Russia’s deployed nuclear capacity overtakes US for first time since 2000

The nuclear submarine (APL) "Vladimir Monomakh" in the 55th Northern Machine Building Enterprise (FSUE) workshop "Sevmash" before being launched into the water in Severodvinsk.(RIA Novosti / A. Petrov)

 

The current figures are in violation of the New START treaty, signed in 2010 by Barack Obama and then-President Dmitry Medvedev, during the short-lived reset in relations between the two states, which prescribe a limit of 1,550 deployed warheads.Overall, the authoritative Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation believes Moscow has more than 8,000 warheads, and Washington over 7,000, although not all of them can be allocated to efficient delivery systems.

Russia recently announced a planned overhaul of its entire nuclear arsenal by 2020, as part of a wider rearmament program that has been budgeted at $700 billion.

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