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127-502: The Soviet Union first developed FOBS as a nuclear-weapons delivery system in the 1960s. It was one of the first Soviet efforts to use space to deliver nuclear weapons. In August 2021, the People's Republic of China tested a weapon that combined a FOBS with a hypersonic glide vehicle . Like a kinetic bombardment system but with nuclear weapons, FOBS has several attractive qualities: it has no range limit, its flight path would not reveal

254-655: A famine between 1930 and 1933 that killed millions. The Soviet forced labour camp system of the Gulag was expanded. During the late 1930s, Stalin's government conducted the Great Purge to remove opponents, resulting in mass death, imprisonment, and deportation. In 1939, the USSR and Nazi Germany signed a nonaggression pact , but in 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union in the largest land invasion in history, opening

381-520: A ICBM, but possessing the ability to function as an FOBS is concerning to many world leaders. The specifications that present the primary concern is the extreme range with low trajectory flight to prevent detection from the NORAD system in Alaska, US. The undetected missile could release at-least 10 multiple targeted re-entry vehicles . In September 2023, the leader of Russia, Vladimir Putin confirmed that

508-541: A closer relationship with France and Britain. In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement , the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact . In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in

635-487: A fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers. Mikhail Yangel Mikhail Kuzmich Yangel ( Russian : Михаил Кузьмич Янгель ; 7 November 1911 – 25 October 1971),

762-597: A full orbit. For instance, US Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara argued that the Soviet Union had only agreed "not to place [nuclear] warheads in orbit," continuing on to point out that the FOBS executes its mission on a "fractional orbit, not a full orbit." Senator Henry M. Jackson , chairman of the Joint Atomic Energy Subcommittee on Military Applications, countered that the Soviet FOBS

889-519: A greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (Russian: Союз Советских Республик Европы и Азии , romanized : Soyuz Sovyetskikh Respublik Evropy i Azii ). Joseph Stalin initially resisted Lenin's proposal but ultimately accepted it, and with Lenin's agreement he changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), although all republics began as socialist soviet and did not change to

1016-606: A month after the 20th test, the Soviet Union designated the R-36O as operational and began its deployment in three groups of six. By 1971, all 18 of the Soviet Union's R-36O silos were in service in Kazakhstan. NATO intelligence suggests that a primary target was the US Grand Forks Air Force Base where an ABM system was set to be established in the late 1960s to early 1970s. The R-36O wasn't equipped with

1143-499: A month before the R-36O was declared operational by the USSR, it remained unclear to the CIA whether the tests they had observed involved a FOBS or a "depressed trajectory" ICBM). At a news conference on November 3, 1967, Defense Secretary McNamara announced that the Soviet Union might be creating a FOBS. This was the first time that the FOBS project had been explicitly referred to in public (though Khrushchev alluded to this kind of weapon in

1270-597: A new profitable market. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labour unions or other organizations on the left, which they labelled social fascists . In the usage of the Soviet Union, and of the Comintern and its affiliated parties in this period, the epithet fascist was used to describe capitalist society in general and virtually any anti-Soviet or anti-Stalinist activity or opinion. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with

1397-608: A nuclear payload until 1972. The Soviet Union identified a number of strategic advantages of the FOBS. The following points prompted its development: There are two main technical disadvantages of the FOBS to consider: There are a number of other factors to consider that prompted the end of FOBS deployment in the Soviet Union: The Soviet Union began decommissioning and dismantling the FOBS deployment in 1982 (officially in January 1983). The R36-O missile

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1524-670: A pioneer of storeable hypergolic fuels . His bureau designed the R-12 , R-16 and R-36 , whose launch vehicle adaptations are known as Kosmos , Tsyklon and Dnepr respectively. Yangel narrowly avoided death during the development of the R-16 in the 1960 Nedelin catastrophe . Yangel's bureau was part of the Ministry of General Machine Building headed by Sergey Afanasyev . He died in Moscow in 1971. For his outstanding work, Mikhail Yangel

1651-476: A radio altimeter used in conjunction with an inertial navigation system). The aiming system would make its checks directly after the missile came into orbit and immediately before third stage ignition. Deorbiting would be induced by the missile's retrorocket, the RD-854 engine, causing the warhead to take on a ballistic path towards its target. The warhead, retrorocket, and guidance system were each contained inside

1778-631: A status that is retained by the Russian Federation . Covering a sixth of Earth's land surface, its size was comparable to that of North America . Two other successor states, Kazakhstan and Ukraine , rank among the top 10 countries by land area, and the largest country entirely in Europe, respectively. The European portion accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to

