Obama limits use of nuclear weapons

[BeAChooser]

Originally Posted by BeAChooser
...Imagine how less we'd be able to attack such preparedness with Forsyth's and Saltzan's arsenal? ...We don't have a clue as to what they're doing there." ...

You need to square your imagination with reality.

But since "we don't have a clue as to what they are doing there", feel free for once to speculate on why the Russians might be templating to attack the West with an all-out nuclear attack, now or in the foreseeable future?

Who would stand to gain what?

In response, I offer a recent post by me on another thread:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5816846&postcount=43

And here's a quote at the end of the post:

The point is that 105 warheads is not enough to even begin to scratch Russia's civil defense system. Or attack hardened military and government targets. Yes, you could certainly severely damage 105 Russian cities, but you couldn't begin to destroy most of them. Vast portions of those cities would escape destruction, as well as their populace. Not so in the US if 1000 warheads are targeted on cities. Russia's government would survive. Ours would not. Much of it's industry would survive. Most of ours would not. Much of it's population would survive. Much of ours would not. And when all was said and done, Russia would still be a powerful nation. Not so the USA. And given such a tradeoff, are you sure that outcome would deter ambitious ex-Communist Russian leaders … like Putin? If so, I think you are being extremely naive.

 

[Darth Rotor]

Let´s see... assuming you and I each had a whole bunch of nuke, would it be okay for me to deter you from using yours by threatening to use mine on an awful lot of people who have no input on your decision to use nukes, and whom you don´t give the slightest damn about?.

In this world, rather than in your fantasy land, such problems are addressed at the aggretate level, which happens to be nation states, and nations.

Nations are collections and aggregations of people. Some things don't scale up perfectly, and at certain levels of aggregation, function changes ... like from cell to tissue to organ to organism.

It is dishonest of you to pretend that you can arbitrarily separate the people and the nation that they live in. You can't, they are what makes up the nation, for better and worse.

Do some nations have better leadership than others? Yes.

Do some nations' people have less say in their nation's policy formulation than others? Yes.

Tough. That is how the world works. Crying about is a waste of time, which is what you appear to be doing.

On a lesser example, I didn't get to vote on whether or not Nixon sent aid to the Israelis in 1973, nor did my Dad, but we all suffered the consequences of the oil embargo all the same. The risk we all live with in this world is that we have political leadership that does something, or a lot of somethings, stupid. Welcome to the world of grown ups, Chaos. I grew up in the Cold War, and lived with the knowledge that with a few decisions, where I lived could become a radioactive wasteland in a few short hours.

You are invited to invent a world in which it works otherwise, at which point I'll address your fantasy based question.

DR

 

[Darth Rotor]

Did someone insist that Iran should be allowed to develop nuke weaponry?
If so then they are a small sub-group of what you refer to as 'the left'.

I am not from the left, and I don't see that big a problem with Iran eventually getting nuclear capability. I think they are more stable than Pakistan, who has them already.

It is my opinion that Iran would use them as a deterrent, as the US and Russia have done for about sixty years. I am far more concerned about friction between India and Pakistan, nuke wise, than anything in that category with Iran, for about the next twenty years.

DR

 

[BeAChooser]

I don't see that big a problem with Iran eventually getting nuclear capability

Except that Iran is violating a treaty they signed to do it. Pakistan didn't.

Except that Pakistan is actively fighting terrorists. Iran is not (unless they are trying to bring down Iran's government).

Except that Pakistan doesn't appear to be promoting terrorism abroad. Iran is doing just that in Israel, Iraq and in other places.

Except that Pakistan's leadership is not making statements about wiping Israel from the face of the earth with nuclear weaponry, even at the cost of hundreds of millions of lives to the arab world. Iran's leadership is.

 

[funk de fino]

Except that Pakistan doesn't appear to be promoting terrorism abroad. Iran is doing just that in Israel, Iraq and in other places.

Maybe you should ask some Indians about that one.

 

[Darth Rotor]

Except that Iran is violating a treaty they signed to do it. Pakistan didn't.

Israel didn't sign the treaty either. Maybe nobody should have, so that nobody could be criticized for building nukes.

Except that Pakistan is actively fighting terrorists. Iran is not (unless they are trying to bring down Iran's government).

I think you'll find that the Pakistani government's change of mode is relatively recent, since Musharraf left the scene. You are exercising a very narrow view here.

Except that Pakistan doesn't appear to be promoting terrorism abroad.

As far as you know, but don't tell anyone in India that.

DR

 

[BeAChooser]

Israel didn't sign the treaty either. Maybe nobody should have, so that nobody could be criticized for building nukes.

A promise is a promise.

I think you'll find that the Pakistani government's change of mode is relatively recent, since Musharraf left the scene. You are exercising a very narrow view here.

I'm exercising a post 9/11 view.

As far as you know, but don't tell anyone in India that.

You'll admit that there is more going on between Pakistan and India than merely claims of terrorism, won't you?

 

[McHrozni]

The answer is in the OP:

To everybodies' opinion? I do doubt that.

I guess, at the DOD they currently see no feasible scenario by which B and C weapons could be in fact quite as devastating as you make them up to be in your fantasy scenario. Ebola-epidemics for example can be relatively easily contained using run-of-the-mill quarantine measures.

