No plans to replace old Kola radar
The Russian parliament recently scraped the early-warning radar deal with Ukraine and places new modern radars in its southern territory. In the north, the old giant radar near Olenogorsk on the Kola Peninsula remains.
The new state-of-the-art radar to detect incoming missile attacks is built in Armavir near the border to Ukraine and will replace the old-giant radar Russia maintained in Ukraine. The Armavir radar is supposed to became operational later this year. Similar early-warning radar near St. Petersburg became operational in 2006. The new radars are said to be capable of detecting not only intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launches, but also launches of tactical and cruise missiles. While Russia is placing state-of-the-art technology radars in the south, the north remains with its old radars from the Soviet period. There are no plans to replace the old radars. The radar near Olenogorsk on the Kola Peninsula was built in the 70-ties. It looks like an enormous block-of-flats, difficult not to see while driving on the road through the taiga forest. The Olenogorsk radar became infamous in 1995 when it misinterpreted a civilian Norwegian science rocket to be an incoming U.S. submarine launched Tridient-missile. The Norwegian rocket was launched from Andøya test rocket field in Northern Norway and carried equipment to study the northern light over Svalbard. As the rocket climbed and was detected by the Olenogorsk radar station on the Kola Peninsula the operators interpreted the signals to appear similar in speed and flight as a nuclear weapon missile. Russian President Boris Yeltsin was notified immediately and the “nuclear briefcase” used to authorize nuclear launch were automatically activated. Russian doctrine reportedly allowed Yeltsin ten minutes from the time of detection to decide on a course of action. The radar operators in Olenogorsk were quickly able to determine that the rocket was heading towards Svalbard and therefore away from Russian airspace and was not a threat. Reports differ greatly as to whether or not Yeltsin came close to authorizing an attack, but the general consensus is that Yeltsin was able to conclude that there was no basis for attack, and therefore no danger. The new radars in southern Russia are reported to be much more accurate in its detection of different missiles than the old Soviet style radars, like the one in Olenogorsk.
