michael barbaro

From The New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro. This is “The Daily.” Today: The mysterious explosion of a Russian missile has left an entire team of scientists dead. David Sanger on what that means for an arms race between the United States and Russia that both sides seem to want. It’s Friday, August 16. David, tell me what happened last Thursday in Russia.

david sanger

Well, if you were in Moscow, Michael, and you were watching TV, all of a sudden your screen went blue. And there was a big star that appeared on a blue background. There was wording up there basically telling people to take cover. It said —

archived recording [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

— a strong wind is expected. Take cover in a capital building. Do not shelter or park under trees or rickety structures. Be careful.

archived recording [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

michael barbaro

So this is a storm warning.

david sanger

Yeah, it’s a storm warning, but the oddity is there was no storm.

[music]

david sanger

Meanwhile, if you were up in northern Russia, up near the White Sea — this is the part of Russia that’s sort of closest to Finland — and you were looking on the website of one of the local cities, you saw an indication of a big surge, a brief surge in the afternoon in radiation levels. This, obviously, led a lot of people to be concerned. And there were announcements, and there was actually a rush to buy iodide. Because if you remember back to the old Cold War days, people used to stockpile iodide to keep their thyroid from absorbing radiation and causing thyroid cancer. Then, a few hours later, that warning just disappeared from the city website.

michael barbaro

Hm. So this is sounding kind of mysterious.

david sanger

It’s sounding kind of mysterious and really, really ominous. And all of a sudden, there was pressure underway for either local officials or the Russian government to begin to offer some answers about what was going on. Now, what everybody knew near this northern Russian town was that there’s a big missile test site nearby. And the first explanation that the Russians gave was that there had been an accident with a liquid-fueled missile. The problem with that explanation is most liquid-fueled missiles don’t produce any radiation. So that didn’t make sense. And then another statement came out that said that actually what happened was an explosion of an isotope power source for a liquid-fueled rocket. Well, that was the first admission by the Russian government that something involving a radiological event had taken place.

michael barbaro

Because isotope suggests radiation.

david sanger

Exactly. But of course, the Russians weren’t coming clean about exactly what it was. They didn’t say nuclear. They didn’t say atomic. They didn’t say accident. They simply said something went wrong with an isotope power supply. And that really got people nervous.

michael barbaro

So what actually happened?

david sanger

Well, as we tried to piece it together, we got a picture of the Russians testing an entirely new kind of nuclear missile, one that uses a small nuclear reactor to propel it. And that, in the course of the testing, something went wrong with the nuclear reactor. And over the course of a day or so, we learned that seven people died, that the reactor had actually exploded after it was recovered from the sea, and that this had turned into a much larger disaster than the Russians had ever publicly admitted.

michael barbaro

But David, I thought that Russia and the U.S. don’t test nuclear weapons and haven’t tested them for years. So how do you explain that?

david sanger

Well, you’re exactly right, Michael. The U.S. and Russia haven’t tested any nuclear weapons for more than 20 years. But to understand what’s happening here, you have to go back to 2018 —

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

— when Vladimir Putin gave his state of the union address. But he did this one with lots of animation. Had a big screen behind him, and he showed images of three new nuclear delivery systems that Russia was developing.

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

And when you watch the animation, it was incredible, and scary, and maybe part-fantasy. But here’s what he showed.

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

One of the weapons was an undersea autonomous drone. Basically, imagine an autonomous torpedo with a nuclear weapon screwed into the nose cone.

michael barbaro

Wow.

david sanger

And it was quickly dubbed the Poseidon. And the idea was that Russia could have it cruising around in the ocean. And if there was ever a nuclear exchange, and even if Moscow was destroyed and all the nuclear commanders were knocked out or killed, this drone would have built-in instructions to head to the West Coast of the United States —

michael barbaro

Wow.

david sanger

— undersea, where American missile defenses could never get at it. So that was one weapon. That was the real doomsday machine.

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

The second one —

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

— was a missile that would move at Mach 5 — that’s five times the speed of sound — and would never really manage to go very high up into outer space, so that the missile itself, again, would avoid missile defenses, which usually are designed to find a predictable arc for an incoming intercontinental ballistic missile and destroy it in outer space.

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

And then the third missile —

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

david sanger

— was basically a cruise missile, which NATO called Skyfall. And yes, before you ask me, Michael, that is the title of a James Bond movie. But a cruise missile goes in a zigzag direction. It can reverse itself. It can go around mountains. It can hug the land. And again, it defeats missile defenses because the missile defenses can’t even see it. In fact, radar may not pick up a cruise missile if it’s down low enough. But what was really strange about this last missile was that it was supposed to be powered by a small nuclear reactor. The nuclear reactor at the back of the missile meant that it could reach any corner of the world, because a nuclear reactor can run for weeks, months, maybe even years. So basically, the fuel is limitless and the range of the missile is limitless.

archived recording [SOUND OF EXPLOSION]

michael barbaro

That’s like science fiction.

david sanger

You know what it’s like? It’s like “Dr. Strangelove.”

