Marmot1
03-01-2004, 10:39 PM
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2001/06/25/MN80532.DTL
http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/pictures/2001/06/25/mn_russiasubs.jpg
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Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Russia -- In Russia's Far East, home to the country's Pacific submarine fleet, thieves within the navy are stripping subs of everything from radio equipment to radioactive isotopes and selling them to criminals.
The crime wave threatens the fleet's safety and has sparked fears about the spread of nuclear weapons. It is all the more alarming because of the area's proximity to North Korea, whose agents operate in the region and have attempted to acquire submarine technology and information.
The most recent known incident occurred in Petropavlovsk on April 24, when three officers were arrested on charges of stealing parts that included radioactive isotopes.
The crime is the second to draw the attention of authorities this year, said Yury Sazonov, military prosecutor with Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky garrison, which is handling the cases. Earlier this year, an officer and a civilian colleague stole similar parts from another submarine.
At least 10 people are believed to have been arrested last year for stealing parts from diesel and nuclear submarines, said Igor Kravchuk, a military reporter with the newspaper Vesti. He suspects that many more thefts went unreported; the military does not publicly report convictions.
One of the most frightening scenarios is that thieves could accidentally touch off a nuclear accident.
Last year in Kamchatka, two sailors sneaked into the nuclear reactor compartment of a submarine and stole the catalysts for igniting the reactor because they contained palladium, a metal of the platinum group, Interfax news service reported. The nine stolen tubes were worth $3,571 apiece.
The thieves also stole 12 radioactive calibrating plates, which looked like gold. (The sailors didn't realize the material was radioactive and hid it under the mattresses of their beds.)
The sailors even tried to lift the control rods but failed because an engineer had welded the lever down. If it hadn't been, they could have sparked a catastrophe, venting radioactive material over the port and thousands of people in the surrounding area.
The crime rate among navy officers on the Kamchatka peninsula has been mushrooming. In 1999, the last year for which statistics are available, the military crime rate was growing by about 20 percent annually, said Sazonov.
"There are constant attacks on the submarines by navy personnel, because they are so poorly paid that they have to steal metal and cable and other things in order to get by and get their families food," said James Clay Moltz, a research professor and associate director of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies.
"The senior navy officials have described it as 'a state of war,' and that's really what it is."
Publicly, at least, the navy is in denial about what is going on.
Rear Admiral Konstantin Sidenko, commander of the Northeast Armed Forces, dismissed the reports from newspapers and his own prosecutorial staff.
"Nobody has stolen anything this year," he said in a phone interview. "What was written in the newspapers is nothing but lies. There was a wave of thefts in 1998, but those who did that have been punished recently."
However, Sazonov, the military prosecutor, said theft from submarines is a booming and lucrative business.
"Unfortunately, this market is developing quite fast, so we are trying to fight it," he said.
Behind the epidemic of thievery is the harsh reality of post-communist Russia.
Newly inducted sailors are paid less than $3.50 a month, according to the Pacific Fleet headquarters, and even veteran submarine officers make only about $63 a month. And like some civilian workers, their wages are often unpaid for months at a time. The national daily Trud reported recently that 48 percent of military officers earn wages at below the national poverty level.
Submarines are tempting targets because they are packed with expensive equipment. And despite Russia's current economic troubles, it boasts a large submarine fleet in the Far East.
In Kamchatka, there are nine Delta III nuclear submarines with a total of 143 long-range missiles carrying 429 nuclear warheads, along with an older Delta I sub carrying 12 missiles with single warheads, Moltz said. Another 12 nuclear attack and guided-missile submarines in port are designed to fire nuclear-tipped cruise missiles and torpedoes at enemy ships. Many of these submarines no longer go to sea and are guarded only by two-man skeleton crews.
Twelve more nuclear attack submarines and another Delta I are based in the nearby region of Primorye. Most of these submarines, too, are decommissioned and guarded by light crews.
The risky situation has resulted in international attempts to pare the fleet. The U.S. Cooperative Threat Reduction program has been paying to help Russia dismantle 14 Delta and Yankee-class nuclear submarines in Bolshoi Kamen,
near Vladivostok. Likewise, the Japanese have offered $120 million to dismantle submarines, but only in Primorye, along the Sea of Japan.