For starters, I find your critique that a worst-case fantasy scenario of a devastating biological attack to be an unrealistic fantasy scenario rather unconvincing. We also weren't talking about how realistic a biological attack was, but what would be the appropriate response should something like that happen.
If you want the full realism, finding a dozen people willing to be infected with a deadly and painful virus and then run around a major city (or two or ...) spreading the virus until they die a painful death is also quite difficult, as is obtaining the virus and smuggling it into the US, and so on. It's another topic entirely.

Here, from the OP:

White House officials said that the new strategy will leave open the option of reconsidering the use of nuclear retaliation against a biological attack, if the development of such weapons reaches a level that makes United States vulnerable to a devastating strike.

Obviously the DoD agrees with the that a severe attack with such consequences would be worthy of at least considering the nuclear option. I was asking what other people here thought about that option.

I thought that was readily obvious, but alas ...

McHrozni

 

[Darth Rotor]

You'll admit that there is more going on between Pakistan and India than merely claims of terrorism, won't you?

Certainly. They have more issues than Time magazine.

 

[mike3]

Here, from the OP:



Obviously the DoD agrees with the that a severe attack with such consequences would be worthy of at least considering the nuclear option. I was asking what other people here thought about that option.

I thought that was readily obvious, but alas ...

Can there be such a thing as a "limited" use of nuclear weapons, i.e. one that won't escalate to a world-wide, extinction-level holocaust? And what about the "nuclear winter" scenarios I mentioned in my last post, that could be triggered with much less nuclear firepower than you might think? Would it be worth initiating that type of worldwide catastrophe over such an attack? What would be gained from killing so many in places that didn't even have anything to do with the initial attack?

 

[McHrozni]

Can there be such a thing as a "limited" use of nuclear weapons, i.e. one that won't escalate to a world-wide, extinction-level holocaust?

I really don't see why not. Not between USA and Russia perhaps, but in the above scenario with North Korea - certainly.

And what about the "nuclear winter" scenarios I mentioned in my last post, that could be triggered with much less nuclear firepower than you might think? Would it be worth initiating that type of worldwide catastrophe over such an attack?

The study with the smallest amount of arsenal involves the use of 100 Hiroshima-sized bombs to produce quite severe, but survivable effects. That's not a small war or a surgical strike, but a significant exchange.

In this sense deployment of small nuclear weapons is highly desirable. A 1kt warhead, for example, packs the explosive power of a fleet of B-52s and is small enough to be fired from a field gun, for example. True, fallout is a much greater concern with small weapons, but their primary use is deterrence anyway - and knowing using these weapons will not lead to catastrophic results worldwide (their fallout is not nearly big enough for that) makes them a much more useful weapon of war, and as such, a much more powerful deterrent.

What would be gained from killing so many in places that didn't even have anything to do with the initial attack?

That's an entirely different question. By being prepared to kill them in response you're essentially holding them hostage. If the enemy (whomever it is) wants to inflict mass casualties onto you, he must also accept that an even greater number of his own people will also die. Some might consider it acceptable, but most won't - especially if the response would be total annihilation.

McHrozni

 

[Corsair 115]

If the Soviets hadn't faced tens of thousands of nuclear warheads on thousands of highly survivable platforms back then, they might have been tempted to attack...

...Back in the 70s, the Soviets had over 1500 nuclear hardened shelters for their top party officials alone … and they still had that many in 1989.

Perhaps they put effort into shelters due to the fact the U.S. had them outgunned in strategic nuclear forces. In 1978, this was the line up of strategic nuclear forces for each side:

United States—1,054 ICBMs carrying a total of 2,144 warheads; 41 SSBNs carrying 656 launchers and a total of 5,120 warheads; 376 strategic bombers capable and a total of 3,568 warheads.

U.S.S.R.—1,251 ICBMs carrying a total of 3,491 warheads; 89 SSB/SSBNs carrying 1,002 launchers and a total of 1,497 warheads; 157 strategic bombers and a total of 568 warheads.

The only area where the Soviets had a numerical advantage was in ICBM warheads, with a 1.6:1 ratio. The number of launchers, however, was similar. The U.S. had a 3.2:1 advantage in SLBM warheads, a 2.4:1 advantage in strategic bombers, and a 6.3:1 advantage in air-delivered warheads.

 

[BeAChooser]

Perhaps they put effort into shelters due to the fact the U.S. had them outgunned in strategic nuclear forces.

Not really. While it's true that in 1978 the US had more immediately launchable warheads than the Soviets (10832 versus 5556, according to your list), that's not the only or most important parameter in the equation. Allow me to explain.

In terms of stockpiled warheads, the US and Soviets had equivalent numbers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_and_USSR_nuclear_stockpiles.svg ). Both had about 25,000 warheads in 1978. But unlike the US, the Soviets planned and prepared for reloads on many of their launchers, including the ICBM silos. Thus in real, nuclear war fighting terms, the Soviets could count on also being able to fire many stockpiled weapons, thus reducing or even eliminating the disparity in warhead numbers.

In terms of numbers of launch vehicles, the USSR had about the same number as the US (1497 versus 1471). Our ICBMs were just as vulnerable to a first strike as Soviet ICBMs. In fact, probably more so. Soviet silos were VERY hard. SS-13 silos could reportedly withstand 13,000 psi (which, trust me, is VERY hard compared to US silos).

The advantage we had on paper in the bomber category depends entirely on the bombers surviving a first strike. And that is highly problematic in an era of SLBMs where time to impact may be only minutes. Which is why we went to great expense keeping a few of those nuclear armed bombers in the air at all times for many years. And even that wasn't perfectly invulnerable to countermeasures.

