Asked if the public has nothing to worry about, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said: “That question is impossible to answer with a straight yes.” Photo / AP
Asked if the public has nothing to worry about, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said: “That question is impossible to answer with a straight yes.” Photo / AP
Russia wants to put a nuclear weapon into space, US intelligence indicates, in what was described as a “serious national security threat”.
Joe Biden was last night urged to declassify US intelligence on the military operation, which has been shared with every member of US Congress.
The US president is understood to have been tracking the threat, described as a “grave”, but not “immediate”, for some weeks, according to White House sources.
Republican Mike Turner, the head of the House intelligence committee, revealed the existence of the intelligence in a public statement calling on Biden to share it with the public.
Sources told ABC News that the intelligence had to do with Moscow seeking to put a nuclear weapon in space. The weapon would not be used to target the earth, the sources said, but described the intelligence as “very concerning and very sensitive”.
Joe Biden is understood to have been tracking the threat - described as "grave" but not "immediate". Photo / AP
It comes amid growing fears that Russia’s war in Ukraine has escalated the potential for a clash between Moscow and Nato.
White House officials said on Wednesday that they assessed the threat to be “serious” but believed there were ways to “contain” it without triggering mass panic.
Dr Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, said:
“If, indeed, Russia has, in fact, deployed, nuclear weapons in orbit, that would be a deliberate and direct violation of the 1967 outer space treaty by Moscow.”
“The outer space treaty is a cornerstone of space stability, and this would be a grave setback for international arms control,” he told the Telegraph.
Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, is due to personally brief the so-called “Gang of Eight”, the top leaders in Congress, on the intelligence.
Sullivan said he had taken the “highly unusual” step of offering himself up along with the country’s top “intelligence and defence professionals”.
Asked whether the public has nothing to worry about, Sullivan said: “That question is impossible to answer with a straight yes.”
“Americans understand that there are a range of threats and challenges in the world that we’re dealing with every single day,” he said.
Sullivan’s public remarks came after senior figures in Congress, who have been granted access to the intelligence, voiced alarm and demanded the information be released to the public.
Turner said the urgent matter was in “regard to a destabilising foreign military capability”.