1905-497: A total vehicle mass of 117 tons. It was 35.31 meters long with a 2.68 meter diameter and could carry a single 2.2 megaton yield nuclear warhead. It was cryogenic liquid propelled, utilizing a mix of RG-1 kerosene with liquid oxygen (LOX). Two other FOBS-type missile projects emerged around the time of the GR-1's early development. It seems that each of these projects were competing with one another for usage selection. The first of

2032-475: A union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians . The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as 'Russia'. While the Russian SFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, and most highly developed. The Russian SFSR

2159-533: Is capable of FOBS implementation could be a new form of an arms race setting back both countries in the progress made following the Cold War. The Cold War brought many times of uncertainty surrounding nuclear arms which presented many agreements between the two powers. Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) are the primary weapon of nuclear capability today. The development of the RS-28 Sarmat classified as

2286-573: Is derived from the Russian word sovet (Russian: совет ), meaning 'council', 'assembly', 'advice', ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of * vět-iti ('to inform'), related to Slavic věst ('news'), English wise . The word sovietnik means 'councillor'. Some organizations in Russian history were called council (Russian: совет ). In the Russian Empire ,

2413-655: Is his background, his education , his profession . These are the questions that will determine the fate of the accused. That is the meaning and essence of the Red Terror ." During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , or by

2540-520: The Council of People's Commissars ), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of

2667-606: The Eastern Front of World War II . The Soviets played a decisive role in defeating the Axis powers , suffering an estimated 27 million casualties , which accounted for most Allied losses. In the aftermath of the war , the Soviet Union consolidated the territory occupied by the Red Army , forming satellite states , and undertook rapid economic development which cemented its status as a superpower . Geopolitical tensions with

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2794-755: The Land Forces , the Air Force , the Navy , Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) and the Internal Troops . The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD secret police, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in

2921-528: The Moscow State Institute of International Relations . The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and changed directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions. During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it

3048-657: The Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia , was much less populous. It spanned over 10,000 kilometres (6,200 mi) east to west across 11 time zones , and over 7,200 kilometres (4,500 mi) north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra , taiga , steppes , desert and mountains . The USSR, like Russia , had the world's longest border , measuring over 60,000 kilometres (37,000 mi), or 1 + 1 ⁄ 2 circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it

3175-790: The Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join with all anti-Fascist political, labour, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism , especially of the Nazi variety. The rapid growth of power in Nazi Germany encouraged both Paris and Moscow to form a military alliance, and the Franco-Soviet Treaty of Mutual Assistance was signed in May 1935. A firm believer in collective security, Stalin's foreign minister Maxim Litvinov worked very hard to form

3302-576: The R-36M2 or known to NATO as SS-18 Satan. The United States Pentagon claims that the RS-28 ICBM can be deployed as a FOBS and could potentially increase the range up to 38,000km. Not only is this idea concerning for security reasons, but the 1967 Outer Space Treaty would prohibit this action likely resulting with responses from NATO, the severity of the consequences would likely depend on the initial action. The RS-28 Sarmat had entered service in 2021, but

3429-464: The Soviet Union , was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. During its existence, it was the largest country by area , extending across eleven time zones and sharing borders with twelve countries , and the third-most populous country . An overall successor to the Russian Empire , it was nominally organized as a federal union of national republics ,

3556-581: The Soviet republics , and the control of the Communist Party weakened. The failed coup attempt in August 1991 against Gorbachev by hardline communists hastened the end of the Soviet Union , which formally dissolved on December 26, 1991, ending nearly seven decades of Soviet rule. With an area of 22,402,200 square kilometres (8,649,500 sq mi), the Soviet Union was the world's largest country,

3683-772: The State Council , which functioned from 1810 to 1917, was referred to as a Council of Ministers. The Soviets as workers' councils first appeared during the 1905 Russian Revolution . Although they were quickly suppressed by the Imperial army, after the February Revolution of 1917 , workers' and soldiers' Soviets emerged throughout the country and shared power with the Russian Provisional Government . The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin , demanded that all power be transferred to

3810-635: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), saying that it was "overly juridical" and potentially infringed on national sovereignty. The Soviet Union later signed legally-binding human rights documents, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1973 (and the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights ), but they were neither widely known or accessible to people living under Communist rule, nor were they taken seriously by

