How they arm and use their missiles today doesn't matter - the question is how they arm their missiles and how they use them in a future where we give up all of our ICBMs and make ourselves vulnerable to such a small attack.
Go ahead and look at the fallout cone for a 25 KT airburst on the Delta Pier in Bangor - Seattle is spared completely.
How they arm and use their missiles today doesn't matter - the question is how they arm their missiles and how they use them in a future where we give up all of our ICBMs and make ourselves vulnerable to such a small attack.
Go ahead and look at the fallout cone for a 25 KT airburst on the Delta Pier in Bangor - Seattle is spared completely.
Exactly what we need to avoid. Sustaining a robust triad - including our prompt & stabilizing ICBMs is a key part of that.
Increasing our tactical nuclear capabilities to deny Russia and China the perception of an advantage at low levels of escalation is also a key part. The W76-2 on D5 helps with that but we need more. We got rid of too much after the cold war ended. Our zeal to reduce the size of our arsenal wasn't match by Russia and now China is rapidly expanding theirs.
I maintain that bombers and SLBM are enough,. No need to make targets of our food production regions by placing nukes there. I would also add that none of the ICBMs are equipped with low yield tactical warheads to allow for the limited response you seem to think is feasible. If anything it is the bombers that would be the most easily to provide for that.
We know the Triad works to prevent large scale nuclear war. The risky and borderline insane strategy of inviting a first strike by eliminating the stabilizing influence that our ICBMs have provided for over 50 years and reducing ourselves to 5 relatively soft and easy to destroy targets is a terrible way to try to save a few dollars. We lost far more to Earned Income Tax Credit fraud every year than we spend on ICBMs.
They know exactly where our soft and easily destroyed bomber and SSBN bases are. Without repair or support facilities or spare parts the few surviving at-sea SSBNs will slowly wither and die.
It's amusing that you think any single nuclear use would result in the end of the world. Then again considering you think our ICBMs carry 300 megaton warheads I can understand why this is confusing for you.
Excuse me Kiloton but still 350 KT significantly more than 20kt and you were not talking just one but 5. Why stop there why not ten or 15 is it no big deal? . Is there going to be some gentlemen's agreement that we won't nuke you more than you nuke us? Good grief.
Again, the issue is about not putting the President in a position where the only choice is to respond with a full launch or nothing after only being hit with 5 small nukes. That is the stability that the ICBMs provide - 450 hardened targets that have to be destroyed.
Without our 450 stabilizing ICBMs we could be attacked by only 5 small warheads and the only surviving element of our nuclear deterrent would be our at-sea SSBNs. Those SSBNs would have no spare parts and no repair crews. The only choice would be to launch a full retaliatory strike while we still have them or to let them slowly wither away and die on the vine.
Everyone knows that they can carry more than one don't be silly. I said under the New START treaty bombers only count as one warhead. That doesn't mean they can only carry one warhead --- it's a simple treaty accountability rule that helps explain the open source data that shows we only carry an average of 4.4 warheads per SLBM.
Oh and obviously there is no missile with 0.4 parts of a warhead on it --- that comes from the math of averaging it out. I just want to make sure it's clear that I understand that before you start claiming to be the only one who understands that too.
Your original contention for keeping the ICBMs was that they give the President a limited response option to 5- 20 Kt nukes. I don't see how a 350 kt ICBM a limited response to a 20kt.
Wrong. Go back and read my actual response --- from the start I have been clear that what ICBMs do is promote stability by providing a large target sink that means any attack against us would have to be massive rather than "them" being able to hit us with just 5 tactical nuclear warheads to destroy our entire nuclear deterrent with the exception of our at-sea SSBNs.
It's all about not putting the president in a position where they have to choose between an all-out response to a very minor attack or nothing as our surviving nuclear deterrent withers away without parts or support.
Also, your math doesn't make any sense. SSBNs can't each hold 240 warheads - the most they can hold is 160 (20x8). And even then they are never fully loaded since that reduces the range/footprint too much. Right now, according to our own public New START data releases we (at least in Dec 2020) had 1457 warheads broken down by: 397 ICBM warheads, 48 bombers (which each count as 1 warhead), and then 1012 SLBM warheads spread around 230 SLBMs --- an average loading of 4.4 warheads per SLBM. (Source: https://www.state.gov/new-start-treaty-aggregate-numbers-of-strategic-offensive-arms-15/ )
According to the internet a D-5 can hold up 12 W-76/W-88 MIRVS 20x12+240
B-52s can carry at least six nuclear armed cruise missiles.