And although the US had about 5000 warheads on highly survivable submarines, only about 50-60 percent of those warheads were at sea at any one time. Those in port were very vulnerable to destruction during a first strike … unless the US were to shift to a launch on warning policy, which would have been very unstable in times of crisis (bad idea).

Furthermore, the Soviets invented, tested and deployed fractional orbital bombardment (FOB) systems that allowed no warning of an attack. The first sign would have been nuclear ignition over the target, thus making the bomber and sub fleets extremely vulnerable, as well as putting our civilian and military command and control system in great jeopardy.

Then, once a launcher did ride out a first strike, the Soviets had several more advantages. One, already mentioned is that they were more prepared to reload than we were. They actually had multiple, survivable rounds available for many their launchers.

Second, Soviet warheads were on average higher megatonnage. In fact, megatonnage on immediate launchers was 5400 megatons for the Soviets and only 3800 megatons for the US (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_arms_race ).

Furthermore, the targets those surviving weapons needed to destroy in order to cripple the Soviet government, military and industry were on average much harder and more plentiful in the Soviet Union than in the US. That's where the number of hardened shelters and factories in the USSR factors into the calculation. These were shelters which for all intent and purpose the US had no counterparts. Hence many more warheads were needed by the US just to achieve equivalent deterence.

The Soviets also deployed far larger anti-aircraft and anti-ballistic defense systems. Unlike the US, they built a dense anti-ballistic missile system to defend their capital city (with upwards of a hundred ABMs). At one time, the British calculated they'd need the warheads from an entire sub just to defeat that ABM system. The US shut it's single ABM site down in 1976 and it never amounted to much before that.

To go after bombers, they fielded over 600 modern strategic defense intercepters (compared to less then 300 mostly 1950s era intercepters in the US). There were thousands and thousands of air defense radars scattered throughout the Soviet Union to keep track of intruders (compared to a hundred or so with that capability in the US). And they had a massive SAM capability along the borders and inside the country (while we essentially had none).

And there is a further question … which came first, the shelters or the growth in US warheads? It turns out that Soviets built much of their massive complex of nuclear hardened shelters for their leadership, military and industry back when the US arsenal was far, far smaller. And given concerns that the Soviets were preparing for offensive war in Europe, with strategic nuclear war being part of it because the Soviets did not distinguish between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, and with the Soviets appearing to think that a nuclear war could be won (documents discovered after the collapse of the USSR reveal that was indeed their planned strategy and what they believed about nuclear war at the time), it was only prudent that the US build more launchers to keep Soviet leaders vulnerable. Otherwise, the Soviet leaders, who pounded shoes on tables saying "we will bury you", might have made a very imprudent decision.

 

[A'isha]

In terms of stockpiled warheads, the US and Soviets had equivalent numbers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_and_USSR_nuclear_stockpiles.svg ). Both had about 25,000 warheads in 1978. But unlike the US, the Soviets planned and prepared for reloads on many of their launchers, including the ICBM silos. Thus in real, nuclear war fighting terms, the Soviets could count on also being able to fire many stockpiled weapons, thus reducing or even eliminating the disparity in warhead numbers.

Reloading a silo is a long and complicated process, especially in the middle of a nuclear war. One CIA report from 1985, for instance, says that in a postattack environment, the Soviets could reload only a small portion of their silos with reserve missiles over a period of weeks or months.

In terms of numbers of launch vehicles, the USSR had about the same number as the US (1497 versus 1471). Our ICBMs were just as vulnerable to a first strike as Soviet ICBMs. In fact, probably more so. Soviet silos were VERY hard. SS-13 silos could reportedly withstand 13,000 psi (which, trust me, is VERY hard compared to US silos).

Where do you get that information? SS-13 silos were generally considered to be hardened to 1300 psi, not 13,000. And actually, they're a perfect example of how the "reload" issue is a red herring - the SS-13 was so huge it had to be transported in sections and assembled directly in the silo. That's not a quick process, even when you're not doing it in a fallout-ridden postattack environment.

And although the US had about 5000 warheads on highly survivable submarines, only about 50-60 percent of those warheads were at sea at any one time. Those in port were very vulnerable to destruction during a first strike … unless the US were to shift to a launch on warning policy, which would have been very unstable in times of crisis (bad idea).

2500-3000 effectively invulnerable and accurate nuclear warheads is still a pretty big threat...which the Soviets were all too aware of.

Furthermore, the Soviets invented, tested and deployed fractional orbital bombardment (FOB) systems that allowed no warning of an attack. The first sign would have been nuclear ignition over the target, thus making the bomber and sub fleets extremely vulnerable, as well as putting our civilian and military command and control system in great jeopardy.

Wrong. This was a threat in the early Sixties, when it was first proposed, because over-the-horizon early-warning radars couldn't detect them. The development of early warning satellites with radar and infrared capability in the early Seventies, though (just a year or two after the Soviets finally deployed an operational FOBS), meant that we could detect any and every launch the Soviets made, at launch, and track the payload.

So, while they might have been able to drop one or two warheads on us via a FOBS weapon disguised as a satellite, they could not have orbited enough to make even a dent in our return-strike capability without us knowing exactly what they were up to. And even then, FOBS would be useless for any kind of decapitation strike, since it was far too inaccurate to target things like silos. The most they could do would be take us by surprise by nuking a couple of cities or large military airfields...and since that would do pretty much nothing to our retaliatory capability, they'd be no better off than if they just launched a conventional first strike.

