As I have blogged before, nuclear tensions are rising between Russia, NATO and the U.S. There are nuclear non-proliferation and weapons reduction treaties in effect between the major nuclear powers but both the U.S. and Russia are upgrading their nuclear arsenals with charges flying around that they are violating the terms of the treaties.
The U.S. Air Force is developing the Air Force's X-37B robotic mini-shuttle. It is about a quarter of the size of the Space Shuttle. The X-37B is launched on top of a rocket and is intended for extended missions in space. The Russians have charged that the X-37B could be adapted to carry a nuclear weapon into orbit. The Russians claim that this would be an obvious violation of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty which explicitly prohibits the signatories, including the U.S. and Russia, from putting weapons in space vehicles.
The Russian Strategic Missile Forces Academy is developing a new hypersonic air/space vehicle that will be similar to the U.S. Air Force's X-37B robotic mini-shuttle. But, unlike the X-37B, the new Russian vehicle is being openly designed to be a strategic bomber capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
The development of the new Russian bomber is definitely a violation of the Outer Space Treaty and some say that it is hypocritical, given that Russia accused the U.S. of such a violation with the development of the X-37B, but the Russian would probably say that it was just prudent given the U.S. work on the X-37B. The U.S. response to the new Russian bomber could well be the development of its own hypersonic strategic nuclear bomber. It appears that the world is entering a new dangerous arms race to place nuclear weapons in space.
The Central Aero-Hydrodynamic Institute will do the actual engineering for the Russian space plane. The weight of the craft will be about twenty five tons. (The weight of the X-37B is about five tons.) The first flights of the new aircraft are planned for 2020. The new bomber will be able to fly in atmosphere and in space. It will be propelled by conventional turbofan engines as well as rocket engines. Both manned versions and unmanned versions are planned.
The engine will have to be what is called a combination-cycle engine. Such engines combine the efficiency of a air-breathing turbofan engine with independent self contained rocket engines. The U.S. has been trying to develop such combination-cycle engines for decades without producing a practical working version. It is believed that the Russians have no such engines despite claims by the Russians that they have mastered the technology required to alternate between airbreathing in atmosphere and rocket propulsion in space.
The new bomber will take off from conventional airfields. It will patrol airspaces like a conventional airplane but when order to do so it will be able to ascend to the edge of space to launch nuclear warheads against targets on the ground. It will be able to reach any target on Earth within two hours.
Logo of the Central Aero-Hydrodynamic Institute:
