On Monday, Reuters reported on my discovery that Russia appears to be building the first launch facility for its experimental Burevestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile, which the United States calls the SSC-X-9 Skyfall. The facility is nearly complete, suggesting that the new missile could soon enter service with Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces.
The site is located at a nuclear warhead storage facility, reportedly called Vologda-20, about 640 kilometers from Russia’s borders with Finland and Estonia. It includes nine fixed launch positions supported by missile handling facilities and bunkers for storing nuclear warheads. Since all launch positions, missiles and warheads are at the same location, it is likely that the Burevestnik is a missile that is ready to launch at any time.
There is a lot of hype surrounding the Burevestnik: US authorities have denounced Russia’s development of “radiation-emitting, nuclear-powered cruise missiles” and called the system a “flying Chernobyl.” Unlike conventional cruise missiles, which are powered by jet engines, the Burevestnik is powered by an unprotected nuclear reactor. This means it can – at least in theory – travel almost unlimited distances.
If deployed, Burevestnik would be the first rocket of its kind to actually be used. The United States explored the concept of a nuclear-powered rocket in the 1950s and 1960s as part of Project Pluto, but abandoned the project due to concerns about the danger the system could pose to the United States’ own population. Those concerns were confirmed in 2019, when a Burevestnik exploded during a test, killing several Russian rocket scientists.
The Burevestnik’s advanced propulsion system and virtually unlimited range could allow Russia to use the missile in radically new ways. In 2020, British intelligence chief General James Hockenhull told reporters that Moscow was developing a nuclear-powered cruise missile system with “global range (that) would enable attacks from unexpected directions” and would offer “virtually unlimited dwell time,” meaning the missile could fly around a given target for a long time before attacking, and could possibly even orbit the Earth.
The loitering reference has raised fears that in the event of a crisis, Russia could launch Burevestnik missiles, which could then fly around near US and NATO targets while awaiting instructions. This would allow Moscow to strike quickly once an order is given, and would significantly reduce the time NATO would have to respond to Russian aggression. Some analysts have even speculated that Russia could fly Burevestniks over European territory as a signal before turning around and flying back, potentially intimidating NATO allies and causing them to back down and give in to Russian demands.
However, these assessments of the Burevestnik’s potential capabilities are not technically feasible. Russia is unlikely to use the new missile in this way because two factors limit its capabilities and potential uses: range and visibility.
Although the Russian Defense Ministry claims that the missile’s range is virtually unlimited, there are significant costs associated with flying a missile over long distances or staying in the missile for long periods of time. Missiles can generally determine their position by communicating with satellites, but satellite signals can be easily jammed or tampered with. To ensure that a missile can function without satellites, it is also equipped with inertial navigation, which determines the missile’s position by dead reckoning. Using mechanical accelerometers and gyroscopes, the missile can determine its position by accurately recording its speed and direction, as well as the length of its flight.
But over time, small errors in the rocket’s guidance system add up, much like a mechanical clock eventually stops. So if a rocket flies in a hover pattern for long periods of time, there’s a serious risk it will veer off course and miss its target.
Russia could try to remotely control its missiles, but the limited range of Russian communications systems – coupled with the minor problem of the Earth’s curvature – drastically limits the range within which Russia could actively control a missile. It is unlikely that Russia could send missiles far from its homeland and still reliably communicate with them. If Russia eventually installs remote control, the missiles would still be vulnerable to electronic warfare.
This does not mean, however, that the Burevestnik’s increased range is useless. Cruise missiles are effectively disposable aircraft; like airplanes, their range is determined by fuel efficiency factors. The missile’s altitude represents an important trade-off: range versus detection. The higher a missile flies with a conventional jet engine, the more fuel efficient it becomes; since the air is thinner, there is less drag. But cruise missiles flying at higher altitudes are also easier for radars to detect. Conversely, lower altitudes allow missiles to evade detection more easily, but the thicker air requires the jet engines to burn more fuel, significantly shortening the missile’s range.
The main advantage of the Burevestnik’s nuclear-powered engine is that it eliminates the need to compromise between fuel efficiency and detectability. For example, while the US Tomahawk missile, with a range of 1,240-2,500 kilometers, cannot reach intercontinental targets, the Burevestnik’s engine could theoretically run for several days, allowing the missile to fly from its base in Russia to targets in the US, all at low altitude to evade radar. Although the Burevestnik’s reactor enables such a plan, precisely guiding the missile to the target would still be a huge challenge.
Although the Burevestnik is harder to detect, it is not invisible. Cruise missiles are stealthier than other missiles because they only produce strong heat signatures at the moment of launch. After that, the heat signature is weaker – not undetectable, but harder to track, especially from satellites in space that must see through an often cloudy atmosphere. However, this advantage of the Burevestnik diminishes the longer Russia lets it loiter aimlessly. If the missile remains in the air for long periods, NATO’s land, sea, air and space-based air defense systems have more time to detect the missile and maneuver into position to intercept it.
Russia could have tried to mitigate this problem by mobilizing the launch system to conceal the missile’s launch location, but it has not done so. Instead, Russia is building fixed launch pads that are closely monitored by NATO reconnaissance capabilities to detect signs of a launch. This makes Burevestnik flights more predictable and easier to track.
Due to the communication and accuracy issues, the Burevestnik is unlikely to be able to truly surprise NATO. The Burevestnik is better thought of as a direct way to penetrate US and NATO air defenses, as it is capable of flying more or less directly at its target at extremely low altitude.
The real problem with Burevestnik is that Russia could be forced to launch it preemptively in the event of a crisis, as its fixed base is vulnerable to attack. In addition, the missile has a very long flight time to intercontinental targets compared to ICBMs, taking many hours rather than minutes. A Russian leader could feel pressured to launch a Burevestnik before the US has a chance to get its air defense systems in position and before the launch site can be destroyed by NATO missiles – including, for example, the conventional hypersonic missiles that the US will deploy in Germany in 2026.
Although Russian leaders may feel pressured to use the Burevestnik preemptively, there is no reason why Moscow could not be deterred from using this missile to start a nuclear war. NATO countries can try to prevent this by investing in military infrastructure that could credibly survive and respond to a Russian nuclear strike, making their targets less tempting in the first place. This means dispersing and making NATO defenses more redundant in places that could be early targets, such as radar sites and airfields—especially in the United States, where assets have never been credibly threatened by hard-to-detect Russian systems.
The Burevestnik is not a silver bullet, and the challenges it poses to NATO security are neither new nor insurmountable. It may seem daunting on paper, but the technical impracticality of its mission limits its threat. Much of the excitement surrounding the missile stems from Russia’s saber-rattling about its capabilities. In this context, perhaps the best thing NATO can do to remain strong in a crisis is to call this weapon what it is: a terror weapon, not a panacea.
So far, the only people Burevestnik has killed are his own developers. Fighting Russian propaganda will help keep it that way.