Navy officials and Western Russia watchers aren't the only ones who have taken an interest in the thefts from subs.
North Korea is eager to get its hands on Russian nuclear submarine technology. In 1999, a former employee of the Zvezda shipyard near Vladivostok was arrested trying to sell radioactive materials to undercover agents posing as a broker for North Korea.
In 1996, 17 North Korean guest workers were caught trying to infiltrate a nuclear submarine facility in the Primorye region and were repatriated. And authorities have arrested North Korean workers for trying to buy dismantlement schedules and cruising patterns for nuclear vessels, Moltz said.
Many sailors and officers who steal parts melt the metal at home, producing impure ingots, Sazonov said. Precious metals such as beryllium and lithium are particularly in demand, but thieves often sell gold and platinum to local jewelry stores.
Open a newspaper in this city, and it is obvious that a thriving enterprise has sprung up.
"Company buys new and used radio equipment," state classified advertisements in the newspaper Vesti. The ads list electronic components for which the buyer offers up to $600.
The dispatcher of one company that buys equipment salvaged from the navy said her company pays up to $1,000 for some parts.
"We have a lot of competitors all over the city," said the woman, who declined to give her name. "Some are very close to the military units, so they get more business than we do."
Nuclear submarines are not the only vessels being looted. Last year, the diesel submarine fleet was even more subject to pillaging, said Kravchuk. An entire division of Kilo class submarines was disabled by thefts, he said.
The thieves even stole parts from the reactor areas, including equipment for measuring radioactivity, and they ripped out hydrogen-burning furnaces for the platinum and palladium they contained. The suspects are awaiting a verdict in a closed trial.
After the theft from the nuclear reactor compartment of the submarine in Kamchatka, Russian Navy commander Vladimir Kuroyedov fired two senior submarine officers, and 10 other officers and admirals were penalized for negligence.
But that is hardly enough to allay fears of a disaster.
"You don't want disgruntled individuals handling nuclear submarines, not to mention weapons," Moltz said. "It's a very bad recipe."
http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/pictures/2001/06/25/mn_russiasubs.jpg
http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/pictures/2001/06/25/mn_russiasub.jpg
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Russia -- In Russia's Far East, home to the country's Pacific submarine fleet, thieves within the navy are stripping subs of everything from radio equipment to radioactive isotopes and selling them to criminals.
The crime wave threatens the fleet's safety and has sparked fears about the spread of nuclear weapons. It is all the more alarming because of the area's proximity to North Korea, whose agents operate in the region and have attempted to acquire submarine technology and information.
The most recent known incident occurred in Petropavlovsk on April 24, when three officers were arrested on charges of stealing parts that included radioactive isotopes.
The crime is the second to draw the attention of authorities this year, said Yury Sazonov, military prosecutor with Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky garrison, which is handling the cases. Earlier this year, an officer and a civilian colleague stole similar parts from another submarine.
At least 10 people are believed to have been arrested last year for stealing parts from diesel and nuclear submarines, said Igor Kravchuk, a military reporter with the newspaper Vesti. He suspects that many more thefts went unreported; the military does not publicly report convictions.
One of the most frightening scenarios is that thieves could accidentally touch off a nuclear accident.
Last year in Kamchatka, two sailors sneaked into the nuclear reactor compartment of a submarine and stole the catalysts for igniting the reactor because they contained palladium, a metal of the platinum group, Interfax news service reported. The nine stolen tubes were worth $3,571 apiece.
The thieves also stole 12 radioactive calibrating plates, which looked like gold. (The sailors didn't realize the material was radioactive and hid it under the mattresses of their beds.)
The sailors even tried to lift the control rods but failed because an engineer had welded the lever down. If it hadn't been, they could have sparked a catastrophe, venting radioactive material over the port and thousands of people in the surrounding area.
The crime rate among navy officers on the Kamchatka peninsula has been mushrooming. In 1999, the last year for which statistics are available, the military crime rate was growing by about 20 percent annually, said Sazonov.
