Trump orders the move of two nuclear submarines near Russia. “In case the stupid statements are more than that”

US President Donald Trump announced on Friday that he ordered two nuclear submarines to be positioned in regions near Russia, in response to the threats of former Russian president Dmitri Medvedev, reports Reuters.

“Given the extremely challenging statements of the former Russian president, (…) I ordered two nuclear submarines to be positioned in the right regions, only in case these stupid and inflammatory statements are more than that,” Trump said in a post on his social network.

“Words are very important and can often lead to unwanted consequences, I hope it will not be such a case,” added the US president.

He did not specify where the submarines will be sent and even if it is submarines with nuclear propulsion or carriers, AFP notes.

Trump did not indicate that of Dmitri Medvedev's comments reacted.

How to challenge Medvedev on Trump

On Thursday, former Russian president and prime minister Dmitri Medvedev told Trump to remember that Russia has nuclear attack capabilities from the Soviet era and confirmed that Moscow still uses the guaranteed mutual destruction system called the “dead hand”, after the White House leader asked the Russian official.

In a message also published on his social media platform, Trump ironized Medvedev, who is currently the vice-president of the Russian Security Council.

“Tell Medvedev, the former missed president of Russia, who thinks he is still president, weigh his words. He walks on a very dangerous ground!”, Wrote the White House leader.

He made the comment after Medvedev stated that Trump's threat of hitting Russia and Russian oil buyers with punitive customs taxes is “an ultimatum game” and an extra step between Russia and the United States.

Trump had announced on July 29 that Russia has “10 days from now” to accept a cessation of fire in Ukraine, otherwise it will be hit with customs duties. Moscow has not indicated so far that he intended to comply with Trump's ultimatum.

Medvedev recalled the “legendary dead hand”

Medvedev reacted on Thursday afternoon, saying that Trump's new comments show that Russia should continue its current course.

“If some words from the former president of Russia trigger such a nervous reaction from the Almighty President of the United States, then it means that Russia does everything properly and will continue to go on its way,” Medvedev wrote in a message distributed on his Telegram channel.

Trump should remember, he said, “how dangerous the dead hand can be”, a reference to a secret-semi-automated military command system from the USSR period, designed to launch Moscow's nuclear missiles if his leadership was annihilated in an enemy attack.

The system of which the West found only after the fall of the USSR, is also nicknamed the “apocalypse machine” because it would be activated only in the case of a large -scale nuclear war.

Russian officials almost never speak of the “machinery of the apocalypse”

The fact that Russia still has this system has been confirmed only twice the last decade.

In 2011, the commander of Russia's strategic missile forces, Colonel Sergei Karakaev, said in an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda that “the” Perimeter “evaluation and communications system, saying that Russia could destroy the United States in less than half an hour.

In 2018, general-colonel Viktor Esîn, the former head of the General Staff of the Russian Strategic Rocket Forces, said the “perimeter” system could become inefficient as a result of the US withdrawal from the Treaty on Intermediate Nuclear Forces. “Perimeter” is the name used by the Russians for the system from the time of the USSR.

How the “dead hand” developed by the Russians in the Soviet period works

The dead hand ensures the possibility of launching Russia's nuclear arsenal in case of a devastating attack on the country. But it is not easy to trigger. The system was designed to remain in semi-manure until it is activated by an official during a crisis. The dead hand would then begin to monitor a network of sensors that provide seismic data, regarding the level of radiation and atmospheric pressure to detect the signs of nuclear explosions.

Prior to the launch of any attack, the dead hand must tick 4 conditional sentences, known in computer science and as “IF/THEN” instructions: if it is activated, the system is trying to determine if a nuclear weapon has hit Russia.

If it concludes that this has happened, the dead hand then checks if there are still lines of communication with the General Staff of Moscow. If they exist and a certain period of time, from 15 minutes to one hour, without new signs of an attack, the system will assume that officials who can order a counterattack are still alive and are disabled automatically.

But if the connections with the General Staff are cut, the dead hand is scheduled to assume that the apocalypse has arrived for Russia. It will immediately transfer the authority to launch the nuclear focoas to the person to order the system at that time, regardless of who he is.

The moment when people lose any control over a nuclear war

Essentially, the dead hand will bypass all the normal control and control hierarchies to give full power to the person at the buttons in that moment in the secret bunker in which the system command is located.

The possibility of destroying the world will be within the reach of the person on duty, whether she is a high-ranking minister sent in a bunker or a fresh graduate of the Military Academy.

If the person concerned decides to press the button, the counterattack of Russia, once initiated, will be controlled by the so-called control missiles. Hidden in reinforced silos to withstand nuclear attacks, these missiles will be the first launched and they will transmit the activation orders to all Russian weapons that survived the alleged initial attack.

Basically, this would be the moment when people would lose any control over the war, being completely taken over by automated systems.