Russia’s "Dead Hand"

[The SC]

What is Russia’s Perimeter or Dead Hand?

It is an automatic system of guaranteed mutual destruction. Here’s how it works.

An array of sensors around the country are monitoring the conditions connected to an AI-like analysis software. If those sensors detect signs of a massed nuclear attack (such as temperature spikes, radiation levels spikes, seismic activity indicating nuclear impacts etc.), the system activates. It then has three failsafe steps to prevent unmotivated destruction of the world:

1. The software attempts to contact the general staff HQ of the armed forces. If the HQ is responsive and online the system immediately deactivats and goes back into the waiting mode. If the staff HQ cannot be reached, proceed to step 2.
2. The software attempts to reach the “Kazbek” interface. Kazbek is the “nuclear suitcase” - a portable nuclear launch interface in possession of the civilian authorities - the President. If Kazbek is online and responsive, the system deactivates and goes back into waiting mode. If Kazbeck is offline, proceed to step 3.
3. The system transfers control interface access to an open access terminal in its command bunker, allowing any living human inside the bunker to cancel the launch decision. If for a set amount of time no override is forthcoming from the open access terminal in the bunker, proceed to step 4. After this the process is irreversible.
4. Several ICBMs are commanded to launch, but they bear no warheads. Instead they carry powerful transmitters, broadcasting launch codes for all the nuclear armaments of Russia. The missiles fly over Russian territory, essentially commanding all nuclear assets to launch even in the absence of a command structure. This command is not overridable on the ground by launch sites control teams, even if any are alive.
5. All surviving nuclear assets are automatically launched towards their designated targets across the world.

https://www.quora.com/What-is-Russia’s-Perimeter-or-Dead-Hand

A retired colonel (probably with some firsthand experience though none is noted) used yesterday’s Komsomolskaya pravda to add to the still fairly small public body of knowledge on Soviet and Russian nuclear command and control.

Colonel Mikhail Timoshenko writes that the Soviet nuclear ‘suitcase’ was created 20 years after the U.S. developed its ‘briefcase.’ Developed in the 1970s under Brezhnev, the Soviet system came in response to the short flight-time of U.S. missiles and fears of a surprise strike. Short-tenured CPSU General Secretary Chernenko (1984-85) was the first Soviet leader to be accompanied by the ‘suitcase’ and officers responsible for operating it.

According to Timoshenko, the ‘suitcase’ (codenamed Cheget) is part of the Kazbek automated command and control system for strategic nuclear forces and was actually introduced in 1983. It answered the threat of a sudden nuclear attack in which the Soviet NCA might not reach the command post, or might not be able to send orders over ordinary communication lines. The system had to have conference-call capabilities so the General Secretary, Defense Minister, and General Staff Chief could all use it. And it had to be simple for elderly men trying to think and decide under extraordinary stress and time constraints.

Timoshenko paints a little scenario of how it would work. The silence of the missile attack warning center is broken by an alert signal. The launch warning puts probable targets and time-to-target information on display screens. The duty officer asks himself, is it a system malfunction or is it war? He decides to send the alert signal to the duty general in the Genshtab’s Central Command Post (ЦКП). The seconds are flying.

The duty general sends the alert signal to the Gensek, Defense Minister, and NGSh as well as the duty officers of the armed services. The three not-so-young people constituting the NCA have to decide if everyone lives or dies. Some kind of mistake is possible. Try the hotline, but the president is playing golf and can’t come to the line. Or maybe he isn’t playing golf, and he’s really hidden in his bunker. There are only seconds left to think.

Finally, the codes are entered and the Gensek (or one of the three in the NCA) presses the button. And in front of the duty crews the indicator panel says, “Order. Conduct Launch.” The crews turn their keys and press their launch buttons. Nuclear war has begun.

Timoshenko says people may wonder whether the Russian nuclear ‘suitcase’ is fundamentally different from the Soviet one. He answers by saying it’s different in the way it’s put together.

