Russia Wants to Build a Whole City for Developing Weapons

By Samuel Bendett,War Is Boring

During the Cold War, the Soviet Union organized its vast academic and industrial resources to achieve scientific and industrial breakthroughs for the nation’s military forces. Locked in the global struggle against Washington’s massive military-industrial complex, Moscow needed its best and brightest citizens working on a vast array of technologies and principles to match and potentially “overtake” its rival.

Much of that science-and-technology and research-and-development work was conducted across Soviet universities and scientific institutions – while a massive amount of work was done at secret science cities spread across the country.

These cities — some with tens of thousands of inhabitants — were usually centered around a specific S&T laboratory or an institution dealing with work such as nuclear, biological, chemical research, rocket and ballistic technologies, development and testing of various weapons, and many other activities carried out in the service of the “state and nation.”

The work in these locales was classified, and those working and living there were kept under “lock and key” — under constant guard, with entry and exit closely guarded and controlled by the Soviet security apparatus. Many of these self-contained and fully functioning cities were not even on any public maps.

Over the decades, the work done at such classified sites contributed to the growth and development of the Soviet armed forces, and many current Russian military achievements — such as nuclear weapons and ballistic missile technologies — are based on the work done at these secret sites over the decades.

Today, after a quarter-century, Russia is returning to a similar principle with the announcement of a “technopolis” technology city to be constructed near Anapa, close to the Black Sea. Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu first announced this initiative, “Era,” during one of the teleconferences he hosts regularly with the nation’s armed forces.

The plan outlined by Shoigu is for “young scientists and graduates of scientific military companies, as well as representatives of scientific research institutes and the military-industrial institutions to work at the ‘technopolis’ in the interest of the armed forces,” RedStar.ru, the official news portal of the Russian military, cites the defense chief as saying.