1/17 I agree with this assessment. Nonetheless, since I am apparently a masochist, I geolocated all of the nuclear weapons storage sites active in Belarus during the 1980s.
I'm pretty sure there were 22 of them, though I am open to corrections.
2/17 First, a few notes: In Russian and Soviet service, nuclear weapons (except those attached to deployed strategic missiles) are under the control of the 12th Main/Chief Directorate (12 GUMO), a separate branch of the military directly subordinate to the Ministry of Defense.
3/17 Thus, while a 12 GUMO unit might be attached to a nuclear-capable unit, the chains of command are separate.
Also, outside of the Strategic Rocket Forces (RVSN), 12 GUMO bases are rarely co-located with the units responsible for delivering the nuclear weapons in wartime.
4/17 I will refer to 12 GUMO units by their 5-digit military unit (военная часть or в/ч) number. I will provide additional information (unit name, the parent unit responsible for operational use of the nuclear weapons, and year of disbandment) when available.
5/17 Let's get started. There were two RVSN arsenals in Belarus: 25819 (Stolbtsby-2), and 42654 (Gomel-30). The weapons storage bunkers at 25819 have been repurposed, and there is now a prison at 42654.
These were high-level weapons storage.
6/17 Besides those two, all 12 GUMO units in Belarus were Repair and Technical Bases (ремонтно-технические базы- RTB) or Mobile RTBs (PRTB). These units were responsible for delivering weapons for wartime use, and storing and maintaining the weapons in peacetime.
7/17 RVSN: Like later mobile ICBMs, nuclear warhead handling for the SS-20 occurred at the division level. Earlier missiles, like the SS-4, were stored without warheads, so 12 GUMO units were attached at the regimental level.
8/17 Thus, the transition from SS-4 to SS-20 resulted in the disbanding of many 12 GUMO units.
For example, when the 170th Missile Regiment switched to the SS-20, the 1055th RTB (unit 23510) was disbanded.
9/ Similarly, the remaining 12 GUMO units transitioned from responsibility for a single SS-4 regiment to an entire SS-20 division. While this represented a much larger number of warheads, they were kept mounted on the SS-20s in sealed launch tubes, rather than in storage bunkers.
10/17 Here are the remaining 12 GUMO units responsible for SS-4 warheads. Only two of them made it to the late 1980s. Part one:
11/17 and part two:
12/17 Navy: For some reason, the naval aviation base at Bychau had two 12 GUMO units attached, в/ч 20906 and 27837. It's not entirely clear to me which base is which unit.
Bychau was home to two Naval Missile Aviation Regiments, flying Tu-16s and Tu-22Ms.
13/17 Army: в/ч 11797 handled SS-23 warheads (and possibly some missiles). The location now belongs to the Precision Electromechanics Plant, a weapons factory.
The missile base near at Tsel, near Lapichi, had a "Separate Assembly Team" (ОСБр), but no PTRB.
14/17 The 5th and 7th Tank Armies, and the 28th Combined Arms Army each had a 12 GUMO unit, presumably for artillery shells and other non-strategic warheads. I can't figure out exactly where the units were based, but these sites share features with many 12 GUMO units.
15/17 One 12 GUMO base, near Shchuchyn, was attached to the Air Defense Forces (PVO). It held nuclear warheads for SA-2 surface-to-air missiles. The number of warheads held by this unit decreased as the SA-2 was replaced.
16/17: Five air force bases had 12 GUMO units attached. The 200th and 402nd heavy bomber regiments both flew Tu-16s and Tu-22Ms, while the 121st and 203rd heavy bomber regiments flew Tu-22Ks.
17/17 Lastly, the 953rd bomber regiment flew Su-24s.
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First stage ignition failure is the one that came to mind first. Sarmat is cold-launched. The missile is ejected from the silo by a small solid propellant "pressure accumulator." The first stage engine does not ignite until the missile leaves the silo.
Sarmat's predecessor, the SS-18 mod 5 (R-36M2), is also cold-launched (as were all SS-18 variants). The cap that separates from the missile protects the missile and first stage engines during ejection.
2/18 As Dr. Postol mentioned, the 4D10 is a submerged engine. On the vast majority of liquid-propellant missiles and rockets, the engine(s) are mounted below the propellant tanks.
3/18 But as a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM), the R-27 needed to be very compact, with the largest possible propellant tanks to maximize range. Thus, the 4D10 was submerged in the R-27's fuel tank, with only the tip of the nozzle protruding from the missile's bottom.
In his 2012 paper, Igor Sutyagin estimates that the Slava-class cruisers had 4 warheads assigned to them - 2 nuclear-armed SS-N-12 anti-ship missiles, 1 nuclear-armed SA-N-6 surface-to-air missile, and 1 nuclear depth bomb for the ship's helicopter. europeanleadershipnetwork.org/commentary/ato…
I'm not sure the nuclear SA-N-6s still exist (if they ever did), and removing a depth bomb from the magazine is probably an easy task. I suspect the SS-N-12s, however, are a pain to move around, and can understand the crew avoiding switching out missiles whenever possible.
2/7 For the longest time, we'd wondered what these circular caps on bottom of the missile were for. Now we know: they're covers for penetration aid tubes.
During the terminal part of its flight, the Iskander-M can poop out up to six penetration aids. But what are they?
3/7 Generally speaking, penetration aids (PENAIDs) can work three different ways: physically, as a decoy, using its radar return; thermally, using a flare to spoof heat-seeking weapons, and electronically, spoofing or jamming radars and electronics.
The Russian encampment is at 46.7627° N, 33.3847° E. The column of vehicles was headed southeast (away from the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam) on the R-47.
Oh, that's interesting. They uncoupled the locomotive prior to launch. So the 2-car set for the missiles is a self-contained unit and (similar to the Soviet RT-23) doesn't need to draw power from the locomotive.
Of the two cars, one obviously carries the missiles (and, based on the September launch, the generator), and the other (let's call it the support systems car) presumably carries electronics, tools, and whatnot.