The Soviets decommissioned their only operational FOBS regiment (composed of just 18 launchers) in 1983.

Then, once a launcher did ride out a first strike, the Soviets had several more advantages. One, already mentioned is that they were more prepared to reload than we were. They actually had multiple, survivable rounds available for many their launchers.

Sure, they could refire a few. After a month.

Second, Soviet warheads were on average higher megatonnage. In fact, megatonnage on immediate launchers was 5400 megatons for the Soviets and only 3800 megatons for the US (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_arms_race ).

Do you know why the Soviet weapons were so big, BAC? Because they were inaccurate as hell! The only way they could get the overpressures on a hardened target like a US missile silo needed to destroy that target was to build a warhead with sufficient megatonnage so that the near-misses their missiles would get would be enough. Unfortunately for the Soviets, a huge warhead requires a huge missile, meaning more expense and less missile bang for your buck (and resulting in issues like the assemble-in-the-silo giant missiles that makes the threat of "silo reloading" so laughable).

US missiles, on the other hand, were far more accurate, so we could use smaller warheads to destroy a given hardened target. This let us deploy more MIRVs, giving us the capability of firing a single missile and taking out twenty targets, while the Soviets needed twenty missiles to do the same. This might not matter for silo-based weapons, but for SLBMs, it's a HUGE difference.

Furthermore, the targets those surviving weapons needed to destroy in order to cripple the Soviet government, military and industry were on average much harder and more plentiful in the Soviet Union than in the US. That's where the number of hardened shelters and factories in the USSR factors into the calculation. These were shelters which for all intent and purpose the US had no counterparts. Hence many more warheads were needed by the US just to achieve equivalent deterence.

Because our missiles were accurate enough to destroy even hardened Soviet targets.

The Soviets also deployed far larger anti-aircraft and anti-ballistic defense systems. Unlike the US, they built a dense anti-ballistic missile system to defend their capital city (with upwards of a hundred ABMs). At one time, the British calculated they'd need the warheads from an entire sub just to defeat that ABM system.

Yes...back when Western SLBMs still had one warhead each (the Polaris missile). With the advent of MIRVed missiles, such as the Poseidon (which carried 14 independent warheads), by the Seventies only 8 missiles (half the payload of just one of the old Benjamin Franklin class SSBNs) would be enough to totally overwhelm the Moscow ABM system with a dozen nuclear warheads left over to flatten the city...and that's assuming that every single Galosh interceptor takes out an attacking warhead (which, given the reliability of reentry vehicle interceptions in even ideal-circumstances tests, is optimistic beyond optimism).

The US shut it's single ABM site down in 1976 and it never amounted to much before that.

Because the US, before Bush's boondoggle reactivation of the idea, knew the above...that spending colossal amounts of money on a hundred nuclear-tipped defense missiles in an ABM system is foolish when it can be rendered utterly ineffectual by half the payload of a single ballistic missile submarine.

To go after bombers, they fielded over 600 modern strategic defense intercepters (compared to less then 300 mostly 1950s era intercepters in the US).

That's because dedicated interceptors were replaced by multi-role air-superiority aircraft in the US. Which we had plenty of in the US.

There were thousands and thousands of air defense radars scattered throughout the Soviet Union to keep track of intruders (compared to a hundred or so with that capability in the US).

Again, do you know why? Because our radars were so much better and more sophisticated! Just as with the nuclear missiles above, the Soviets had to spend tons of money on huge numbers of crappy low-tech things, just to reach even half the capability we were able to achieve with just a few.

We didn't build "thousands and thousands of air defense radars" because we didn't need to - the radars we had were better, more sensitive, and more integrated into command and control than anything the Soviets had.

And they had a massive SAM capability along the borders and inside the country (while we essentially had none).

Because our network of sophisticated radars and command and control functions would allow us to route squadrons of air-superiority fighters to intercept and destroy incoming bombers long before they got within range of their targets. The Soviets didn't have any of that, and so had to rely on floods of SAM installations to try and achieve the same goal.

And there is a further question … which came first, the shelters or the growth in US warheads? It turns out that Soviets built much of their massive complex of nuclear hardened shelters for their leadership, military and industry back when the US arsenal was far, far smaller. And given concerns that the Soviets were preparing for offensive war in Europe, with strategic nuclear war being part of it because the Soviets did not distinguish between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, and with the Soviets appearing to think that a nuclear war could be won (documents discovered after the collapse of the USSR reveal that was indeed their planned strategy and what they believed about nuclear war at the time),

Just as our planning documents show we believed at the time.

it was only prudent that the US build more launchers to keep Soviet leaders vulnerable. Otherwise, the Soviet leaders, who pounded shoes on tables saying "we will bury you", might have made a very imprudent decision.

And that's exactly what happened. The Soviets were well aware of everything I mentioned above.

 

[MikeMangum]

That doesn´t answer my question.

Is the policy "if someone kills our innocent civilians, we kill a lot more of their innocent civilians" justified for nations other than the US, too?

That is not the policy of the United States nor is it a legal policy. But then, you were the one who included the phrase "innocent civilians" in the mix. Why you put it there, only you can answer.

Generally, it is the policy of most nations to respond to an attack with a counterattack that is more devastating to their attacker than the initial attack was to them. There is no requirement that a counterattack be against civilians to be effective (even if the response is to an attack against civilians), and indeed there is both a moral imperative and international norms that forbid purposefull attacks against civilians even if such an attack would be effective.