Either way the math does not work in favor your idea of limited response with an ICBM. In your scenario arguing in favor of keeping them would have the President respond to a 20-25 megaton strike on Bangor with a 300+ megaton ICBM (per missile) counter strike.
The internet is wrong - only 8 has ever been tested and they are actually loaded with far less than that as the New START numbers show.
Now - I said a 20 KT strike on Bangor not a 20 MT. Also, the whole point is the president WOULDN'T be put in a "use or lose" scenario if attacked by only 5 small warheads BECAUSE we still have hundreds of ICBMs.
Also, our ICBMs don't carry 300 MT eachs. That is just nonsense.
Even if it is only 8, that is 8 x 20 x 5=800 at sea plus not courting what the Air Force gets air. You are going to argue that is not enough? You limited tactical nuke war is as crazy as the Army telling troops not worry about a nuclear battlefield in their aluminum battel taxi in MOPP-4
Though your assumption that only 5 are at sea is also a poor one. Look at the satellite photos of Kings Bay and Bangor sometime and count the boats.
Any nuclear war is crazy --- but so is the idea of inviting a nuclear strike by doing away with ICBMs and incentivizing an adversary to strike early to destroy everything we have that isn't actively at-sea at the time.
The idea is to never put the President in a position where they have to choose to respond to an attack on the US with only 5 tactical nukes with a full all out attack by our surviving nuclear forces.
Also, just because ICBMs don't deter tactical nuclear use doesn't mean they aren't useful at deterring large scale nuclear exchanges. Those 450 hard targets, and over 500 more at the height of the cold war, have been in the midst of our food production region for over 50 years.
How they arm and use their missiles today doesn't matter - the question is how they arm their missiles and how they use them in a future where we give up all of our ICBMs and make ourselves vulnerable to such a small attack.
Go ahead and look at the fallout cone for a 25 KT airburst on the Delta Pier in Bangor - Seattle is spared completely.
https://youtu.be/EcK6ad_t9ak
Exactly what we need to avoid. Sustaining a robust triad - including our prompt & stabilizing ICBMs is a key part of that.
Increasing our tactical nuclear capabilities to deny Russia and China the perception of an advantage at low levels of escalation is also a key part. The W76-2 on D5 helps with that but we need more. We got rid of too much after the cold war ended. Our zeal to reduce the size of our arsenal wasn't match by Russia and now China is rapidly expanding theirs.
I maintain that bombers and SLBM are enough,. No need to make targets of our food production regions by placing nukes there. I would also add that none of the ICBMs are equipped with low yield tactical warheads to allow for the limited response you seem to think is feasible. If anything it is the bombers that would be the most easily to provide for that.
We know the Triad works to prevent large scale nuclear war. The risky and borderline insane strategy of inviting a first strike by eliminating the stabilizing influence that our ICBMs have provided for over 50 years and reducing ourselves to 5 relatively soft and easy to destroy targets is a terrible way to try to save a few dollars. We lost far more to Earned Income Tax Credit fraud every year than we spend on ICBMs.
You have to find them first to destroy them. They know were the missile silos are. 5 with up to 240 warheads (MIRV) each sounds pretty good to me.
They know exactly where our soft and easily destroyed bomber and SSBN bases are. Without repair or support facilities or spare parts the few surviving at-sea SSBNs will slowly wither and die.
It is amusing that you think there will any repairing and supporting going on once nukes start to get thrown around
It's amusing that you think any single nuclear use would result in the end of the world. Then again considering you think our ICBMs carry 300 megaton warheads I can understand why this is confusing for you.
Excuse me Kiloton but still 350 KT significantly more than 20kt and you were not talking just one but 5. Why stop there why not ten or 15 is it no big deal? . Is there going to be some gentlemen's agreement that we won't nuke you more than you nuke us? Good grief.
Again, the issue is about not putting the President in a position where the only choice is to respond with a full launch or nothing after only being hit with 5 small nukes. That is the stability that the ICBMs provide - 450 hardened targets that have to be destroyed.
