Poseidon as a "doomsday" counter-force or 2nd strike weapon, but I think it has enormous potential as a carrier killer.  In the event of USN aggression against Russia, the CVNs are the Achilles heel...

If there is a war between USA and Russia those CVNs would be getting a salvo of nuclear tipped missiles within minutes and that would be it for them

People keep forgetting that even small naval nuke is still 25 Hiroshimas, they don't even need to hit anything they just need to go off on general vicinity

Poseidon is a city killer, nothing more, to use it against anything else is slow and pointless

Agree with you mostly, but the use of nuclear weapons (as opposed to nuclear propulsion) crosses a big line, and invites escalation.  Killing a CVN with a conventional warhead keeps the game in the class of a conventional fight, but once you use nukes the gloves come off and the seppo enemy will then do likewise.

Viewed another way, it lowers the bar for an armed response to murkan aggression.  Russia can act decisely with lethal force without having to commit to a nuclear exchange.  Knowing Russian forces have that flexibility puts pressure onto murkan elites and their war planners, and sows the seeds of doubt in their evil small minds, and deterrence is better than having to shoot it out and prove yer point.

Being able to rip the guts out of a HATOstani taskforce without resorting to nukes is a big advantage.  It allows Russia to discourage (or defeat) seppo aggression and being able to hold their heads high afterwards without the seppos crying about "evil criminal Russians" using nukes.  It limits the effectiveness of any post-defeat table thumping by murkans at the UN or elsewhere demanding the world "speak out" and adopt more "crushing" sanctions BS. Don't hand the US any ammo they can potentially use to cause more geopolitical trouble than they already can.

Of course, if the US escalates, then nuke the f*ckers till they glow.

There was an understanding during the Cold War that "nukes don't leave craters on the ocean" so as long as you keep it away from the homelands you are not crossing the big one

Same applies here

War between Russia and USA is hypothetical scenario with very little wiggle room between peacocking and extermination

USA tried to make that extra room with ABM shield but it didn't work out

But of course the Russians developing these systems and weapons that violate all sorts of previous treaties like the ABM treaty and the INF treaty and of course all sorts of international norms and accepted practises just proves Russian aggression does it not?

Amusing they think that Russia is spending all this money on infrastructure but actually is just using all this as a bluff... something they can trade for something they want....

You know... the west thinks Russia is just playing mind games and this is not life and death stuff they are playing for keeps at.

People are focusing on Poseidon as a "doomsday" counter-force or 2nd strike weapon, but I think it has enormous potential as a carrier killer. In the event of USN aggression against Russia, the CVNs are the Achilles heel, and taking them out is still the key to neutralizing (or just dissuading) the seppos.

But that is the point... this is all about... and only about deterrence... making WWIII unthinkable.

The ABM treaty was critical because limiting ABM systems prevents one side from building a shield to hide behind they think might be good enough to stop most of their enemies nuclear responses to their attack. Arms limitations reducing warheads together with an ABM shield in europe and asia and the US itself might be enough to blunt a Russian attack if they can launch a quick strike to take out a portion of their nuclear strike capability their world wide ABM system might be enough to take down anything that is left.

It is destabilising because it does not matter whether it works or not... if the country with it thinks it works and their economy is going to down the toilet they may decide they have nothing to lose... the fact that they are wrong wont matter because by the time we find out one way or the other it is too late to go back.

That American guy is right... poseidon is just another nuke pointed at the US but what he doesn't mention is that it is a nuke their ABM can't stop and we can probably safely assume not much else will stop it either so it is assured to get through and destroy a bit of the west.

Its purpose is to prevent America starting a war they think they can win and therefore making WWIII less likely.

They are not going to trade that away for US troops leaving Syria or any such thing.

A 1000kg HE warhead exploding under the hull of even a Ford-class white elephant... errr.. "super" carrier tongue will take it out of service, even if it doesn't sink outright.

If Russia is sinking US carriers there is no value in being a pussy about it... as the Poseidon passes under the carrier which it should recognise due to its magnetic anamoly detector and 100 thousand tons of metal it could turn on to the direction the carrier is heading and accelerate 2km ahead of it and drop a 40kg 2kt nuclear warhead based on a 152mm nuclear artillery shell and release it and continue on its way... the explosion should take out several ships in the group... in fact you might want to drop a spread of 3 to 4 bombs in a fan shape ahead of the ships about 1km apart... and then carry on to US waters.

Once you reach US waters you can start sowing the coastal waters with hundreds more small nuke bombs... not to cause tsunamis, but to contaminate the fishing grounds for any survivors... and of course if the prevailing winds head inland some super heated salt water that is radioactive can make conditions even less pleasant.

Poseidon is a city killer, nothing more, to use it against anything else is slow and pointless

It is an I am probably dead so this is for you type weapon... it is a revenge weapon to cripple your enemy and destroy an easy future for him...

But it can't be secret because its best feature is preventing war... ideally it will never be used.... like SS-18 and SS-19 missiles.

USA tried to make that extra room with ABM shield but it didn't work out

They created the entire situation... but they wont admit it.

Russia is planning or already constructing a SOSUS-like sonar system arount her shores. With this system in place the Poseidon could be turned into a sub killer. No need for a large nuclear payload, which could be partially replaced by some sonar systems in addition to the one the lil´ torpedo already has.

They have missiles and torpedoes to attack ships and subs that work perfectly fine. There is no need to use a poseidon for that.

Isos wrote:They have missiles and torpedoes to attack ships and subs that work perfectly fine. There is no need to use a poseidon for that.

Of course there is. Use long-range autonomous UUVs (such as Poseidon) to hunt down and kill murkan SSNs. Don't expose your own SSNs to risk until the murkans have worked their way through the UUV screen (which hopefully will reduce their numbers and make them more manageable).

Seriously, the Poseidon is a fucking nuke-powered long-duration/range deep-diving stealthy UUV that can put the pedal to the metal when needed and do 60 knots (estimate only). Do peeps really believe that such a vehicle can only have application as Doomsday weapons?????

Poseidon's carried by submersibles will probably be counter-force weapons, but with their endless endurance I can see them operating from Northern shore bases once their AI and navigation systems and sensors have been thoroughly tested. If UAVs can fly autonomously for intell and surveillance, why not UUVs? Once their AI is up to snuff, why not search and destroy missions? It may take a decade (?) to get their AI stable enough to permit such missions, but its just a matter of time. ​Few would have anticipated the impact of UAVs when the first primitive aerial drones were bumbling around the skies, yet now we can't forsee how UUVs may similarly change naval warfare?

The Poseidon is too promising to be restricted solely to nuking Seppoland after RVSN warheads have already had party time...

The Poseidon is the equivalent to the Okhotnik drone. Long-range. For high-value targets. Western attack subs will mostly be intercepted by lighter UUVs, some fellow at Army-2021 was hinting that they already testing some underwater drones in that role, but out in the Arctic Ocean or even the Atlantic a few Poseidons could hunt down Virginias or Ohios.