MOSCOW — At around 6 a.m. GMT on Aug. 8, seismic and acoustic sensors in Sweden, Finland and Norway detected an explosion. The sensors are operated by the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, and on Monday the group — which monitors the globe for prohibited nuclear tests — said four stations identified an event “coinciding” with an explosion in Nyonoksa, Russia.

The organization did not share any data about the size and nature of the explosion. And though little is known about what happened on Russia’s northern frontier last week, it seems safe to say there was no detonation of a nuclear weapon.

But that does not make the Nyonoksa incident any less concerning.

In the wake of the explosion, the city government of Severodvinsk — a major military shipbuilding town about 40 kilometers from the explosion — said local monitors detected a brief spike in radiation levels. The military was quick to deny, asserting no harmful materials were released into the air. Pharmacies in Severodvinsk reportedly saw a run on iodine tablets.

A statement issued Sunday by the Norwegian Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority, an outfit that spends a lot of its time standing watch for undisclosed Russian radiation hazards, said Norwegian monitoring stations detected no such increase. Neither did European or Russian stations to which the agency has access.

Initial reports in the Russian press were confusing and contradictory, and at least some of them were perhaps deliberate fakes. At first, the precise location of the explosion was unclear. Did it happen at sea, as the Tass news agency reported? Or perhaps at the Russian Navy’s missile test range at Nyonoksa, as other, more reputable outlets reported?

Whatever was detected in Severodvinsk was highly localized. Or perhaps never happened all. The city administration quietly withdrew its claim of a brief radiation spike over the weekend. This has only heightened concerns that the military is covering something up.

Unconfirmed reports Tuesday suggested Nyonoksa residents were being prepared for evacuation. However, Tass published a story later quoting the head of the village as saying he got a call from the test range commander, who said all of their planned activities have been canceled. The head of the town then said there’s no need for an evacuation and that residents should proceed as usual.

Unconfirmed videos showing medical personnel responding to the incident in hazmat suits surfaced on social media on Aug. 8. As did videos showing ambulances shielded with plastic tarps transporting the wounded to a Moscow hospital to be treated for radiation burns. In Russia and in the West, concerns quickly grew of a small-scale Chernobyl incident.

The Russian military, for its part, was not helpful. In an Aug. 8 statement, the military said the explosion took place at a military testing ground. As for what exploded, it only referenced a test of a liquid-fuel propulsion system.

Initial speculation within the Russian press suggested several possibilities based on what little evidence was available. One of those included a failed test of a missile already in service with the Russian Navy, perhaps something using a highly toxic fuel known as heptyl. Another story, based on unidentified sources, claimed it was Russia’s new Tsirkon anti-ship hypersonic missile.

But the detection of elevated radiation levels in Severodvinsk has been hard to ignore, and consensus has settled on a third theory: a failed test of one of President Vladimir Putin’s nuclear vengeance weapons announced in a saber-rattling speech last year. Specifically, the 9M730 Burevestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile, known to NATO as SSC-X-9 Skyfall.

A failed test of Burevestnik would explain the radiation spike, the apparent secrecy, the hazmat response team and the extension on Aug. 8 of a sea lane closure in the region around the Russian military’s Nyonoksa missile test range. Western experts have since compiled additional, compelling evidence that the device in question was indeed Burevestnik.

In a thread on Twitter, arms control expert Jeffrey Lewis with the Center for Nonproliferation Studies laid out the case for Burevestnik: Commercial satellite imagery of the Nyonoksa range suggests the site has been modified to resemble a remote range at Novaya Zemlya where Western experts believe earlier Burevestnik tests were conducted.

In the same photo of the Nyonoksa, taken by Planet Labs on Aug. 8, Lewis and his team identified a nuclear fuel-carrying ship that has shown up in suspected Burevestnik tests at Novaya Zemlya. A report by The New York Times on Monday featured other Western experts and officials signing on to the Burevestnik theory.

But the simple fact is that almost nothing is known about Burevestnik. And it is entirely possible the entire program, perhaps a real budget item, is doomed to fail. Its real purpose is likely to coax the U.S. into talks on future arms control treaties that limit its missile defense ambitions.