"There are constant attacks on the submarines by navy personnel, because they are so poorly paid that they have to steal metal and cable and other things in order to get by and get their families food," said James Clay Moltz, a research professor and associate director of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies.
"The senior navy officials have described it as 'a state of war,' and that's really what it is."
Publicly, at least, the navy is in denial about what is going on.
Rear Admiral Konstantin Sidenko, commander of the Northeast Armed Forces, dismissed the reports from newspapers and his own prosecutorial staff.
"Nobody has stolen anything this year," he said in a phone interview. "What was written in the newspapers is nothing but lies. There was a wave of thefts in 1998, but those who did that have been punished recently."
However, Sazonov, the military prosecutor, said theft from submarines is a booming and lucrative business.
"Unfortunately, this market is developing quite fast, so we are trying to fight it," he said.
Behind the epidemic of thievery is the harsh reality of post-communist Russia.
Newly inducted sailors are paid less than $3.50 a month, according to the Pacific Fleet headquarters, and even veteran submarine officers make only about $63 a month. And like some civilian workers, their wages are often unpaid for months at a time. The national daily Trud reported recently that 48 percent of military officers earn wages at below the national poverty level.
Submarines are tempting targets because they are packed with expensive equipment. And despite Russia's current economic troubles, it boasts a large submarine fleet in the Far East.
In Kamchatka, there are nine Delta III nuclear submarines with a total of 143 long-range missiles carrying 429 nuclear warheads, along with an older Delta I sub carrying 12 missiles with single warheads, Moltz said. Another 12 nuclear attack and guided-missile submarines in port are designed to fire nuclear-tipped cruise missiles and torpedoes at enemy ships. Many of these submarines no longer go to sea and are guarded only by two-man skeleton crews.
Twelve more nuclear attack submarines and another Delta I are based in the nearby region of Primorye. Most of these submarines, too, are decommissioned and guarded by light crews.
The risky situation has resulted in international attempts to pare the fleet. The U.S. Cooperative Threat Reduction program has been paying to help Russia dismantle 14 Delta and Yankee-class nuclear submarines in Bolshoi Kamen,
near Vladivostok. Likewise, the Japanese have offered $120 million to dismantle submarines, but only in Primorye, along the Sea of Japan.
Navy officials and Western Russia watchers aren't the only ones who have taken an interest in the thefts from subs.
North Korea is eager to get its hands on Russian nuclear submarine technology. In 1999, a former employee of the Zvezda shipyard near Vladivostok was arrested trying to sell radioactive materials to undercover agents posing as a broker for North Korea.
In 1996, 17 North Korean guest workers were caught trying to infiltrate a nuclear submarine facility in the Primorye region and were repatriated. And authorities have arrested North Korean workers for trying to buy dismantlement schedules and cruising patterns for nuclear vessels, Moltz said.
Many sailors and officers who steal parts melt the metal at home, producing impure ingots, Sazonov said. Precious metals such as beryllium and lithium are particularly in demand, but thieves often sell gold and platinum to local jewelry stores.
Open a newspaper in this city, and it is obvious that a thriving enterprise has sprung up.
"Company buys new and used radio equipment," state classified advertisements in the newspaper Vesti. The ads list electronic components for which the buyer offers up to $600.
The dispatcher of one company that buys equipment salvaged from the navy said her company pays up to $1,000 for some parts.
"We have a lot of competitors all over the city," said the woman, who declined to give her name. "Some are very close to the military units, so they get more business than we do."
Nuclear submarines are not the only vessels being looted. Last year, the diesel submarine fleet was even more subject to pillaging, said Kravchuk. An entire division of Kilo class submarines was disabled by thefts, he said.
The thieves even stole parts from the reactor areas, including equipment for measuring radioactivity, and they ripped out hydrogen-burning furnaces for the platinum and palladium they contained. The suspects are awaiting a verdict in a closed trial.
After the theft from the nuclear reactor compartment of the submarine in Kamchatka, Russian Navy commander Vladimir Kuroyedov fired two senior submarine officers, and 10 other officers and admirals were penalized for negligence.
But that is hardly enough to allay fears of a disaster.
"You don't want disgruntled individuals handling nuclear submarines, not to mention weapons," Moltz said. "It's a very bad recipe."