It is pretty stupid, however, to expect a nation to uphold international norms that doom their ability to protect their population from an existential threat. For instance, if Iraq's stated policy aims during the Iran-Iraq war were to annihilate and/or enslave the people of Iran, and Iraq had the advantage in conventional forces that would have allowed them to do so, it would have been silly to expect Iran not to use nukes against Iraqi population centers, assuming they had had them at the time. That's just reality. I don't even know what the morality of such a scenario would be, even though the weapons would be used against civilians who had little or no say in the policy of their nation.

And btw, to answer a question (not the one you proposed, but an actual valid question), yes, it would be justified for some other country to try and kill 10 US military personnel for every one of theirs that the US killed. That's called war. The laws of war apply equally to all sides of a conflict, whether they are the "good guys" or the "bad guys".

The question of whether a war is justified is completely seperate from the question of if the conduct of the war is justified.

 

[McHrozni]

Because the US, before Bush's boondoggle reactivation of the idea, knew the above...that spending colossal amounts of money on a hundred nuclear-tipped defense missiles in an ABM system is foolish when it can be rendered utterly ineffectual by half the payload of a single ballistic missile submarine.

I won't touch the rest of your argument, but this is a bit different: the new ABM is not intended as a significant factor in an all out nuclear war. It is meant to intercept a missile or two, coming from a rogue state, like North Korea and Iran are at the moment. It is intended, in short, to counter far less than the payload of a single ballistic missile submarine. Just about every public statement about it said that, there is no reason to believe it is anything other than that, and as you have demonstrated, plentiful reasons why not to believe it (you summed up quite a few).

I understand why Putin wants to throw up smoke and lie about it (political concessions etc), but I really don't see why you should.

McHrozni

 

[A'isha]

I won't touch the rest of your argument, but this is a bit different: the new ABM is not intended as a significant factor in an all out nuclear war. It is meant to intercept a missile or two, coming from a rogue state, like North Korea and Iran are at the moment. It is intended, in short, to counter far less than the payload of a single ballistic missile submarine. Just about every public statement about it said that, there is no reason to believe it is anything other than that, and as you have demonstrated, plentiful reasons why not to believe it (you summed up quite a few).

I understand why Putin wants to throw up smoke and lie about it (political concessions etc), but I really don't see why you should.

McHrozni

You're right. I'd conflated it with the earlier THAAD ABM system. I apologize, and withdraw my completely unjustified snark at former President Bush and the recent ABM system.

 

[barrymore]

That is not the policy of the United States nor is it a legal policy. But then, you were the one who included the phrase "innocent civilians" in the mix. Why you put it there, only you can answer.

Generally, it is the policy of most nations to respond to an attack with a counterattack that is more devastating to their attacker than the initial attack was to them. There is no requirement that a counterattack be against civilians to be effective (even if the response is to an attack against civilians), and indeed there is both a moral imperative and international norms that forbid purposefull attacks against civilians even if such an attack would be effective.

What does the policy of most nations have to do with it? I personally hold the US to a higher standard because of our size and technological sophistication. We could annihilate any country on the face of the Earth--but for what? To prove we are the sheriff of the town? The fact of the matter is that we have the technological sophistication to respond to a nuclear attack in a precise way--moreso than any other country--that does NOT require nuclear weapons. It would be an utter shame if we retaliated with nuclear weapons--an utter shame.

I am FOR self-defense, but I am not for unmeasured self-defense.

It is pretty stupid, however, to expect a nation to uphold international norms that doom their ability to protect their population from an existential threat. For instance, if Iraq's stated policy aims during the Iran-Iraq war were to annihilate and/or enslave the people of Iran, and Iraq had the advantage in conventional forces that would have allowed them to do so, it would have been silly to expect Iran not to use nukes against Iraqi population centers, assuming they had had them at the time. That's just reality. I don't even know what the morality of such a scenario would be, even though the weapons would be used against civilians who had little or no say in the policy of their nation.

I hope that is merely conjecture. The only way I would be OK with that scenario is if it was the ONLY way to accomplish the mission. Just saying "Well, it seems like the best thing to do in this situation. Remember, might makes right!" But I would be shocked if nukes were the best way to accomplish this.

And btw, to answer a question (not the one you proposed, but an actual valid question), yes, it would be justified for some other country to try and kill 10 US military personnel for every one of theirs that the US killed. That's called war. The laws of war apply equally to all sides of a conflict, whether they are the "good guys" or the "bad guys".

The question of whether a war is justified is completely seperate from the question of if the conduct of the war is justified.

This is hardly related at all. An enemy soldier is someone, who given enough time, will commit an act of aggression against you. You are 100% justified to take out him and his comrades. A civilian does not even compare. There is functionally no difference between a civilian of an enemy country and a civilian of your own country. The only reason to kill a civilian of an enemy country is to satisfy an aggressive urge in a way achieves maximum cognitive dissonance (after all, THEY were not like YOU, and they were surely plotting your death!)

 

[BeAChooser]

Reloading a silo is a long and complicated process, especially in the middle of a nuclear war. One CIA report from 1985, for instance, says that in a postattack environment, the Soviets could reload only a small portion of their silos with reserve missiles over a period of weeks or months.