The entire point of Burevestnik is unlimited range to maneuver around missile defenses. Over the past year, a basic understanding of the Burevestnik design has been adopted by observers, essentially by default. The U.S. in the 1950s and 1960s experimented with a nuclear ramjet engine called Project Pluto. The entire concept was scrapped, both for being a bad idea and for being too large to fit into a cruise missile design.

The assumption has been that Burevestnik is a nuclear ramjet. But such a concept does not square nicely with official descriptions of the device in question issued over the weekend by Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear concern.

On Saturday, an official statement from Rosatom confirmed five of its specialists died in the blast, and identified them as employees of the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Experimental Physics (VNIIEF, by its Russian acronym). This institute is Russia’s equivalent of the United States’ Los Alamos National Lab, and it’s Russia’s premier nuclear research facility where the Soviet atomic bomb was born.

VNIIEF was also identified last year by newspaper Kommersant as the design house for the Burevestnik propulsion system.

In its statement, Rosatom explained that the explosion took place during the test of an “isotopic power source” within or mounted to a “liquid propulsion system,” depending on how you interpret the Russian-language phrasing. Either way, this is not the description of a ramjet system — which would work by a nuclear reactor heating air as it passes through an intake.

On Sunday, the scientific director of VNIIEF, Vyacheslav Solovyov, issued a statement on camera in which he described work on miniature nuclear power devices, such as new kinds of radioisotope thermoelectric generators or small nuclear reactors like NASA’s Kilopower project. The implication was that this is what the specialists were working on.

Neither Rosatom nor Solovyov gave any other indication that a missile was involved.

Taken at face value, the Rosatom statements suggest at least two possibilities: The Burevestnik uses some other form of nuclear propulsion other than a nuclear ramjet, or that the Nyonoksa incident involved something other than the Burevestnik. And given the scope of current Russian nuclear efforts, this possibility should be seriously entertained.

If Burevestnik is not powered by a ramjet, then perhaps the vague descriptions issued by Rosatom point to a different — perhaps even more risky — form of propulsion. This could be a nuclear thermal rocket, which sees liquid fuel pushed through a reactor. But why, then, would testing be moved from Novaya Zemlya, as Lewis claims, and closer to population centers?

A likely candidate for an alternate explanation would be Poseidon, announced by Putin last year alongside Burevestnik. Poseidon is an underwater drone packed with a large nuclear bomb. It is intended to crawl up to a coastline and detonate, causing massive damage. An another possible explanation is an underwater atomic battery for Russian seafloor infrastructure.

Another scenario, according to Russian aerospace analyst Pavel Luzin, is that the test involved — as Rosatom suggested — a of new kind of radioisotope thermoelectric generator or a small reactor for use in spacecraft. Luzin speculates that Russia may have been testing the impact of rocket engine vibrations on the new power source.

Ultimately, the problem with the Nyonoksa incident is that it’s unclear what anyone, on any side, is actually talking about. And attempts to connect the dots between certain observations and vague official statements can lead one to reasonably argue several plausible scenarios.

If the evacuation were still on, it would have at least suggested the Russian government was ready to continue testing whatever exploded last week.

Defense News experienced a carrier landing firsthand on April 23, hitting the deck of the Abraham Lincoln aboard a U.S. Navy C-2A Greyhound aircraft with U.S. Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman and Adm. James Foggo, commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe. The purpose of the visit was twofold — to kick off a dual-carrier exercise with sister ship John C. Stennis on April 24, and to deliver a sternly worded message to Russia: Stand down.

“Each of the carriers operating in the Mediterranean as this time represent 100,000 tons of international diplomacy,” Huntsman said aboard the Lincoln, according to a Navy news release. “Diplomatic communication and dialogue, coupled with the strong defenses these ships provide, demonstrate to Russia that if it truly seeks better relations with the United states, it must cease its destabilizing activities around the world.”

Moscow received the message loud and clear, and though the response was predictable — at least publicly — it may not be the one Huntsman and Foggo were hoping for.

“I would like to believe that American megaphone diplomacy will not turn into megaton diplomacy,” said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, the ministry’s point man on arms control issues, “ because in that case there would be no winners, and American diplomats will regret how they failed to find opportunities for normal, constructive dialogue with partners around the world. We regret the U.S. ambassador in Russia made such a statement.”

In a briefing at the Foreign Ministry on April 25, spokeswoman Maria Zakharova advised Huntsman to study up on his history.