3937-769: The largest arsenal of nuclear weapons in the world . As an Allied nation, it was a founding member of the United Nations as well as one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council . Before its dissolution, the USSR was one of the world's two superpowers through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, global diplomatic and ideological influence (particularly in the Global South ), military and economic strengths, and scientific accomplishments. The word soviet

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4064-538: The right to food , the right to work , and the right to education . The Soviet conception of human rights was very different from international law . According to Soviet legal theory , "it is the government who is the beneficiary of human rights which are to be asserted against the individual". The Soviet state was considered as the source of human rights. Therefore, the Soviet legal system considered law an arm of politics and it also considered courts agencies of

4191-441: The 18 Soviet FOBS launchers in Kazakhstan were to be taken apart or demolished and never replaced. This was meant to happen within an eight month period following the treaty's ratification. The terms allowed the USSR to modify the six remaining launchers to fit missile modernization testing purposes. The U.S. considered creating orbital bombardment weapons in the early 1960s, but concluded in 1963 that they offered few advantages over

4318-703: The 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union , concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR , to himself. Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling

4445-482: The 1950s, the Soviet Union expanded its efforts in space exploration and took a lead in the Space Race with the first artificial satellite , the first human spaceflight , the first space station , and the first probe to land on another planet . In 1985, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev , sought to reform the country through his policies of glasnost and perestroika . In 1989, various countries of

4572-601: The 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines , and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel . It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea , which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in

4699-525: The Air Force Frank Kendall III said that the People's Liberation Army was developing and testing a FOBS. In 2021, Russia entered into service a new ICBM that could arguably fit the criteria to be considered a FOBS. The RS-28 Sarmat or SS-X-30 Satan II is a liquid-fueled missile with a range of 10,000-18,000km and a payload capacity of 10,000kg which can be various types of warheads and weapons. The RS-28 Sarmat will be replacing

4826-526: The CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees , local Soviets and executive committees . While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary. The state security police (the KGB and its predecessor agencies ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Red Terror and Great Purge , but

4953-400: The Cold War and ICBMs tend to be the go-to for most advanced militaries. ICBMs can hold larger warheads because they do not need retrorockets to get the warhead out of orbit like the FOBS does. [4] The amount of warheads the vehicle can deliver is still unknown. The invention of FOB missiles is nothing new. In the 1960s, the Soviet Union tested these missiles. The development was scrapped in

5080-529: The Communist authorities. Under Joseph Stalin , the death penalty was extended to adolescents as young as 12 years old in 1935. Sergei Kovalev recalled "the famous article 125 of the Constitution which enumerated all basic civil and political rights" in the Soviet Union. But when he and other prisoners attempted to use this as a legal basis for their abuse complaints, their prosecutor's argument

5207-438: The FOBS was not particularly useful militarily may explain why the Soviet FOBS was defended by McNamara and others as legal under the 1967 Outer Space Treaty . U.S. officials may not have been willing to see the treaty break down over a single issue like the FOBS, especially given that they had already evaluated it as a minor threat in the grand scheme of that period's nuclear weapon landscape. In 2021, United States Secretary of

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5334-633: The FOBS: Each Party undertakes not to develop, test, or deploy: (...) (c) systems for placing into Earth orbit nuclear weapons or any other kind of weapons of mass destruction , including fractional orbital missiles; The SALT II agreement was never ratified by the United States Senate. The Soviet Union ultimately complied with its terms anyway, decommissioning its FOBS in 1983 (see the 'End of deployment and associated reasons' section). The agreement also stipulated that 12 of

5461-513: The GR-1's 8D726 retrorocket was demonstrating a proclivity for failure in its initial tests and, as a cause for yet more worry, the troublesome R-9A , the subject of a different ongoing Korolev ICBM project, was quite similar to the GR-1 in construction. Thus, military leadership was encouraged to look elsewhere for more immediate progress. The GR-1's ability to deal with US ABM systems and its lengthy fueling process were questioned by Soviet analysts. There were also significant delays associated with

5588-648: The GR-2. It was to use the RD-0202 and RD-0205 engines for its first and second stages respectively and be equipped with an AB-200 aeroballistic warhead. Unlike the GR-1, the UR-200 and its derivatives used storable (or hypergolic) liquid propellants ; specifically nitrogen tetroxide and UDMH . Chelomey and his engineers received development authorization for the UR-200 ICBM on March 16, 1961, beginning work on

