Moscow has just revived a nightmare that the United States had buried in the 60s. burevestnik, Russian nuclear-powered cruise missile, completed a 15-hour test covering 14.000 kilometers, as announced by Putin October 26, 2025. The weapon is powered by a small reactor that heats compressed air to generate thrust, theoretically allowing for days-long flights without refueling.
NATO calls it SkyfallAmerican experts consider it technologically risky and strategically questionable. But the fact that Russia continues to invest in it after years of failures and a deadly explosion in 2019 The killing of five nuclear scientists proves one thing: Moscow truly believes this weapon can work. And that's enough to shake things up.
A flying reactor
The principle is similar to a ramjet, but instead of burning kerosene, it uses nuclear fission. Air enters through the front intake, is compressed by the missile's speed, passes through a miniaturized nuclear reactor that heats it to extreme temperatures, and is then expelled from the rear, generating thrust. No tanks, no refueling. At least in theory, range is limited only by the mechanical durability of the engine and the stability of the reactor. According to Russian Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, the Burevestnik covered 14.000 kilometers in 15 hours during the October 21 test, and clarified that “this is not its limit.”
The design envisions a launch with solid-fuel rockets to bring the missile to the speed required for the ramjet to operate. Once cruising speed is reached, the boosters are released and the nuclear reactor kicks in. From that point, the Burevestnik can fly at low altitude, follow the terrain, and change course unpredictably. The estimated speed is high subsonic, likely around 1.200 km/h, although Putin has spoken of supersonic capabilities, which Western experts consider unlikely given the engine configuration.
Project Pluto, the American precedent
The idea is not new. Between 1957 and 1964 the United States developed Project Pluto, a program to create the Supersonic Low Altitude Missile (SLAM), a nuclear-powered cruise missile capable of flying at Mach 3 at very low altitudes and carrying up to 26 nuclear warheads. Tests of the prototype engines, called Tory II-A e Tory II-C, were technically successful. The reactor worked. But the project was canceled in July 1964 for four reasons that today seem almost prophetic.
First reason: ICBMs had evolved more rapidly than expected, making SLAM less strategically necessary. Second reason: No one could find an acceptable way to flight-test a missile that releases radiation all the way through. Third reason: The noise. A low-altitude supersonic missile generates devastating shock waves, and SLAM would have passed at three times the speed of sound just a few hundred meters above the ground. Fourth reason: radioactive emissionsThe SLAM reactor did not have a closed cooling circuit: it used external air directly, which was then contaminated and released into the atmosphere.
A former U.S. State Department official, Thomas Countryman, called the entire concept "uniquely stupid" and compared it to a "flying Chernobyl." The fact that Russia is actually pursuing such a project raises both technical and strategic questions.
Burevestnik, a problematic track record
The Burevestnik doesn't exactly have a track record of success. According to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, between 2016 and today at least 13 known tests have been conducted, of which only two were partially successful. The most serious episode occurred on August 8, 2019 in white sea, when an explosion during the recovery of a missile from the seabed caused the release of radiation, killing five nuclear scientists at the state agency Rosatom and causing a radiation spike in the nearby city of Severodvinsk.
The fundamental issue remains reactor management. It must be small and light enough to fly, yet robust enough to withstand extreme temperature fluctuations, pressure variations, and aerodynamic stresses that can generate high pressures, on the order of hundreds of bars, equivalent to tens of megapascals. This combination of lightness and strength is a crucial challenge to ensure the system's safety and efficiency under complex operating conditions.
The Norwegian authorities They confirmed that they did not detect any radioactive peaks after the October test, but this does not exclude localized contamination along the route.Intelligence Service Norway had already warned in 2024 that “the tests carry risks of accidents and local radioactive releases”.
Burevestnik: strategy or propaganda?
Putin described the Burevestnik as "invincible" against current and future defenses, thanks to its nearly unlimited range and unpredictable flight path. He ordered the Ministry of Defense to prepare the infrastructure for the weapon's operational deployment. But many Western analysts remain skepticalThe director of the Nuclear Information Project of the Federation of American Scientists, Hans Kristensen, he noted that a cruise missile remains as vulnerable as any other, and the longer it flies the more time there is to track it.
Then there's the issue of weight. Some estimates suggest the Burevestnik could weigh up to 24 tons, making it difficult to transport and deploy. And even if it were to function perfectly, its use raises enormous geopolitical questions: even a test launch of a nuclear-powered weapon could be interpreted as an act of aggression, given that it's impossible to distinguish from the ground whether the missile is carrying a warhead or not.
Il New START Treaty between the United States and Russia, which limits the number of strategic nuclear warheads, expires in February 2026. The Burevestnik, with its intercontinental range, could fall under strategic rather than tactical weapons, further complicating future negotiations.
Perhaps the most important message is not technical, but political. Russia is demonstrating its willingness to take extreme technological risks to maintain a credible deterrent capability. Whether the Burevestnik is actually operational or not, the very fact that Moscow continues to invest in it after repeated failures and human casualties is a testament to its continued commitment to it. indicates a clear strategic determination. And this, in an era of rising tensions, could be enough to reignite dynamics that we hoped had ended with the Cold War.
As a We wrote in the past talking about other extreme scenariosCertain technologies should never be developed. But once someone starts, stopping becomes nearly impossible. The Burevestnik is the perfect example of an idea that should have remained on paper, but instead continues to fly. Literally.