“Throughout its long history, Russia has repeatedly faced threats disguised as recommendations, and each time managed to demonstrate that it is futile,” she said, listing off examples such as France’s Napoleon Bonaparte and Sweden’s Charles XII, Russian news agency Tass reported.

Zakharova suggested the timing of Huntsman’s remarks and visit to the Lincoln was a slight toward Russia, as the country is gearing up to celebrate its victory in World War II on May 9. The U.S. Navy’s explanation for the timing of his visit was that it just happened to occur when the Lincoln and Stennis were crossing paths in the Mediterranean Sea, as they made their way to different regions.

In a video statement published on the U.S. Embassy’s Twitter page on April 25, Huntsman paid tribute to the 74th anniversary of Soviet and American soldiers meeting on the banks of the river Elbe in Germany, saying the event reminds Russians and Americans that, despite tensions between their nations, the world is safer when they commit to dialogue and discussion on areas of disagreement.

Meanwhile, in the Russian media, a political cartoon ran by state-owned RIA Novosti depicted Huntsman as Freddy Krueger, with aircraft carriers for fingers rather than razors. A talk show host on Vesti-FM, a state-owned radio station, said on Twitter that Huntsman “forgot to stomp his foot. Without this, it did not sound convincing enough.” Across the Russian media on April 24th, variations on this theme were abundant.

Much of this reaction is typical of the Russian government and the state-owned media machine that carries the government’s preferred narratives. But there are open questions about the utility of carrier-based messaging, according to Michael Kofman, an expert in the Russian Navy at the CNA think tank in Virginia.

“Military signaling is fraught with misperception,” Kofman said. “Most of the time it simply feeds an iterative cycle where both forces justify the other’s presence or behavior as the rationale for their demonstrative activity. Deterrence or competition are often cited as the catch-all bywords for much of the activity.”

“Moscow is generally indifferent to an American carrier in the Mediterranean, or even two or three” said Mikhail Barabanov, a naval analyst at the Centre the Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, a Moscow-based think tank. “I do not believe it is a ‘signal to Moscow,’ if only because no one in Russia seriously believes in the possibility of a conventional military conflict with the United States.”

Back in the game

“We are not here to do anything but deter and defend,” Foggo told Defense News in an exclusive interview aboard the Lincoln’s flag bridge, “and while we are at it and in the Med, we have seen an increased presence of Russian naval forces, particularly in the eastern Med. And the USS Abraham Lincoln will experience that while they are here. And I would expect nothing short of professional conduct from both navies.”

Russian naval activity in the Mediterranean goes beyond the presence of American carriers. Revival of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet — and, by extension, the old Mediterranean flotilla — was one of the key provisions of Russia’s updated naval doctrine in 2015. The annexation of Crimea the year before gave Moscow unhindered access to the key naval base at Sevastopol and opened the door to modernization of that fleet, once prohibited under an agreement with Ukraine.

Crimea also enabled much of what Russia has done in Syria since its surprise intervention in that Middle Eastern conflict in late 2015. Equipment is regularly ferried from Sevastopol, on down through the Bosphorus, into the eastern Mediterranean and then delivered to the Russian naval station at Tartus on the Syrian coast. Meanwhile, Russian warships set up shop in the eastern Mediterranean and have been a regular fixture ever since.

But renewed activity by Russia’s Navy extends beyond the Black Sea and eastern Mediterranean. The service as a whole has been a key beneficiary of President Vladimir Putin’s military modernization efforts. New submarines — nuclear and conventionally powered — are coming online across all of Russia’s major fleets, as are smaller surface platforms. Russia is again active in the north Atlantic, the Baltic and the Arctic.

“The Russian Navy has definitely modernized. They have put some of their capital into faster, leaner, more agile and smaller warships,” Foggo said, referring to Russia’s Admiral Grigorovich- and Admiral Gorshkov-class frigates as well as the Steregushchy-class corvettes. “And they have never stopped putting money into the undersea domain and their submarine force, which is very capable. So, to tell you the truth, I respect the Russian Navy for the capability that they have.”

However, Foggo noted, nothing the Russian Navy can muster compares to the show of force assembled in the Mediterranean. “Nothing comes close to this,” Foggo said, gesturing around the flag bridge of the Lincoln, “a [U.S.] carrier strike group, two at a time in the Med.”