archived recording (vladimir putin) [SPEAKING RUSSIAN] [APPLAUSE]

michael barbaro

So is that the weapon that we think might have exploded on Thursday night, that third kind of weapon that Putin outlined during this speech in 2018?

david sanger

Exactly.

michael barbaro

And clearly, David, Vladimir Putin is not trying to hide the fact that Russia is working on these pretty stunning weapons. I mean, in this speech, he’s actively broadcasting to the world that he is working on developing these.

david sanger

Oh, he’s not hiding a thing. I mean, quite the opposite. It really does show you what the nature of the new arms race is, and how it’s different from what went before. Back in the ‘60s and ‘70s, the Americans and the Russians would try to hide their developments from each other. Eventually, of course, some of them came out. But what Putin wanted to do was announce to the public, we’re back. And in fact, remember, he announced this in 2018 just before a major Russian election. And he was basically saying, you know, we are going to restore the power of the old Soviet Union. You respected the old Soviet Union because it had nuclear weapons. And now, having revived the conventional military, Putin was saying, I’m reviving our nuclear force and finding a way to evade all of those anti-missile systems that the Americans have spent $300 billion building over the past 30 years.

michael barbaro

So how does the United States react to that disclosure of these new weapons plans by Russia, our longtime adversary?

david sanger

Well, the reactions were mixed, Michael. And there was obviously a group that was pretty freaked out, because, you know, not a whole lot has changed in nuclear technology since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and suddenly here were the Russians announcing a whole new set of weapons. Then there was a group saying, you know, good luck with that reactor thing. But then there was a third group that was actually pretty gleeful about the entire thing.

michael barbaro

Gleeful.

david sanger

Gleeful, Michael, because there is a group inside the Pentagon, certainly among many conservatives in the arms world, who believe the United States has underinvested in its nuclear weapons over the past 10 to 15 years. And here, all of a sudden, was the justification for what they’ve long argued for, which is a renewal of the American nuclear arsenal.

michael barbaro

Hm. So they actually see this — some of them — in the United States as an opportunity to do something that they’ve wanted to do for a long time, but have felt that they couldn’t.

david sanger

Yeah, Michael, there are two arguments for building up a nuclear arsenal. One is you go to Congress and you say, there’s new technology around, we should really do this. That may not convince very many people, and certainly isn’t going to convince many of the Democrats. The other way to go at it is to say, we’re falling behind, and if we don’t invest, too, we’re really going to find that we’ve got an old system that can’t defend against a new class of nuclear weapons.

michael barbaro

And with Putin’s speech, they have what looks like a very legitimate argument that the U.S. could be falling behind.

david sanger

Absolutely. And that’s the argument that was working. Buried in that more than $700 billion defense budget that President Trump has pushed through is a lot of new money for new nuclear weapons, hypersonic missiles, all kinds of weaponry that many in the Pentagon and many defense contractors have been dreaming about for a decade or two, but now they’re getting to go experiment with.

[music]

michael barbaro

We’ll be right back. So at this point, David, you’re describing two adversaries who are seeing opportunities to build up their nuclear program. But my sense is that both countries operate under this massive structure of nuclear treaties that mean that neither can do any of the things that you’re describing. So how does that work?

david sanger

Well, Michael, the treaties that were signed over the course of decades between Russia and the United States have begun to fritter away. Some have expired. President Trump, since he came in, made it clear he wanted to get out of at least one, the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty —

archived recording (donald trump) You have to have everybody adhere to it. And you have a certain side that almost pretends it doesn’t exist.

david sanger

— which he said the Russians were violating, and they were.

archived recording (donald trump) We can’t be put at the disadvantage of going by a treaty, limiting what we do, when somebody else doesn’t go by that treaty. O.K.?

david sanger

And that happened just a few weeks ago —

archived recording The United States taking a stand against Russia.

david sanger

— where the U.S. ended it.

archived recording The U.S. is pulling out of a decades-long nuclear treaty with Russia, sparking fears of a new arms race we thought was confined to the Cold War.

david sanger

And now there’s a question about whether the one remaining treaty between the United States and Russia — it’s called New START, and which limits the number of intercontinental nuclear weapons — will even be renewed when it expires in February 2021, just a month after the next presidential inauguration. So this whole structure that’s been built up over the past 20 or 30 years to limit both sides in what they can build, that is all crumbling. And meanwhile, new technologies are coming up with new kinds of weapons that aren’t even covered by the treaties anyway. And that’s exactly what both Putin and President Trump are experimenting with.

michael barbaro

David, from everything you’re saying, both the U.S. and Russia are simultaneously casting off this history of denuclearization treaties that limited the size of our arsenals, and were focused on having less, not more. So why are we both seeming to reverse course here?

david sanger

Well, that’s exactly right, because the old think was that these nuclear arms limitation treaties actually created security by reducing the number of nuclear weapons in the world. The new think is that these treaties are actually constraining the United States and Russia from adopting new technologies that each one of them wants. Putin wants them because he wants to avoid American missile defenses, and he thinks his old weapons won’t do that. Donald Trump wants them because he believes that there are a whole new group of nuclear actors coming in, led by China. And he doesn’t want to be limited by his old, outdated treaties with Russia that prohibit him from building weapons that might counter new competitors.

