Why the U.S. Navy Just Deployed Nuclear Submarines Near Russia’s Coasts

U.S. President Donald Trump in August 1 announced that he had ordered two U.S. Navy nuclear submarines to move close to Russia, adding that this was done in response to social media comments by former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. Condemning Medvedev’s “highly provocative”statements, Trump claimed that “words are very important, and can often lead to unintended consequences.”“I have ordered two Nuclear Submarines to be positioned in the appropriate regions, just in case these foolish and inflammatory statements are more than just that,” he added.

Medvedev had warned that Trump ought to “remember his favorite movies about ‘the walking dead,’ as well as how dangerous the fabled ‘Dead Hand’ can be.” The ‘dead hand’ refers to Russia’s system for launching large scale strategic nuclear attacks automatically even if its political and military leadership were neutralised.

Tensions between the United States and Russia have risen due to the former’s imposition of a deadline for Moscow to make progress towards negotiations to end ongoing Russian-Ukrainian hostilities. This is considered critical to allow Ukrainian forces to recover, as Russian forces have continued to make rapid advances in recent weeks. The Trump administration has threatened serious consequences should Russia fail to meet its demands, with U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham having gone so far as to imply that direct military action, possibly using strategic bombers, could be taken. With both the United States and Russia deploying vast satellite networks capable of detecting one another’s missile launches, forward deployment of submarines allows for a minimisation of the warning times before missiles impact their targets. This also places submarines at greater risk of being detected and targeted, however. While it remains uncertain whether the submarines referred to by President Trump were attack submarines armed with cruise missiles, such as the Los Angeles Class, or were strategic ballistic missile submarines such as the Ohio Class armed for full scale nuclear war, both types of ship can pose significantly greater threats when forward deployed.