Kuznetsov blues

To be sure, Russia has itself tried to pull off an American-style carrier-strike-group operation. In 2016, the Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov departed its base at Severomorsk, on Russia’s northern frontier, with a group of escorts that included the powerful battlecruiser Peter the Great. Together they sailed around Scandinavia, down through the English Channel and into the Mediterranean on their way to Syria.

In many ways, it was Putin’s Great White Fleet moment. The strike group was paraded across Russian television, boasting that Moscow was again a great naval power and the Kuznetsov could do anything a ship like the Lincoln can. The reality, however, was a bit underwhelming compared to the story sold to Russian audiences.

The Kuznetsov was even used as a diplomatic tool when returning to Russia from Syria in 2017, stopping off the coast of Libya to pick up the local military leader Khalifa Haftar. There, he was given a tour of the ship by Kuznetsov’s officers and ended the visit with a video conference with Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu.

“The Russians want what we have right here on the deck of this ship, they want a powerful carrier strike group. But she does not have the incredible capability of the steam catapult like this ship,” Foggo said, referring to the mechanism installed on American carriers like the Lincoln that accelerate heavily loaded aircraft to takeoff speed in the course of about 300 feet.

“So when you do an apples-to-apples comparison, there is no comparison,” the U.S. Navy officer added.

The cruise was not without its utility, he noted. Russia did prove Kuznetsov could deploy for a prolonged period of time. But the ship’s shortcomings were also put on display. “As they came around, they were blowing some pretty nasty black smoke, so I think the engineering system on that ship is in dire need of upgrade,” Foggo said.

Then there is the case of Kuznetsov’s air wing. Because the ship lacks catapults, its fighters can only take off with a reduced fuel and weapons load. And even then, the jets have to charge the end of the deck at full speed, with the ship sailing into the wind. At the end of the deck there is a large ski ramp to give the planes a little kick into the air. It gets the job done, but it severely limits what the Kuznetsov can put up, and relegates the wing to defensive rather than offensive duties.

To be fair, this is by design. Kuznetsov was never envisioned as a strike carrier, but rather as an “aircraft-carrying heavy guided missile cruiser,” as it is technically designated in Russia. The ship was built with guided-missile tubes and hangar space for a modest air wing. The idea was Kuznetsov would largely act as a guided-missile cruiser, throwing planes up to defend the battle group. This was the greatest obstacle for Moscow’s desire to use it as an American-style strike carrier.

“Today you saw cycling air operations, launching and recovering aircraft,” Foggo said. “We do that 24/7, including at night. … The Russians didn’t do that. They basically drove the air wing down to Syria and offloaded it, so it was more like a fly-on/fly-off type of ship. So there is no comparison, and I am very happy the United States Navy has got two of these fantastic carriers in the Med right now to send a very strong message to all of our adversaries, and also to all of our friends.”

It’s unlikely Russian leadership would seriously argue the U.S. is not a formidable, much stronger naval power. But Russia’s entire defensive posture on the water is arrayed to keep U.S. carrier strike groups away; beyond surface ships and submarines, Russia has coastal defense cruise missiles, and the country’s Air Force plays a significant role with its bombers such as the Tu-22 and Tu-142, which can be fitted with standoff cruise missiles to hit U.S. ships at range.

“Waving about carriers is a standard attempt at bolstering coercive credibility, but it is of limited utility when dealing with a continental land power,” said CNA’s Kofman. “The Russians are perfectly aware that we can put together two carrier strike groups, but they are able to effectively contest maritime approaches and project power into adjacent seas nonetheless. I wouldn’t expect them to be terribly impressed.”

Coordinated messaging

Huntsman’s arrival on the Lincoln was an unusual move for a U.S. ambassador to Russia. But it is part of a growing relationship between Huntsman and Foggo. “We have been consulting with each other and comparing notes on a pretty regular basis,” Huntsman said. “There is nothing quite like being on the ground and working across the negotiating table on a day to day basis.”

“We are able to pick up on perceptions that are impossible to get anywhere else, how the system works internally, and what the trends are likely to be going forward — because they are going to impact obviously the strategic dynamic in a broader context,” Huntsman added. “So this is a pretty good example of the integration you seek between diplomats and our men and women in uniform. And it is a good thing that we are doing that more and more.”

