User Reviews

Just when you think you understand the way the world works, along comes a film like Kursk: Submarine In Troubled Waters to disturb your complacency. This astonishing documentary takes a look at the sinking of the Russian submarine Kursk on August 12, 2000, an accident that was inevitably attributed to an accidental explosion caused by a faulty torpedo. In the immediate wake of the accident, Russian naval officers attributed the sinking to a torpedo strike from a U.S. Navy sub, an accusation I assumed was designed to cover up their own carelessness and ineptitude. The thesis of this film, however, is that the admirals were right all along: American subs were shadowing the Kursk during its Barents Sea exercises, and (intentionally or otherwise) rammed and then torpedoed it. The film is damning and its evidence overwhelming: only hurried talks between Vladimir Putin and Bill Clinton kept the world from a catastrophic nuclear war. Another reminder that one should never, EVER take what politicians say at face value.

Done in 2004, the show clings to a conspiracy theory surrounding a collision with an American sub which has since been completely disputed with solid evidence. Most of the "experts" interviewed were either British or Russian, I don't recall a single American other than the narrator. The Documentary was made by a French filmmaker. French filmmakers and British "experts" is a documentary combination that almost always leads to anti-American conspiracy theory. The main part of the Kursk was subsequently raised and a more thorough investigation determined that the sinking did, in fact, result from the explosion of the faulty peroxide fueled practice torpedo which disabled the sub and started a furious fire which eventually set off the warheads of something like 5 to 7 additional torpedoes, blowing the bow apart and sealing the sub's fate. This was clearly covered in a 2012 episode of "Seconds from Disaster".

Disappointing. Mostly conspiracy theory stuff with a bit of attention on the Russian navy's delays. The worst bit was people banging on about the Kursk having the same kind of reactor as the one used at Chernobyl, and my eyes rolled so hard I saw a bit of my brain. As if a reactor designed to power whole towns and needed a several storey building to sit in was going to fit in the hull of even a very large submarine. I wish I could have my 75 minutes back.

As far as documentaries go it's made fairly well.

Having said that I couldn't believe how absolutely inaccurate it was of all the evidence other docs accurately put in their work around the time this was made. I'm not going to bash it because people need to see this to believe how absurd it is on it's belief of the events that happened the day and years that followed when the Kursk went down.

Please don't base any opinion (negative or positive) until you've spent some time researching and viewing other items on the Kursk.

I am in NO way a fan of JWB but Coyote's remark about Putin securing his allegiance to Bush sealed it's fait as lies on film.