5715-608: The ICBM. So when the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) began in 1962 to suspect that the Soviet Union would develop a FOBS-like system, they concluded that Moscow sought the weapon for "propaganda or political reasons", not any militarily significant capacity. The Soviet Union's R-36O test launches in 1966 and 1967 persuaded the CIA that Moscow was more serious about the military applications (though even through October 1968, around

5842-500: The OGCh module. A series of nozzles on the RD-854 enabled aerial maneuvering of the OGCh. Other nozzles facilitated the separation of the warhead from the rest of the OGCh, allowing it to fall alone on a ballistic path to the target. The R-36O's 8F021 warhead had an explosive yield between 5-20 megatons according to Soviet sources. Western intelligence suggests that the yield was smaller, being somewhere between 1-3.5 megatons. The missile

5969-553: The Pacific Ocean; the missile's payload would be retrofired into Soviet territory. Over 2000 Soviet service people participated in the tests. Six of the tests were outright failures while the others achieved either complete or partial success. Prior to the first launches, the Soviet Union stated that a "space vehicle landing system" was being tested over the Pacific. The first test flight occurred on December 16, 1965. It missed

6096-538: The Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party. Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from

6223-524: The R-36O a better choice for further FOBS development. Having lost the ability to tap into the Soviet Premier's influence, Chelomey ultimately failed to secure the survival of the UR-200A, its development coming to an end in 1965. At its missile range near Baikonur , Kazakhstan, the Soviet Union tested and deployed the R-36O. A testing station and a horizontal assembly facility were constructed for

6350-404: The RD-251 engine in its first stage and the RD-252 engine in its second stage. The weapon's third stage was related to the deorbiting process as well as warhead guidance and delivery; the Soviets referred to this system as OGCh. An aiming system inside the OGCh would check and rectify trajectory issues in relation to the desired target location through the use of various instruments (for instance,

6477-499: The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), the world's first constitutionally socialist state . The revolution was not accepted by all within the Russian Republic , resulting in the Russian Civil War . The RSFSR and its subordinate republics were merged into the Soviet Union in 1922. Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power, inaugurating rapid industrialization and forced collectivization that led to significant economic growth but contributed to

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6604-420: The Russian name of the Soviet Union as СС has been taboo, the reason being that СС as a Russian Cyrillic abbreviation is associated with the infamous Schutzstaffel of Nazi Germany , as SS is in English. In English-language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. The Russian SFSR dominated the Soviet Union to such an extent that, for most of the Soviet Union's existence, it

6731-450: The Soviet Union and turned into SSRs, which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation . After the Soviet invasion of Finland , the Karelo-Finnish SSR was formed on annexed territory as a Union Republic in March 1940 and then incorporated into Russia as the Karelian ASSR in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below). While nominally

6858-477: The Soviet Union . Boris Yeltsin , the leader of the RSFSR, oversaw its reconstitution into the Russian Federation , which became the Soviet Union's successor state; all other republics emerged as fully independent post-Soviet states . During its existence, the Soviet Union produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations . It had the world's second-largest economy and largest standing military. An NPT-designated state , it wielded

6985-454: The Soviet Union was capable of utilizing "global missiles" that could fly over both the North and South Poles on their way to a target, continuing on to say that this type of weapon would render early warning radar systems practically obsolete and leave the enemy with no time to retaliate before the weapon's impact. Korolev's engineers first estimated that NATO radar systems would detect the GR-1's warhead only two minutes before arrival. The GR-1

7112-417: The Soviet Union's priorities changed. Despite previous conflict with the United Kingdom , Vyacheslav Molotov dropped his post war border demands. The Cold War was a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc , which began following World War II in 1945. The term cold war is used because there

7239-480: The Soviet Union's superpower status, the economy struggled due to its centralized nature, technological backwardness, and inefficiencies. The vast military expenditures and burdens of maintaining the Eastern Bloc, further strained the Soviet economy. In the 1980s, Mikhail Gorbachev 's policies of Glasnost (openness) and Perestroika (restructuring) aimed to revitalize the Soviet system but instead accelerated its unraveling. Nationalist movements gained momentum across

7366-424: The Soviet authorities admitted. The Soviet Union was the world's second largest producer of harmful emissions. In 1988, total emissions in the Soviet Union were about 79% of those in the United States. But since the Soviet GNP was only 54% of that of the United States, this means that the Soviet Union generated 1.5 times more pollution than the United States per unit of GNP. The Soviet Chernobyl disaster in 1986