michael barbaro

So without anyone really announcing it, the U.S. has entered a new nuclear arms race, primarily with Russia, but also with China and a host of other growing nuclear powers.

david sanger

That’s exactly right. But it’s different than the old arms race. The old arms race was mostly about sheer numbers. It was about overwhelming the enemy. The new arms race is all about high technology.

michael barbaro

But David, this Russian test on Thursday night over the White Sea, it sounds like a spectacular failure for Putin and for Russia. So what does that mean for the state of the nuclear arms race between the U.S. and Russia?

david sanger

That’s a really good question, Michael, because we really don’t know. And one way to think about it is that the Russians aren’t succeeding at their grandiose dreams, and everybody can breathe a sigh of relief and we can slow down on this arms race.

michael barbaro

Right.

david sanger

I don’t think that’s where the Trump administration is going to come out. I think that what you’re already beginning to hear is this public embarrassment, this explosion that killed the scientists and leaked out, is only going to drive President Putin to invest more, and that even if his dreams of a nuclear-propelled missile fail, he will find other ways to come up with weapons that evade American defenses and that have new ways of reaching the U.S., just to establish that he’s a power to be reckoned with. And so if anything, I think this Skyfall incident could end up speeding up the arms race on both sides. The Russians will want to show that they’re not going to be defeated, that they’re going to pick themselves up and build something better, and the Americans are going to say, see, the Russians are experimenting with all this new technology. Even if they fail at getting there, the Chinese will get there. So we’d better speed up, too.

michael barbaro

Hm. So both sides have real incentives to be in this arms race, to stay in this arms race, and what look and feel like major setbacks aren’t really setbacks at all. They just keep everybody invested in the arms race.

david sanger

I think that’s right. Now, if you listen to President Trump, and sometimes if you listen to President Putin, what you hear is, you know, this is a reason that we need a whole new type of comprehensive arms control. And President Trump has said even in the past few weeks, I want new agreements that encompass all nuclear weapons — intercontinental, intermediate-range, these new technologies — and I want to wrap it all together. And Putin, at various moments, has indicated he might be interested in doing the same thing. But the fact of the matter is we are nearly three years into the Trump administration, and they have not sat down once over negotiating a new arms control regime. So it’s hard to imagine, between now and the American presidential election, that Donald Trump is going to try to sit down and work out with Vladimir Putin an entirely new arms control agreement. And frankly, given what’s in the air about the odd relationship between Presidents Trump and Putin, I’m not sure that you could even get such a treaty through even if they negotiated one.

michael barbaro

It sounds like there’s a greater likelihood of both countries ramping up nuclear arsenals than there is of both countries sitting down and signing a nuclear treaty. And I wonder if that means we’re going to be seeing more incidents like what just happened in northern Russia with this exploding missile.

david sanger

I think that’s entirely possible, Michael. The history of nuclear arms races is that, if both sides aren’t talking to each other, then each side builds up, in part so that they have them, and in part so they have something to trade away if they do get into a negotiation. And that may be exactly what’s going on here. Of course, at a moment when we’re seeing nuclear proliferation that we’re worrying about around the world, that the North Koreans are building up their nuclear arsenal, that the Iranians may be building up their nuclear arsenal, it doesn’t set a really great example to have the two largest nuclear powers, two countries that together have more than 90 percent of all the nuclear weapons in the world, build even more.

michael barbaro

And of course, that could mean more Russian communities suddenly exposed to radiation spikes and government attempts to hide that. So I wonder how people in Russia are feeling in the days since this accident.

david sanger

Well, Michael, we’ve been trying to figure it out, too. And of course, the Russians aren’t exactly eager to let Western reporters into some of these towns. But from what we can pick up, people are anxious, they’re angry, and they feel lied to. There’s a reason they should feel lied to, because the Russian government to this day has not said this was a missile test involving a nuclear reactor that went wrong. They’ve sort of laid all the little elements out there, but not put it all together. And for Russians who really wanted to try to get an understanding of what went on, they had to be reading Western news reports. And you know, this has sort of created a sort of post-traumatic stress syndrome for Russians who remember this from their past. There were past accidents, missile accidents, and of course nuclear accidents, up to and including Chernobyl, which was on a far larger scale than what we’re seeing in recent days, where the government lied to people, and they were exposed. And of course, many thousands died. So there is a sort of the old Cold War is back and so are the anxieties that came with it.

[music]

michael barbaro

David, speaking of distrust, whatever happened to that emergency weather report that played across so many television screens on the night of this accident? Did the government ever acknowledge what that was?

david sanger

You know, Michael, we still don’t know. I mean, they said it was a malfunction, but I’m not sure any Russians really believe them — even if they’re right, even if it was a malfunction, even if the weather report was really about the weather and not about a nuclear accident. And it tells you something about the depth of distrust in Russia and around the world for what governments say about their nuclear tests and their nuclear arsenals.

michael barbaro

Thank you, David.

david sanger

Thank you.

michael barbaro