You don't get it, do you? Even if it took weeks (and many sources say a matter of days for some silos), that would still have given the Soviets a decided edge in any prolonged conflict once we were effectively out of missiles to counter that prolonged threat. And there are all sorts of sources that point this out. For example,

http://books.google.com/books?id=wC...=onepage&q=soviet reload silo nuclear&f=false

International relations in the nuclear age: one world, difficult to manage

By Henry L. Bretton

… snip …

One problem with straight numerical count is highlighted by the Soviet ICBM (cold-launch) reload capacity, which enables them to reload and refire certain ICBMs. However, the process may take several days and a nuclear war is believed not to last that long; see US Department of Defense, Second Edition, 1983, p. 21 … snip … According to the DOD, certain "currently deployed liquid-propellant ICBMs" of the Soviet Union "are contained in a launch cannister within the silo." This too is believed to give the Soviet a reload capacity in the event the nuclear war is protracted.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/7996445/Soviet-Military-Power-1983-Strategic-Forces

Soviet Military Power
1983
Strategic Forces
Defense Intelligence Agency

… snip ...

The Soviet belief that war might be protracted requires the survivability needed for follow-on strikes, along with war reserves, protection for people and equipment, and the capacity to reload launchers. For there ICBM, LRINF and air defense forces, the Soviets have stocked extra missiles, propellants, and warheads throughout the USSSR. ICBM silo launchers can be reloaded in a matter of days and provision has been made for the decontamination of those launchers.

.

Where do you get that information? SS-13 silos were generally considered to be hardened to 1300 psi, not 13,000.

You don't understand. It is perception that matters when discussing deterrence. And it was our perception that Soviet silos were very hard. It's being argued here that the US was being unreasonable in building 10000 immediately deliverable warheads when the Soviets only had 5000. But it's important to note that when calculating the number of warheads needed, our planners/leaders had to rely on defense intelligence *expert* estimates about the hardness of Soviet silos. Those estimates may have been very wrong (to the high side), but they none the less influenced our building and our perception of what would happen during a potential conflict. And what were those estimates?

http://russianforces.org/podvig/2008/06/the_window_of_vulnerability_that_wasnt.shtml

According to U.S. intelligence estimates made in 1978, about 650 of the Soviet Union’s 1,400 silo-based ICBMs could have survived a U.S. first strike, with this number gradually increasing throughout the 1980s. U.S. intelligence data projected that by 1988 the total number of Soviet silos would decrease to about 1,250, of which about 670 could withstand a two-on-one attack. The same estimate projected that by 1988 no more than about 17 of the United States’ 1,000 silo-based ICBMs could survive a two-on-one strike, painting a picture of alarming disparity.

That's a pretty frightening picture to have faced back then.

Now true, the article goes on to point out that Soviet silos weren't that hard (if we can believe Soviet literature), but never the less, that's what we believed based on the best information available and what the Soviet's let be known. And that's where I get numbers like 13,000 psi. For example, from the same source:

These figures differ dramatically from the U.S. estimates, which put the hardness of the Soviet missile silos at 5,000 psi and even 15,000–25,000 psi.

Perceptions is what deterrence is all about. Which is why it's dangerous for Obama to carefully detail how we will react in any given circumstance. It's better to leave the other guy guessing than give him a perception that he might misinterpret as a loophole through which he can attack you.

And actually, they're a perfect example of how the "reload" issue is a red herring - the SS-13 was so huge it had to be transported in sections and assembled directly in the silo. That's not a quick process, even when you're not doing it in a fallout-ridden postattack environment.

Fine, that was a bad example. A better example would be the SS-18. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-36_(missile) indicates there were about 190 of these missiles deployed by 1977. They were capable of carrying a 20 megaton bomb or being MIRVed (8-10 warheads in the 500 kT to 1.5 MT range). It was accurate enough to attack US ICBM silos and launch control centers. It was also cold launched (tests began in 1971) from silos that were amongst their hardest. In fact, http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/icbm/r-36m.htm indicates the silos were at least 4500 psi - 6000 psi hard. This was a very serious threat and they did have reloads for this missile.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/7996445/Soviet-Military-Power-1983-Strategic-Forces , 1983 DIA document cited earlier:

ICBM Reload Capability: The Soviets have contingency plans for reloading and refiring ICBMs from launchers that already have been used to fire an initial round. The cold-launch technique employed by the SS-17 and SS-18 lends itself to such a reload capability. Additionally, all currently delployed liquid-propellant ICBMs - SS-11, SS-17, SS-18 and SS-19 - are contained in a launch canister within the silo. This, and the silo design minimize damage to the launcher during the initial firing and give the Soviets the capability to reload each of these launchers. The Soviets probably cannot refurbish and reload silo launchers in a period less than a few days; nevertheless, they believe that this capability is of significant value because they anticipate that a nuclear war might be protracted. The Soviets have made provisions for the delivery of reserve missiles, warheads and propellants to ICBM complexes for reload purposes. None of these extra missiles or warheads are counted under SALT agreements. Only the launchers are counted.

So are you really that confident of your opinion, ANTPogo?

2500-3000 effectively invulnerable and accurate nuclear warheads is still a pretty big threat

But a threat against what? If you are fighting an adversary who was willing to let millions of its citizens die in order to win a conflict once and for all … and they demonstrated they were in WW2, you have a problem. That number of warheads was not enough to deal effectively with the huge Soviet war machine, with possible reload threats, and still threaten the number of hardened CCC centers, bunkers (housing politicians, military and their families) and hardened industrial targets that the Soviets possessed at the time. If they had looked into the future, and saw the likelihood that in the long run we would drive them into collapse economically … and there is no reason they couldn't have foreseen that, they might have decided it was in their best interest to attack at that time … especially if the US had limited itself to the sort of *parity* some of you seem to be insisting would have been more *fair*.