7493-406: The Soviets, and gained support from the workers and soldiers. After the October Revolution , in which the Bolsheviks seized power from the Provisional Government in the name of the Soviets, Lenin proclaimed the formation of the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic (RSFSR). During the Georgian Affair of 1922, Lenin called for the Russian SFSR and other national Soviet republics to form

7620-415: The Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet ,

7747-400: The Treaty undertake not to place in orbit around the Earth any objects carrying nuclear weapons or any other kinds of weapons of mass destruction, install such weapons on celestial bodies, or station such weapons in outer space in any other manner. The overriding opinion of US administrators was that the Soviet FOBS did not violate the treaty, mostly for the reason that the system didn't go into

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7874-435: The UR-200A variant at some point after. The second of the two other projects came from the Soviet missile designer Mikhail Yangel . His proposal was the R-36O (8K69 by GRAU index and SS-9 Mod 3 Scarp by NATO report) which was approved for development by Soviet officials on April 16, 1962. Yangel used an ICBM design of his own, the R-36 (NATO designation SS-9 Scarp), as a base for the R-36O. The missile had three stages, using

8001-551: The US led to the Cold War . The American-led Western Bloc coalesced into NATO in 1949, prompting the Soviet Union to form its own military alliance, the Warsaw Pact , in 1955. Neither side engaged in direct military confrontation, and instead fought on an ideological basis and through proxy wars . In 1953, following Stalin's death , the Soviet Union undertook a campaign of de-Stalinization under Nikita Khrushchev , which saw reversals and rejections of Stalinist policies. This campaign caused tensions with Communist China . During

8128-430: The USSR. Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and de facto diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it

8255-409: The Warsaw Pact overthrew their Soviet-backed regimes , and nationalist and separatist movements erupted across the Soviet Union. In 1991, amid efforts to preserve the country as a renewed federation , an attempted coup against Gorbachev by hardline communists prompted the largest republics—Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus—to secede. On December 26, Gorbachev officially recognized the dissolution of

8382-449: The accident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). Another major radioactive accident was the Kyshtym disaster . The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with major problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk , where nickel , for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During

8509-464: The country had deployed missiles that would ensure safety and provide a strong deterrence to any enemy (referring to the Sarmat). China tested a FOBS missile system in July and August of 2021. [1] A rocket was launched into orbital flight and re-entered the atmosphere deploying a glide vehicle that traveled at hypersonic speeds. [2] It is claimed that the warhead missed its unidentified target by roughly twenty-four miles. [3] FOBS are technologies from

8636-429: The country was limited. The state restricted rights of citizens to private property . According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights , human rights are the "basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled." including the right to life and liberty , freedom of expression , and equality before the law ; and social, cultural and economic rights, including the right to participate in culture ,

8763-442: The creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget . The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee ) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court , the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as

8890-409: The degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by

9017-432: The duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in

9144-460: The early 1960s). McNamara emphasized that the potential Soviet FOBS did not worry him in consideration of its disadvantages compared to the ICBM. At a subsequent congressional hearing, John S. Foster Jr. , Director of Defense Research and Engineering, said that the U.S. had since 1963 been developing "over-the-horizon" radar networks that could give about 30 minutes' warning of a FOBS strike, and that such funding would continue. The U.S.' view that

9271-514: The field of ballistic missiles, where he first was in charge of guidance systems . As Sergei Korolev ’s associate, he set up a rocket propulsion centre in Dnepropetrovsk in UkSSR which later formed the basis of his own OKB-586 design bureau in 1954. At first, Yangel’s facility served to mass-produce and further develop intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) in which area Yangel was

9398-583: The first FOBS-type missile design. His offering was the GR-1 ; it was also known as 'Global Missile 1' within Korolev's design bureau, as SS-X-10 Scrag by NATO authorities, and as 11A513 (or 8K73) by Soviet GRAU index. Korolev's research began as early as 1960 and the GR-1 project was sanctioned by Soviet officials on September 24, 1962. Korolev brought up the idea of the GR-1 to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev in early 1962. Soon after, Khrushchev announced that

9525-593: The flight path of an HGV based missile is harder to predict, and could cause trouble for anyone attempting to intercept them.   While a FOBS system could essentially bypass missile defense systems located in the northern regions of the United States, the United States has been upgrading existing radar on stationary and mobile platforms as well, which could diminish the strike rate of a hypersonic glide vehicle. [7] Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( USSR ), commonly known as

9652-831: The founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan PSPs . In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR

9779-410: The general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism , demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above. The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments . All senior government officials and most deputies of