Huntsman also said Foggo’s insights are useful for his work in Moscow, since they bolster his understanding of the strategic situation and Russia’s priorities. It also helps him better comprehend how the Kremlin responds to American deployments, such as the dual-carrier op with Lincoln and Stennis.

“This is all very helpful for us, for me as chief of mission,” Huntsman said, “particularly when you are from Russia because a lot of what we are doing here is being watched and analyzed, and we are watching and analyzing [Russia], and it is best if we do it together with our colleagues in uniform.”

That was the 70th anniversary parade, a major event in contemporary Russian patriotic lore. And it was the year the Victory Day parade became something more than what may have been an earnest, albeit very Russian, event to mark a solemn and hard fought victory. As talk of a new Cold War proliferated, the parade was used to unveil scores of new vehicles and weapons for the world to see, and fear.

For those, like me, hoping to get a peak of what President Vladimir Putin’s massive military modernization program was producing, the parade was a goldmine. Tanks roared onto the brick pavement of Red Square, followed by every armored vehicle in Russia’s arsenal. Massive bombers flew in tight formation trailed by the red, white and blue stripes of their flag.

It is easy enough as an American to witness such a spectacle and wonder why the U.S. military does not parade like the Russians do. In four years of witnessing these parades, I have concluded that it is only something that a government that feels politically or militarily insecure would do.

My dissolution with the idea began shortly after the parade ended. I wandered off Red Square and bumped into Steven Seagal (I have a selfie to prove it), and began to witness the public spectacle taking place outside the closed off square.

Families with young children flooded the closed off streets of central Moscow. Some of the kids dressed in costumes resembling WWII-era Red Army uniforms. The whole city seemed to be adorned in the orange and black St. George’s ribbons, a symbol that saw a massive boost in popularity after Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Everything about it was unapologetically militaristic.

The Victory Day parade serves as an important case study for Americans sympathetic to President Donald Trump’s call for their own massive military parade. While it may seem as simple as calling up Defense Secretary James Mattis and ordering him to arrange a parade, my experience in Moscow over the past four years has shown me it is significantly more complicated. First, preparations begin weeks before the parade actually begins. This takes men and material out of regular and training duty. But, more important for the common man, it is a major, prolonged disturbance to city life. Moscow’s main roads, like the central Tverskaya artery in and out of the city, are closed frequently. This exacerbates an already dramatic traffic problem.

While the processions of tank columns and nuclear missiles make their way through the city streets mostly at night, it is the bomber flights that have really come to bother me over the past four years. They practice their Red Square runs early in the morning, and their flight path has always somehow gone directly over whatever apartment I am living in. If you have never heard the propellers of a 60-year-old Tupolev Tu-95 Bear strategic bomber before, I can promise you that they are loud. Very, unreasonably loud. The massive jet engines hanging below the body of the Tu-160 supersonic bombers are a much more pleasant sound in comparison. They’re all unwelcome, recurring wakeups in the lead up to the big day on May 9.

Back to the topic of the children. What kind of message does a parade like this send to them? Inevitably, they will be the most attentive audience. I can’t speak for Russia’s children, but I can’t help but feel saddened when I see legions of them swarming Moscow’s lovely bulevards in play uniforms, fawning over Topol-M nuclear missiles designed to incinerate millions of people.

When the parade ends, the aftermath begins. Transiting across the city center can be a nightmare, especially on foot. Streets remain blocked off for hours. Fireworks are detonated in a steady barrage. One year, I stood on the river bank and found myself dodging large, hot chunks of firework shrapnel falling down on the crowd.

This leaves a lot for the city to clean up the next morning. And needless to say, almost everyone wakes up with a bad hangover. The city streets are no match for the treads of a 46 tonne T-90 main battle tank. And, every year, Moscow’s city government dishes out tens of thousands of dollars in street repair tenders after the military has retreated to their bases outside the city.

In 2015, the cost of repairs to Manezh Square, a lead-in to Red Square stormed several times by over 100 armored vehicles, cost the city $80,000 alone. In previous parades, repair contracts across the city have sometimes totalled millions of dollars.

The parades are messy, expensive, and morally questionable affairs. The White House and Pentagon should keep this in mind.