Russia on Tuesday launched a nuclear-powered attack submarine that took 17 years to build because of funding shortages following the Soviet collapse.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the Severodvinsk should “increase our military might and our naval potential, and strengthen Russia’s position in the world’s oceans.”
Analysts said the launch of the Severodvinsk, the first in a new class of submarines, was a step in that direction, but cautioned that the vessel is not complete and still faces tests.
PHOTO: AFP
“Putting it in water does not show that it is ready,” said Konstantin Makiyenko, deputy director of the Moscow-based Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies.
Officials at the Sevmash said the submarine is 80 percent complete and that trials are to begin this summer, according to the Itar-Tass news agency.
State-run RIA news agency said the 119m Severodvinsk is the first Yasen/Graney class submarine, and is designed to carry long-range nuclear-capable cruise missiles and other armaments.
RIA and Itar-Tass reported that the Severodvinsk is expected to enter service by next year, but Makiyenko said that was “extremely optimistic.”
He also said it is unclear whether Russia will have the funding to produce several more submarines of the same class if the Severodvinsk is successful.
Construction of the Severodvinsk began in 1993, but Makiyenko said it was effectively frozen for about a decade because of funding shortfalls.
Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg was deported from Israel yesterday, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, the day after the Israeli navy prevented her and a group of fellow pro-Palestinian activists from sailing to Gaza. Thunberg, 22, was put on a flight to France, the ministry said, adding that she would travel on to Sweden from there. Three other people who had been aboard the charity vessel also agreed to immediate repatriation. Eight other crew members are contesting their deportation order, Israeli rights group Adalah, which advised them, said in a statement. They are being held at a detention center ahead of a
A Chinese scientist was arrested while arriving in the US at Detroit airport, the second case in days involving the alleged smuggling of biological material, authorities said on Monday. The scientist is accused of shipping biological material months ago to staff at a laboratory at the University of Michigan. The FBI, in a court filing, described it as material related to certain worms and requires a government permit. “The guidelines for importing biological materials into the US for research purposes are stringent, but clear, and actions like this undermine the legitimate work of other visiting scholars,” said John Nowak, who leads field
NUCLEAR WARNING: Elites are carelessly fomenting fear and tensions between nuclear powers, perhaps because they have access to shelters, Tulsi Gabbard said After a trip to Hiroshima, US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday warned that “warmongers” were pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war. Gabbard did not specify her concerns. Gabbard posted on social media a video of grisly footage from the world’s first nuclear attack and of her staring reflectively at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. On Aug. 6, 1945, the US obliterated Hiroshima, killing 140,000 people in the explosion and by the end of the year from the uranium bomb’s effects. Three days later, a US plane dropped a plutonium bomb on Nagasaki, leaving abut 74,000 people dead by the
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to visit Canada next week, his first since relations plummeted after the assassination of a Canadian Sikh separatist in Vancouver, triggering diplomatic expulsions and hitting trade. Analysts hope it is a step toward repairing ties that soured in 2023, after then-Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau pointed the finger at New Delhi’s involvement in murdering Hardeep Singh Nijjar, claims India furiously denied. An invitation extended by new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney to Modi to attend the G7 leaders summit in Canada offers a chance to “reset” relations, former Indian diplomat Harsh Vardhan Shringla said. “This is a
RSS