9906-525: The globe. The post-Stalin leadership, particularly under Nikita Khrushchev , initiated a de-Stalinization process, leading to a period of liberalization and relative openness known as the Khrushchev Thaw . However, the subsequent era under Leonid Brezhnev , referred to as the Era of Stagnation , was marked by economic decline, political corruption, and a rigid gerontocracy . Despite efforts to maintain

10033-497: The government. Extensive extrajudicial powers were given to the Soviet secret police agencies . In practice, the Soviet government significantly curbed the rule of law , civil liberties , protection of law and guarantees of property , which were considered as examples of "bourgeois morality" by Soviet law theorists such as Andrey Vyshinsky . The USSR and other countries in the Soviet Bloc had abstained from affirming

10160-518: The highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989, the first in Soviet history. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since

10287-472: The implementation of socialist policies and the New Economic Policy (NEP), which allowed for market-oriented reforms. The rise of Joseph Stalin in the late 1920s ushered in an era of intense centralization and totalitarianism. Stalin's rule was characterized by the forced collectivization of agriculture , rapid industrialization , and the Great Purge , which eliminated perceived enemies of

10414-417: The landing area by a wide margin owing to a stabilization instrument malfunction. The second test was on February 5, 1966 and was also a failure due to a retrorocket issue. The third test took place on March 16, 1966. Nitrogen tetroxide spilled over the surface pad during fueling due to a miscommunication and the missile was quickly destroyed by fire. Some success was had with the fourth test on May 20, 1966, but

10541-462: The large mass of resulting debris. In one failed test case, small pieces of the missile rained down on the midwestern United States. In 1967, the Soviet Union conducted ten more R-36O tests, nine of them seeing some level of success. In that year and beyond, the Soviet Union used public statements about satellite launch tests as cover for any R-36O test that was intended to put its payload into orbit for some period of time. On November 19, 1968, about

10668-545: The largest and most populous of which was the Russian SFSR . In practice, its government and economy were highly centralized . As a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , it was a flagship communist state . Its capital and largest city was Moscow . The Soviet Union's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917. The new government, led by Vladimir Lenin , established

10795-617: The late 1960s however, because the Soviet government thought they were inadequate due to their decreased payload and easier detection. The Chinese military tested these same missiles using the new Hypersonic Glide Vehicle (or HGVs) equipment. Like other medium and long range ballistic missiles, HGVs can reach Mach 5 speeds easily at around 1 mile per second. [5] The difference between missiles equipped with HGVs and those that are not, are that HGV missiles can maneuver and change course after launch far easier than regular ballistic missiles without an HGV. [6] While these missiles can still be detected,

10922-400: The missile's development initially. Over most of 1965, two R-36 test pads were modified to work with the R-36O for its early test flights. In addition, 18 silos capable of launching the R-36O were built over the mid 1960s to 1971; three rounds of construction occurred with six silos being built each time. Those built in the same area were placed 10-15 kilometers away from one another to prevent

11049-541: The most common Russian initialization is Союз ССР (transliteration: Soyuz SSR ) which essentially translates to Union of SSRs in English. In addition, the Russian short form name Советский Союз (transliteration: Sovyetsky Soyuz , which literally means Soviet Union ) is also commonly used, but only in its unabbreviated form. Since the start of the Great Patriotic War at the latest, abbreviating

11176-417: The newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR , and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt . The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power 'in the period of transition'. Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR. The judiciary

11303-400: The nominal head of state . The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations . However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party, nor

11430-608: The official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force fourth, and Navy fifth). The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis , under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov , it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989, there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on

11557-544: The only legal party and the final policymaker in the country. At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee , elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the general secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the de facto highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on

11684-694: The other order until 1936 . In addition, in the regional languages of several republics, the word council or conciliar in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian soviet and never in others, e.g. Ukrainian SSR . СССР (in the Latin alphabet: SSSR ) is the abbreviation of the Russian-language cognate of USSR, as written in Cyrillic letters . The Soviets used this abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. After this,

11811-570: The partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II . Up until his death in 1953, Joseph Stalin controlled all foreign relations of the Soviet Union during the interwar period . Despite the increasing build-up of Germany 's war machine and the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War , the Soviet Union did not cooperate with any other nation, choosing to follow its own path. However, after Operation Barbarossa ,

11938-538: The party's highest body the Politburo . Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs . It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in

