Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future

If the constant failures by the Bulava were not
enough, the Navy was becoming increasingly embarrassed.
Why? Because the Kremlin was building submarines
to be equipped with the Bulava missile. The
MoD expected to have them in service in 2008. The
submarine Dmitri Donskoy had been refitted in time to
accommodate the Bulava missiles. In addition, a new
submarine, the Yuri Dolgorukiy, was launched in 2009
and ready to go to sea by 2010. Moscow had also begun
work on two additional submarines, the Aleksandr
Nevsky and the Vladimir Monomakh. This meant that
the Kremlin was faced with the very embarrassing
situation of having one submarine that was supposed
to be equipped with Bulava missiles going to sea with
its missile tubes empty—with two more on the way!
For his part, Admiral Vladimir Vysotskiy maintained
that one of the major problems confronting the
military in Russia was the decrepit state of its military-industrial
complex. There is a lot of truth in his
comments—the technology in many of the industrial
plants is from the 1970s or 1980s. Furthermore, the average
age of most of those who are competent to work
in most of those factories is over 60. The majority of
the younger qualified workers left the military factories
to work in better paying jobs elsewhere.
Faced with this dismal situation, Yuri Solomonov,
the Chief Designer who in 1998 claimed that he could
design the new missile, was fired. After all, the missile
had failed 7 times out of 11 launches since 2004.
Despite the poor performance , Moscow appears to be
stuck with the Bulava missile. There was talk of inserting
the Sineva missile, but it is a completely different
system. Furthermore, taking the Bulava tubes
and related equipment out of submarines like the Yuri
Dolgorukiy and replacing them with tubes that would
fire the Sineva missiles would be cost prohibitive.
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