Russia Submarine Captain Gave Order to 'Arm' Torpedoes in Brush With US Sub

A Russian commander ordered his submarine's crew to arm the vessel's torpedoes during a standoff with a U.S. nuclear submarine in early 2022, according to a new report.

A U.S. nuclear submarine captain "had to decide whether to arm his own weapons, which might provoke the Russians into opening fire," The Times, a U.K. newspaper, reported on Monday, describing the encounter as previously unreported.

The two submarines were in the Arctic at some point in the spring of 2022, but the newspaper did not offer further details.

Newsweek has contacted the Russian Defense Ministry, the Pentagon and the U.S. Navy for comment via email.

Tensions between the U.S.—and, more broadly, NATO—and Russia have reached their worst point in decades, exacerbated by Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The U.S. is one of many countries that have thrown their weight behind Kyiv.

The full-scale conflict in Ukraine, which began in February 2022, has prompted a reevaluation in many Western countries of their military readiness for a possible wider war. The U.S. is gauging how best to counteract Russia, keeping an eye on China's vast and rapid military expansion, and monitoring increasingly close ties between Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran.

The Arctic is an important region where both NATO and Russia maintain a strong presence. The Kola Peninsula, where Russia bases its key Northern Fleet and much of its nuclear deterrent, looks out onto the Barents Sea south of the Arctic Ocean.

Experts told Newsweek in May 2023 that the Arctic could find itself at the center of straining tensions as NATO welcomed Finland and Sweden to the bloc.

While Russia's surface vessels have been described as atrophying, Moscow has one of the largest and advanced submarine fleets in the world. The U.S. operates only nuclear-powered submarines, whereas Russia's fleet is only partly nuclear-powered.

Moscow has tipped significant resources into modernizing its submarines. "Russia has massively invested in its underwater capability since 2014, first of all submarines," retired Admiral Ihor Kabanenko, a former Ukrainian first deputy chief of defense and chief of staff of the Ukrainian navy, said in 2023.

Analysts and officials have raised the alarm in recent years over fears about the safety of vital undersea cables and how they could be vulnerable to submarine attacks.

In mid-June, Russian state media reported that two nuclear submarines belonging to the Northern Fleet had fired live cruise missiles at an unspecified target in the Barents Sea.

Russia has routinely held military drills in the Arctic. In 2020, a senior Russian military official said NATO had "stepped up its activity in the Arctic" after the bloc carried out exercises in the Barents Sea.

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