A top Kremlin official has suggested an ambitious new infrastructure project — a “Putin-Trump Tunnel” running beneath the Bering Strait — that would physically connect Russia and the United States, promote joint development of natural resources, and serve as a “symbol of unity” between the two powers.
The idea was presented by Kirill Dmitriev, President Vladimir Putin’s special investment envoy and head of Russia’s RDIF sovereign wealth fund. His proposal envisions an $8 billion venture financed by Moscow along with “international partners,” creating a 70-mile (112-kilometer) rail and freight tunnel to be completed in less than eight years.
Dmitriev, who has been at the forefront of Moscow’s recent diplomatic outreach to Washington, floated the concept Thursday evening following a phone conversation between Putin and President Donald Trump, during which the two agreed to meet in Budapest to discuss possible steps toward ending the war in Ukraine.
“The dream of a US–Russia link via the Bering Strait reflects an enduring vision — from the 1904 Siberia–Alaska railway to Russia’s 2007 plan. RDIF has studied existing proposals, including the US–Canada–Russia–China railroad, and will support the most viable,” Dmitriev wrote on X.
The Bering Strait spans 51 miles (82 kilometers) at its narrowest point, separating Alaska from Russia’s Chukotka Peninsula. For more than a century and a half, engineers and political leaders have occasionally revived the idea of bridging or tunneling this stretch, though no proposal has ever advanced beyond the planning stage.
Dmitriev — who has developed ties with Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy, and discussed opportunities for U.S. energy companies to invest in Arctic ventures — proposed that the tunnel be built by The Boring Company, the U.S.-based tunneling enterprise founded by Elon Musk.
“Imagine connecting the US and Russia, the Americas and the Afro-Eurasia with the Putin-Trump Tunnel – a 70-mile link symbolizing unity. Traditional costs are $65B+, but @boringcompany’s tech could reduce it to <$8B. Let’s build a future together,” Dmitriev wrote to Musk on X.
Neither Musk nor Trump has issued a public reaction to the proposal.
Dmitriev also noted that a similar idea had been raised during the Cold War — a “Kennedy-Khrushchev World Peace Bridge” — and he shared an archival sketch showing the proposed route from that era, along with an updated map outlining the envisioned modern tunnel between Chukotka and Alaska.
“RDIF has already invested in and built the first ever Russia-China railroad bridge. The time has come to do more and connect the Continents for the first time in human history. The time has come to connect Russia and the US,” said Dmitriev.
{Matzav.com}
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This is actually a pretty good idea. There have also been ideas of building an automobile bridge across the Bering Strait. In the mid-1800’s there were actual plans that the cross-country railroad that had then just been completed was to be just the first phase of a massive project of building a rail line from Western Europe all the way through Russia (through its far eastern tip at the Bering Strait) then over the Bering Strait in through Alaska down though Canada and the United States and down through Mexico and Central America and then down through the whole South America to its southern most tip. This would have thus connected together by rail several whole huge areas of the world. (Please see this related in the YouTube video titled: “1932, A True History of the United States.”)