Without our 450 stabilizing ICBMs we could be attacked by only 5 small warheads and the only surviving element of our nuclear deterrent would be our at-sea SSBNs. Those SSBNs would have no spare parts and no repair crews. The only choice would be to launch a full retaliatory strike while we still have them or to let them slowly wither away and die on the vine.
On the plus side I new that a B-52 could be equipped with more than one nuke-and standoff missiles.
Everyone knows that they can carry more than one don't be silly. I said under the New START treaty bombers only count as one warhead. That doesn't mean they can only carry one warhead --- it's a simple treaty accountability rule that helps explain the open source data that shows we only carry an average of 4.4 warheads per SLBM.
Oh and obviously there is no missile with 0.4 parts of a warhead on it --- that comes from the math of averaging it out. I just want to make sure it's clear that I understand that before you start claiming to be the only one who understands that too.
Your original contention for keeping the ICBMs was that they give the President a limited response option to 5- 20 Kt nukes. I don't see how a 350 kt ICBM a limited response to a 20kt.
Wrong. Go back and read my actual response --- from the start I have been clear that what ICBMs do is promote stability by providing a large target sink that means any attack against us would have to be massive rather than "them" being able to hit us with just 5 tactical nuclear warheads to destroy our entire nuclear deterrent with the exception of our at-sea SSBNs.
It's all about not putting the president in a position where they have to choose between an all-out response to a very minor attack or nothing as our surviving nuclear deterrent withers away without parts or support.
Also, your math doesn't make any sense. SSBNs can't each hold 240 warheads - the most they can hold is 160 (20x8). And even then they are never fully loaded since that reduces the range/footprint too much. Right now, according to our own public New START data releases we (at least in Dec 2020) had 1457 warheads broken down by: 397 ICBM warheads, 48 bombers (which each count as 1 warhead), and then 1012 SLBM warheads spread around 230 SLBMs --- an average loading of 4.4 warheads per SLBM. (Source: https://www.state.gov/new-start-treaty-aggregate-numbers-of-strategic-offensive-arms-15/ )
Our latest data release in May 2023 doesn't break it down to that extent but we sitting at (as of March 2023): 1419 total warheads on 662 total launchers. (Source: https://www.state.gov/new-start-treaty-aggregate-numbers-of-strategic-offensive-arms-5/ )
According to the internet a D-5 can hold up 12 W-76/W-88 MIRVS 20x12+240
B-52s can carry at least six nuclear armed cruise missiles.
Either way the math does not work in favor your idea of limited response with an ICBM. In your scenario arguing in favor of keeping them would have the President respond to a 20-25 megaton strike on Bangor with a 300+ megaton ICBM (per missile) counter strike.
The internet is wrong - only 8 has ever been tested and they are actually loaded with far less than that as the New START numbers show.
Now - I said a 20 KT strike on Bangor not a 20 MT. Also, the whole point is the president WOULDN'T be put in a "use or lose" scenario if attacked by only 5 small warheads BECAUSE we still have hundreds of ICBMs.
Also, our ICBMs don't carry 300 MT eachs. That is just nonsense.
Even if it is only 8, that is 8 x 20 x 5=800 at sea plus not courting what the Air Force gets air. You are going to argue that is not enough? You limited tactical nuke war is as crazy as the Army telling troops not worry about a nuclear battlefield in their aluminum battel taxi in MOPP-4
But again it isn't 8 - it's an average of 4.4.
Though your assumption that only 5 are at sea is also a poor one. Look at the satellite photos of Kings Bay and Bangor sometime and count the boats.
Any nuclear war is crazy --- but so is the idea of inviting a nuclear strike by doing away with ICBMs and incentivizing an adversary to strike early to destroy everything we have that isn't actively at-sea at the time.
The idea is to never put the President in a position where they have to choose to respond to an attack on the US with only 5 tactical nukes with a full all out attack by our surviving nuclear forces.
Also, just because ICBMs don't deter tactical nuclear use doesn't mean they aren't useful at deterring large scale nuclear exchanges. Those 450 hard targets, and over 500 more at the height of the cold war, have been in the midst of our food production region for over 50 years.