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Furthermore, the Soviets invented, tested and deployed fractional orbital bombardment (FOB) systems that allowed no warning of an attack. The first sign would have been nuclear ignition over the target, thus making the bomber and sub fleets extremely vulnerable, as well as putting our civilian and military command and control system in great jeopardy.

Wrong. This was a threat in the early Sixties, when it was first proposed, because over-the-horizon early-warning radars couldn't detect them. The development of early warning satellites with radar and infrared capability in the early Seventies, though (just a year or two after the Soviets finally deployed an operational FOBS), meant that we could detect any and every launch the Soviets made, at launch, and track the payload.

Fair enough, but actually wasn't it satellites that nullified the threat? The first of those orbited in 1971 but the Soviets still continued deploying FOB systems until 1983 when they were phased out in compliance with the 1979 SALT II treaty. And why would they do that? Well perhaps because during the same period, the Soviets were testing and fielding co-orbital anti-satellite weapons, ground based high energy lasers, ABMs with ASAT capability, and satellite jammers. All of which could leave open the possibility that FOBs would still have a role in a full scale nuclear first strike using FOBs to catch bombers and subs in port or on the ground. Because it's unlikely we would have scrambled the bombers, or put the subs to sea just because we lost contact with a satellite, and at that time there might be only one watching a given set of silos.

So, while they might have been able to drop one or two warheads on us via a FOBS weapon disguised as a satellite, they could not have orbited enough to make even a dent in our return-strike capability without us knowing exactly what they were up to.

Actually, even a few weapons would have done quite a bit of damage to our bomber and sub forces since the basing of those was concentrated in only a few locations in the US. One good sized nuke could have taken out multiple bombers or several subs at any one location. Do you know that there are currently only two bases for Ohios … one on the Pacific Coast and one on the Atlantic. Sure, there were more bases back in 1978, but there were also more subs to disperse amongst them. Still inviting targets.

And even then, FOBS would be useless for any kind of decapitation strike, since it was far too inaccurate to target things like silos.

That depends on what you're decapitating. Civilian authority would be very vulnerable to a FOB attack. Say during the State of the Union address. The US could lose almost it's entire civilian authority while the Soviets might retain most of theirs. Making the retention of control and recovery much easier for them post conflict.

Then, once a launcher did ride out a first strike, the Soviets had several more advantages. One, already mentioned is that they were more prepared to reload than we were. They actually had multiple, survivable rounds available for many their launchers.

Sure, they could refire a few. After a month.

Actually, that's not what the literature seems to have said. As I proved above with several credible links to CIA and DIA documents of the period, it was more like days and more than "a few". If you have a source that actually says few and months, then by all means post a link.

Do you know why the Soviet weapons were so big, BAC? Because they were inaccurate as hell! The only way they could get the overpressures on a hardened target like a US missile silo needed to destroy that target was to build a warhead with sufficient megatonnage so that the near-misses their missiles would get would be enough.

Never the less, they had bigger warheads so any surviving warheads would do more damage to soft targets. And given the small number of hard targets we had (remember, we didn't have thousands of hardened bunkers or hardened industry), and given that we are talking here about a first strike by them, they would have had plenty of big warheads left over to use on our cities, industry, infrastructure and population after destroying most of our fixed launchers with those bigger warheads. Leaving us with a quandry of what to do with any launchers that survived the attack. Go after their launchers and try to prevent reloads? Go after their hardened bunkers and try to kill their leadership and industry? Or go after their cities and the bulk of their population (which they might have been willing to trade for victory in the conflict) and try to even up the score in that area? One thing is clear, with fewer warheads we wouldn't have been able to do all three … and perhaps not even two. Keep in mind that this whole branch of the conversation started because someone implied we are being unfair by having more warheads than them.

Unfortunately for the Soviets, a huge warhead requires a huge missile, meaning more expense and less missile bang for your buck (and resulting in issues like the assemble-in-the-silo giant missiles that makes the threat of "silo reloading" so laughable).

Except that the SS-18, which I mentioned earlier, wasn't assemble-in-the-silo or nearly as inaccurate as you might suggest. Their CEP was 500-1000 meters (according to Russian sources) which was plenty accurate to take out most anything they needed taken out. We thought their CEP was 250 to 500 meters. Again the problem of perception and why we felt we needed many more warheads to counter the threat.

US missiles, on the other hand, were far more accurate, so we could use smaller warheads to destroy a given hardened target. This let us deploy more MIRVs, giving us the capability of firing a single missile and taking out twenty targets, while the Soviets needed twenty missiles to do the same.

LOL! We never MIRVed any missile with 20 warheads. The Minuteman IIIs in the 1978 time period had just 3 warheads. It was the SS-18 that could carry 8 to 10 warheads, each with more than twice the yield of ours. The fact is we MIRVed in response to the threat posed by these large Soviet ICBMs.

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Furthermore, the targets those surviving weapons needed to destroy in order to cripple the Soviet government, military and industry were on average much harder and more plentiful in the Soviet Union than in the US. That's where the number of hardened shelters and factories in the USSR factors into the calculation. These were shelters which for all intent and purpose the US had no counterparts. Hence many more warheads were needed by the US just to achieve equivalent deterence.

