US nukes just got a lot deadlier — and experts say it could cause Russia to attack

A recent report from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists details how the US massively upgraded the lethality of its submarine-based nuclear missiles — and US adversaries like Russia may be spooked to the point of considering countermeasures.

Essentially, the US’s latest update to its Trident missiles aboard US Navy submarines ensures that each and every single missile will explode at precisely the right moment to devastate any target.

Because of this new “super fuze,” or timing element, the US’s submarine-launched ballistic missile fleet has tripled in destructive potential, according to the report.

This is important because US military planners previously only relied on submarine-launched missiles to strike soft targets like military bases. Now these missiles could be used to wipe out Russia’s nukes buried deep underground.

“Because of improvements in the killing power of US submarine-launched ballistic missiles, those submarines now patrol with more than three times the number of warheads needed to destroy the entire fleet of Russian land-based missiles in their silos,” wrote Hans M. Kristensen, Matthew McKinzie, and Theodore A. Postol, the authors of the report.

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Featured image courtesy of Reuters