Russia Quietly Reinforces Five Strategic Nuclear Locations
Satellite imagery from recent years indicates significant development of secret facilities at sites associated with Russian nuclear installations.
The Gaze reports on this with reference to Business Insider.
The images reveal new facilities, road construction, and other modifications, according to analysts specializing in Russia's nuclear forces who spoke to BI.
Four bases are located in Europe, one is closer to Alaska
The first base, located in Asipovichi, Belarus, is a strategically important center to the 1405th ammunition base that has been actively developed in recent years.
Satellite data shows new buildings, multi-level fences, covered observation points, as well as an unloading ramp and a large platform, likely for the transportation of warheads by rail.
Analysts believe that although the base was built to store these nuclear weapons, it is unlikely that warheads are currently there.
Pavlo Podvig, a senior researcher at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, believes that the warheads could be in Bryansk. “They would be moved to Asipovichy when necessary,” Podvig remarked.
The second base, Gadzhiyevo, serves as a naval base where Russian ballistic missile submarines are stationed. Satellite images show the presence of storage facilities in the mountain range where nuclear warheads are stored, as well as a special crane for loading missiles onto submarines.
As of May 2025, the base is being actively expanded, with at least six new buildings erected near the missile processing area. Experts speculate that these could be garages or warehouses for warheads, including conventional or not yet equipped with nuclear warheads.
The third base, in Kaliningrad, near the borders with Lithuania and Poland, is suspected of storing tactical nuclear warheads. Its location next to the base of a Soviet-era nuclear unit only reinforces these doubts.
By 2025, a new gray building, similar to the one at the Asipovychi base, appeared on the site. Its purpose remains unclear. Michael Duitsman, a research fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, suggested that it could be a guard shack.
The fourth base, Kamchatka, near Alaska across the Bering Sea, is a key base for the Russian Pacific Fleet. This is where the Poseidon, a new nuclear-powered torpedo capable of traveling long distances underwater and striking targets on the US West Coast, is planned to be deployed.
Satellite images show the nuclear weapons storage facility, reinforced by multi-level fences and guards. There are “clear nuke signs” on these storage upgrades, said Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists.
The fifth base is located on the Novaya Zemlya archipelago, where in 1961 the USSR detonated the most powerful thermonuclear bomb in history, Tsar.
Severny Island is home to a support base that has undergone significant expansion since 2023, including a large new building in the south, which was completed by June 2025.
“Russia has a policy of keeping the site prepared for the resumption of tests, if necessary,” Kristensen voiced.
The Gaze has previously reported that Russia is actively modernizing its nuclear infrastructure at five bases near Europe, including one just 270 kilometers from Sweden.