In 1993, the Kazbek system’s service life expired. ‘Holes’ in Cheget and Kazbek had to be patched. Only Soviet parts were used in its development, but he USSR’s collapse left almost all microelectronics production ‘abroad.’ It was forbidden to use imported elements that might have ‘bugs.’ And there were practically no specialists remaining who knew all the intricacies of the system and terminal. But naval officers continued to follow in the RF President’s shadow the way they had the Gensek. And they were inseparable, practically part of his family, in the next room or behind a wall, checking the system, testing comms channels.

Timoshenko says the next problem was what if the Gensek or President, Defense Minister, and NGSh were spread out all over the country or abroad, and they still needed to be connected instantly. Can you imagine a Soviet-era Defense Minister being ‘temporarily inaccessible’ for even an hour?

So, Timoshenko says, we had to create the Kavkaz mobile communications system, the signal of which cannot be decoded or jammed. With such a channel, the three special subscribers could quickly get information on a nuclear attack regardless of their location, the repeater is always with the special subscriber.

But what if somehow the comms didn’t work, Kazbek or the missile attack warning system didn’t work, or all three people with the Cheget were killed? There’d be no one to make decisions or give orders. Even more improbable–what if missile duty crews can’t launch. What to do? A safey net, some insurance was needed.

Simultaneously with Kazbek, development work on the Perimeter system began at Experimental-Design Bureau (ОКБ) Leningrad Polytech. Perimeter was intended for the assured retaliatory launch of ICBMs and SLBMs, if the enemy has destroyed all command levels. But the main thing is the system evaluated the situation and made decisions independently.

In Perimeter, there was a component with the name ‘Dead Hand.’ If its sensors reliably confirmed a mass nuclear strike, and the system itself lost comms with the RVSN’s main command nodes, several command missiles with powerful radio transmitters would launch. Flying over Russian territory, these missiles would repeat a signal and launch codes to Russia’s missile forces. Having gotten the signal, launch systems would work in automatic mode, giving a guaranteed retaliatory blow to the enemy.

But how can a machine know when it’s time, not too early or too late. Creating a reliable system with such parameters is highly difficult. Timoshenko says there were lots of conditions that could block the system’s operation.

Testing was conducted from 1979 to 1982. According to Timoshenko, the U.S. learned of Perimeter from one of its developers in 1993. And the New York Times published an article entitled, “Russia Has ‘Doomsday’ Machine” on October 3, 1993.

Timoshenko says, at the insistence of its American ‘friends,’ the system was taken off combat duty in June 1995 as part of START I [?].

He goes on to note that naval officers with the nuclear ‘suitcase’ are not so visible these days. They’ve probably been ordered to keep a low profile. He relates how Yeltsin handed over his beloved ‘suitcase’ to Putin on the day of his resignation. But Gorbachev didn’t personally hand his over to Yeltsin. A general carried it to the new Russian President’s office.

Timoshenko tells one last story. In 2000, NII AA [presumably the Moscow-based Scientific-Research Institute for Automated Equipment named for Akademik V. S. Semenikhin] was competing the job of chief designer and one candidate was from a Russian-American computer and electronics firm called RAMEK-VS. Timoshenko says imagine how much would have been paid in Soviet days to get close to the nuclear button and C2 systems.

https://russiandefpolicy.blog/tag/dead-hand/


Russia May Still Have An Automated Nuclear Launch System Aimed Across The Northern Hemisphere

Anxiety over a nuclear exchange between super powers seems out of place in a post-Cold War world where conflicts are usually fought within states, rather than between them. But despite the changing nature of the times, nuclear weapons continue to play a central role in Russian military strategy.

Last week, as thousands of Russian troops streamed into Ukraine, Putin issued a statement reminding the world that Russia was a nuclear-armed power.

"Russia is one of the most powerful nuclear nations," he said. “This is a reality, not just words.”

Putin is certainly playing up the threat of his strategic arsenal. This month, Russia is conducting a massive drill simulating the defense of its strategic nuclear sites that will involve more than 4,000 soldiers. And as columnist and historian Anne Applebaum recently noted, commentators in Russia are now claiming that Putin is "weighing the possibility of limited nuclear strikes" against targets in Eastern Europe, at least creating the impression that the Russian president is keeping his options open.

The situation recalls tensions between the USSR and the U.S. during the closing decade of the Cold War.