12065-408: The payload didn't break away from the missile's guidance system as intended. The following tests were conducted from silos. The first two tests of the silo phase ended in the intentional destruction (via self-destruct functionality) of the R-36O as a result of the second stage engine accidentally being activated for too long, sending the payload into an unplanned orbit. NATO radar systems picked up on

12192-481: The possibility of a single nuclear strike destroying multiple silos. The Soviet Union originally planned nineteen R-36O launches, but 24 were carried out by 1971. The initial four were to begin from a ground-based testing pad and then fly to the Kamchatka Peninsula . The other tests called for the R-36O to be launched from a silo into orbit where it would then execute its third stage deorbit process over

12319-548: The production of the GR-1's NK-9 engine, of which the Kuznetsov bureau was responsible for. Under the weight of these issues, the GR-1 project fell apart in January 1965. Chelomey's UR-200A project lost a great deal of support after Khrushchev, his most important political ally, was ousted in 1964. Military authorities under the Brezhnev administration were far less friendly to Chelomey and quick to deem

12446-714: The state. The Soviet Union played a crucial role in the Allied victory in World War II , but at a tremendous human cost, with millions of Soviet citizens perishing in the conflict. The Soviet Union emerged as one of the world's two superpowers, leading the Eastern Bloc in opposition to the Western Bloc during the Cold War . This period saw the USSR engage in an arms race, the Space Race , and proxy wars around

12573-469: The struggle for dominance was expressed via indirect means such as psychological warfare , propaganda campaigns, espionage , far-reaching embargoes , rivalry at sports events and technological competitions such as the Space Race . Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being

12700-465: The target location, and warheads could be directed to North America over the South Pole , evading detection by NORAD 's north-facing early warning systems. The maximum altitude would be around 150 km. Energetically, this would require a launch vehicle powerful enough to be capable of putting the weapon 'into orbit'. Some USSR officials began expressing a desire for a FOBS-type weapon around

12827-587: The time of Sputnik's launch. By the early 1960s, the Soviet Union felt that pursuing a system like the FOBS would be a natural next step given its belief that the US was already planning to use space to mount nuclear attacks. The success of the Soviet Vostok program which saw a rocket send a human into orbit and then land at a predesignated location made this kind of weapon seem more feasible. Soviet rocket engineer Sergei Korolev seems to have been responsible for

12954-539: The treaty did not ban any form of weapons testing—not even the testing of an orbital nuclear weapons system. None of the Soviet Union's test R-36Os were ever equipped with a nuclear warhead; so, even if it were the case that the launches went orbital, they still would not have broken the treaty. Unlike the Outer Space Treaty, the SALT II agreement of 1979 explicitly prohibited the pursuance and deployment of

13081-492: The truth". Human rights in the Soviet Union were severely limited. The Soviet Union was a totalitarian state from 1927 until 1953 and a one-party state until 1990. Freedom of speech was suppressed and dissent was punished. Independent political activities were not tolerated, whether these involved participation in free labour unions , private corporations , independent churches or opposition political parties . The freedom of movement within and especially outside

13208-401: The two other projects was that of Soviet missile engineer Vladimir Chelomey who proposed two designs: one called the UR-200A (GRAU index 8K83) that was derivative of his UR-200 ICBM and another designated as GR-2 which built off of his colossal UR-500 prototype ICBM and had a much larger explosive yield of 30 megatons. The UR-200A design was eventually selected for further development over

13335-527: The west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19 , K-8 , a K-129 , K-27 , K-219 and K-278 Komsomolets . There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union , the government represented by the Council of Ministers , and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),

13462-465: The world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran ), and Lake Baikal , the world's largest (by volume) and deepest freshwater lake that is also an internal body of water in Russia. Neighbouring countries were aware of the high levels of pollution in the Soviet Union but after the dissolution of the Soviet Union it was discovered that its environmental problems were greater than what

13589-719: Was 32.60 meters long with a 3.00 meter diameter and a total launch mass of 180 tons. The R-36O used the same hypergolic propellants as the UR-200. In 1965, Soviet military officials worked to select one of the three FOBS projects. The R-36O of Yangel's design bureau was chosen for further development over the others. The reasoning behind the Soviet FOBS design selection process remains somewhat unclear. A particularly confounding factor to consider is that none of the three proposed missiles had undergone a single test flight prior to the R-36O's selection. Even so, there are some explanations as to why Yangel's design

13716-565: Was a Soviet engineer born in Irkutsk who was the leading designer in the missile program of the former Soviet Union . Yangel was the grandson of a Russian political prisoner who had been deported to Siberia by the Tsarist regime. Yangel's career started as an aviation engineer, after graduating from Moscow Aviation Institute in 1937. He worked with famous aircraft designers Nikolai Polikarpov and later, Artem Mikoyan . Then he moved to

