Whoops! Russians leak their own secrets

Such attacks, it said, would create “zones of extensive radioactive contamination unfit for military, economic or other activity for a long period of time”.

The footage of a slide titled “Ocean Multipurpose System: Status-6” was captured during a defense meeting led by President Vladimir Putin in the Russian city of Sochi.

The footage was aired on Tuesday and was later removed.

The airing of the video on television channels under tight Kremlin control raised suspicions that it was done intentionally to scare the West at a time when its ties with Russian Federation are at the lowest point since the Cold War.

On Wednesday, Mr Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry S Peskov, told Russian news agencies that the cameras had accidentally filmed a secret document.

After declaring Moscow would take the “necessary measures to respond by strengthening its own missile defence”, the president added: “And at the first stage we are also going to develop strike weapons that can penetrate any missile defence shield”. “Such systems have already begun to enter the military this year”.

In May, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation condemned Russia’s plans to deploy nuclear-capable missiles in Kaliningrad, a Russian region sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland, as well as its increased number of nuclear bomber flights. Russia, therefore relies on nuclear weapons as a deterrent and offensive strike capability.

That would be a type of thermonuclear warhead with a layer of cobalt-59, which on detonation would be transmuted into highly radioactive cobalt-60 with a half-life longer than five years.

Meanwhile, commentators on the Echo of Moscow radio station argued Thursday that the revelation of the secret weapon was hardly an accident, considering the tight grip of Putin’s hand on the state-controlled news media in Russian Federation.

The documents appears to reveal the giant torpedo’s range as “up to 10,000km” and depth of trajectory “up to 1000m”.

It remains unclear if such a system is indeed being developed or if it was presented as just one of the options the Russian military could hypothetically offer.

The nuclear torpedo is reportedly created to be used against enemy coastal installations.

Podvig said the apparent deliberate leak of the Status-6 details looks menacing, irrespective of how realistic the project is from the technological viewpoint.

Russia’s been pretty cagey lately, what with the whole Ukraine thing, so any development like this is sure to ratchet up the tension even further.