In 1983, relations between the U.S. and the USSR were under almost unprecedented strain after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Olympic boycotts, and increasingly hardline leadership in Moscow. Both sides began to put into place new intermediate-range nuclear weapon systems that could reach a target in only a matter of minutes.

"Both sides now are putting weapons in to place that can reach each other in seven, eight minutes," Tom Nichols, a professor at the Naval War College, told National Geographic. This reduced "the amount of time for a decision about whether or not to begin a nuclear war, about whether or not to incinerate the entire northern hemisphere from minutes to seconds."

To deter the possibility of a U.S. nuclear first-strike, the Soviets created a system called Perimeter, also known as "Dead Hand."

The Dead Hand was a computer system that could autonomously launch all of the USSR's nuclear weapons once it was activated, across the entirety of the Soviet Union.

U.S. D of Defense map of Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) bases as of the 1980s.Wikipedia

Dead Hand was a weapon of last resort. It was created to ensure that even if the Soviet leadership was wiped out, a nuclear response could still be launched against the West and NATO in retaliation.

After Dead Hand was activated by Soviet military officials, "the first thing it does is check the communication lines to work out if there's anyone alive and in charge of the Soviet military," Alok Jha, author of "The Doomsday Handbook," told National Geographic. "If they're not alive, it takes over."

If Dead Hand did not detect signs of a preserved military hierarchy, the system would perform a check for signals of a nuclear attack, such as a change in air pressure, extreme light, and radioactivity.

If the system concluded that a nuclear strike had taken place, Dead Hand would proceed to launch all of the remaining nuclear weapons from all of the silos throughout the Soviet Union at targets across the Northern Hemisphere.

Of course, no system is fool-proof, and there are concerns that Dead Hand could still operate at some level within the modern Russian military and accidentally trigger the launch of Russia's active nukes.

"We've since asked the Russians if it's still on," Nichols writes at The National Interest, "and they've assured us, with complete confidence, that we should mind our own business."



Russia's Modern Reliance On Nuclear Weapons
Charts and statistics detailing past U.S.-Russia arms treaties and nuclear arsenals as of 2010.REUTERS

There's a possibility that Dead Hand was dismantled when the Soviet Union fell — but nuclear weapons are still an integral part of Moscow's defense architecture, even without a semi-automated doomsday machine in place.

The limited use of nuclear weapons has remained an official center point of Russian military strategy since a policy of nuclear "de-escalation" was officially adopted by Putin in 2000.

De-escalation is "the idea that, if Russia were faced with a large-scale conventional attack that exceeded its capacity for defense, it might respond with a limited nuclear strike," Nikolai N. Sokov, a senior fellow at the Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation, wrote for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

This is a military strategy that envisions that "the threat of a limited nuclear strike that would force an opponent to accept a return to the status quo ante," Sokov notes. "Such a threat is envisioned as deterring the United States and its allies from involvement in conflicts in which Russia has an important stake, and in this sense is essentially defensive."

Although de-escalation is intended to be a defensive strategy, Russia has included simulations of nuclear strikes in all large-scale military exercises since 2000 to make the threat credible. This might be one of the reasons Russia is staging a massive strategic nuclear exercise this month, amid intensifying conflict in eastern Ukraine.

According to experts, de-escalation is a principal aspect of Russian military doctrine due to the country's relative weakness in terms of conventional military strength, compared to the NATO states. The reliance on the threat or possibility of nuclear counter-measures is the only way that Russia can stand up to the combined strength of the U.S. and NATO in the event of all-out war.

"Russia is acutely aware of its conventional weakness," Nichols writes at The National Interest. "[E]ven as they torment Ukraine right under NATO’s nose, the Russians know that they have no chance against NATO without nuclear weapons."

However, as Nichols notes, Moscow knows that its reliance on nuclear weapons is an unsustainable crutch, and that Russia's conventional forces are still sorely in need of modernization.

Below is a video from National Geographic on the establishment of the Soviet Dead Hand system:

http://www.businessinsider.com/russias-dead-hand-system-may-still-be-active-2014-9

 

[The SC]

The Soviet Union operated the dead hand during crises only..
In 2011 The commander of Russian strategic missile forces said:
"It is possible to return to the dead hand system immediately when necessary.. It's automatic nuclear revenge when you cut off the head of Great Russia"