13843-572: Was a coastline . The country bordered Afghanistan , the People's Republic of China , Czechoslovakia , Finland , Hungary , Iran , Mongolia , North Korea , Norway , Poland , Romania , and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the USSR from the United States . The country's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak ) in Tajikistan , at 7,495 metres (24,590 ft). The USSR also included most of

13970-539: Was also the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was 'window dressing' for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called 'Russians', not 'Soviets', since 'everyone knew who really ran the show'. Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of

14097-463: Was at least a "good faith violation of the treaty," alluding to the notion that the weapon could go into technical orbit. This is certainly true: the only thing stopping the Soviet FOBS' payload from completing a full revolution around the Earth (and thereby literally going orbital and violating the treaty) was the firing of the system's retrorocket. Even so, McNamara also drew attention to the fact that

14224-483: Was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov , the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The constitution , which

14351-595: Was carried out within the terms of the Soviet Civil Code. Some Soviet legal scholars even said that "criminal repression" may be applied in the absence of guilt. Martin Latsis , chief of Soviet Ukraine 's secret police explained: "Do not look in the file of incriminating evidence to see whether or not the accused rose up against the Soviets with arms or words. Ask him instead to which class he belongs, what

14478-428: Was chosen in the end. These revolve around the occurrence of negative events in the competing GR-1 and UR-200A projects that effectively knocked them out of contention. One strike against Korolev's GR-1 was that it used a cryogenic propellant, thereby rendering the missile a poor candidate for operational storage in a missile silo as the Soviet military desired. Other negative factors include that

14605-542: Was colloquially, but incorrectly, referred to as Russia . The history of the Soviet Union began with the ideals of the Bolshevik Revolution and ended in dissolution amidst economic collapse and political disintegration. Established in 1922 following the Russian Civil War , the Soviet Union quickly became a one-party state under the Communist Party . Its early years under Lenin were marked by

14732-496: Was completely removed from service by February 1983. Starting in May 1984, the Soviet Union razed its FOBS-capable silos. There's confusion over whether all 18 silos were destroyed. One source suggests that six silos were instead modified for the purpose of ICBM modernization testing, as per a SALT II agreement (see Outer Space Treaty and SALT II ). Article IV of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 stated that: Parties to

14859-404: Was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia , Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from the Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Soviet-occupied Bessarabia , and Ukrainian SSR. Estonia , Latvia and Lithuania were also annexed by

14986-424: Was no large-scale fighting directly between the two superpowers , but they each supported major regional conflicts known as proxy wars . The conflict was based around the ideological and geopolitical struggle for global influence by these two superpowers, following their temporary alliance and victory against Nazi Germany in 1945. Aside from the nuclear arsenal development and conventional military deployment,

15113-450: Was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts ( People's Court ) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law , where the judge, procurator , and defence attorney collaborate to "establish

15240-475: Was not successfully tested until 2022 when it concluded its first test flight. Following Russia's new highly advanced missile, the United States is leaning towards the development of a new missile to replace the outperformed Minuteman III missile. The United States response program would cost ~$ 85 billion according to the Pentagon. The results of these missile developments, particularly the RS-28 Sarmat which

15367-485: Was promulgated in 1924 , 1936 and 1977 , did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in

15494-477: Was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of

15621-482: Was that "the Constitution was written not for you, but for American Negroes, so that they know how happy the lives of Soviet citizens are". Crime was determined not as the infraction of law, instead, it was determined as any action which could threaten the Soviet state and society. For example, a desire to make a profit could be interpreted as a counter-revolutionary activity punishable by death. The liquidation and deportation of millions of peasants in 1928–31

15748-587: Was the Russian responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic —lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help. By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became

15875-404: Was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant . Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses were scattered relatively far. Although long-term effects of the accident were unknown, 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer which resulted from the accident's contamination were reported at the time of

16002-486: Was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned . The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets ) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including

16129-584: Was to use the NK-9 and NK-9V as main engines in its first and second stages respectively. Though the NK-9 and NK-9V weren't created by Korolev's team, the GR-1's 8D726 retrorocket engine was. This engine would prove to be instrumental to the progress of Russian rocketry, specifically for its importance in the development of the Blok-D upper stage of rockets like the N1, Proton , and Zenit . The GR-1 had three stages and

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