Leaked video shows Russian "Doomsday Device" capable of triggering tsunamis of up to 300-feet.

Following President Trump's contentious meeting with Vladimir Putin, the Russian government has released a series of videos showcasing an array of new nuclear weapons. One video, in particular, is most disconcerting. It is rumored to be a giant torpedo purpose-built to avoid US defenses. One expert has nicknamed it a "Doomsday Machine."

Putin himself has addressed the weapon on March 1st. According to a Kremlin translation of Putin's remarks, the weapon is said to be remotely-controlled, allowing for no Russian casualties, be able to hold masses of nuclear power, as well as have few vulnerabilities. "It is really fantastic," said Putin, "there is really nothing in the world capable of withstanding them".

A torpedo-shaped device called 'Poseidon' featured on the Russian Ministry of Defenses' YouTube account on July 19th. The new clips show real-world footage of a prototype warhead. Defense analyst H.I. Sutton believes Poseidon could measure in at about 2 meters (6.5 feet) wide and 20 meters (66 feet) long rendering capable of holding great nuclear power.

Nuclear Weapon Russia

Why is this new weapon so terrifying?

In 2015 the Russian government released diagrams of weapon that looks eerily similar to Poseidon which suggested the weapon would be capable of carrying a 50-megaton nuclear bomb which is about as powerful as Tsar Bomba, the largest nuclear device ever donated.

US nuclear tests of the 1940s, '50s, and '60s, including the underwater operations Crossroads Baker and Hardtack I Wahoo, illustrated why bombs detonated underwater could be so devastating. Warships were staged around the explosions to test the effect of the bombs, which were roughly as energetic as the bombs dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki on August 1945. Some warships were vaporized, others were flipped and sunk, while only a few sustained cracked hulls and damaged engines.

However, experts have questioned the purpose and effectiveness of Putin's device. While it could potentially create a Tsunami, if detonated above ground the effects could be far more destructive and widespread. There is also no guarantee the Tsunami would occur, especially as the bomb would be detonated miles from shore and waves lose energy as they approach land meaning it would be a waste of a nuclear bomb and a significant amount of money for Russia.

Why Would Russia Develop Such A Weapon?

While the reports and leaked videos/images portray a terrifying 'Doomsday Machine', it is still unconfirmed whether Putin has developed this weapon of mass destruction or not.

In 2015, Jeffrey Lewis, an expert on nuclear policy at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, wrote an article saying there wasn't speculation that the underwater bomb might be "salted", or surrounded with metals like cobalt, which would drastically increase the radius of fatal radiation levels from fallout for at least several months, or possibly even decades. However, if detonated underwater, the vast majority of the fallout or 'source term' will never escape the water as airborne particles.

Whereas, if it was dropped on land, almost 100% of the source term would end up on the land and so the devastation from a "salted" weapon detonated on land would be far worse than that of a weapon detonated below the water, salted or not.

To Lewis and many other nuclear experts, it doesn't really matter whether the rumors are real or not and Russia really has this kind of weaponry:

"Simply announcing to the world that you find this to be a reasonable approach to [nuclear] deterrence should be enough to mark you out as a dangerous creep, "Lewis said.

To conclude, this is certainly a worrying development emerging from one of the most powerful countries in the world, and we should all be wary indeed.