Because our missiles were accurate enough to destroy even hardened Soviet targets.

Non sequitor. You didn't address my point at all with that response. My point is that we'd have limited warheads surviving a first strike. And if we had equal numbers of warheads, we'd have had to choose between killing their launchers to prevent reloads, killing their leadership to make them pay for the attack with their lives, or killing their cities to equal the cities and population we'd already lost in the first strike. We wouldn't have been able to do all three or even two of the above.

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The Soviets also deployed far larger anti-aircraft and anti-ballistic defense systems. Unlike the US, they built a dense anti-ballistic missile system to defend their capital city (with upwards of a hundred ABMs). At one time, the British calculated they'd need the warheads from an entire sub just to defeat that ABM system.

Yes...back when Western SLBMs still had one warhead each (the Polaris missile). With the advent of MIRVed missiles, such as the Poseidon (which carried 14 independent warheads), by the Seventies only 8 missiles (half the payload of just one of the old Benjamin Franklin class SSBNs) would be enough to totally overwhelm the Moscow ABM system with a dozen nuclear warheads left over to flatten the city.

Actually, at the time the UK Polaris' could carry 3 warheads each (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevaline ). But in any case, a quarter of the US submarine force still carried Polaris missiles in 1978. And while each Poseidon would carry 10 to 14 warheads, they had a yield of only about 40 kT. So the use of even one sub to negate Moscow would have required over 5% of the total surviving SLBM inventory following a first strike. In fact, almost 5% of the total surviving retaliatory warheads. And we know that British planners calculated they'd need 32 much, much larger warheads (200kT vs 40kT) to effectively destroy Moscow. How many 40 kT warheads would have been needed to do the same damage? I suspect more than what you'd have left in one sub after negating Moscow's ABM system.

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The US shut it's single ABM site down in 1976 and it never amounted to much before that.

Because the US, before Bush's boondoggle reactivation of the idea, knew the above...that spending colossal amounts of money on a hundred nuclear-tipped defense missiles in an ABM system is foolish when it can be rendered utterly ineffectual by half the payload of a single ballistic missile submarine.

First of all, in Bush's defense, his ABM system isn't designed to counter the threat that the USSR's system was designed to counter. It's intended to stop rogue nations (who likely don't have submarines full of SLBMs to expend) and terrorist threats from causing problems. And to guard against accidental launches by a nation. Those sound like reasonable objectives.

As for the US system, your response doesn't alter the strategic picture back in the 70s. The Soviets still had an ABM system deployed that would have significantly hardened the Moscow region against any retaliatory response. And by the way, those ABM launchers also had reloads available.

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To go after bombers, they fielded over 600 modern strategic defense intercepters (compared to less then 300 mostly 1950s era intercepters in the US).

That's because dedicated interceptors were replaced by multi-role air-superiority aircraft in the US. Which we had plenty of in the US.

Debateable. Have a source? Because I had one for the above.

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There were thousands and thousands of air defense radars scattered throughout the Soviet Union to keep track of intruders (compared to a hundred or so with that capability in the US).

Again, do you know why? Because our radars were so much better and more sophisticated! Just as with the nuclear missiles above, the Soviets had to spend tons of money on huge numbers of crappy low-tech things, just to reach even half the capability we were able to achieve with just a few.
We didn't build "thousands and thousands of air defense radars" because we didn't need to - the radars we had were better, more sensitive, and more integrated into command and control than anything the Soviets had.

Problem is, were any of ours going to survive a Soviet ICBM and SLBM first strike. That is the scenario being debated here, ANTPogo.

Because our network of sophisticated radars and command and control functions would allow us to route squadrons of air-superiority fighters to intercept and destroy incoming bombers long before they got within range of their targets. The Soviets didn't have any of that, and so had to rely on floods of SAM installations to try and achieve the same goal.

Again, it's more likely there would have been very little left of our "sophisticated radars and commmand and control functions" (not to mention our interceptors) after a Soviet ICBM and SLBM first strike. At which point their bombers, arriving a little later in the war, would have had free reign to drop their bombs on anything that was left. And then return for more (because we wouldn't have had enough warheads to get all their military airfields). See the problem?

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And there is a further question … which came first, the shelters or the growth in US warheads? It turns out that Soviets built much of their massive complex of nuclear hardened shelters for their leadership, military and industry back when the US arsenal was far, far smaller. And given concerns that the Soviets were preparing for offensive war in Europe, with strategic nuclear war being part of it because the Soviets did not distinguish between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, and with the Soviets appearing to think that a nuclear war could be won (documents discovered after the collapse of the USSR reveal that was indeed their planned strategy and what they believed about nuclear war at the time),

Just as our planning documents show we believed at the time.

If you're trying to suggest that we didn't see a difference between tactical and strategic nuclear war at the time, you are wrong. If you are trying to suggest that we put as much effort into shelters for our leadership etc., you are wrong. If that's not what you are trying to suggest, then your response is another non-sequitor. It doesn't address the point I was making at all. We responded to those concerns by building lots of warheads. And the soviet shelters mostly came first, contrary to the suggestion made at the beginning of this branch of the debate.

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it was only prudent that the US build more launchers to keep Soviet leaders vulnerable. Otherwise, the Soviet leaders, who pounded shoes on tables saying "we will bury you", might have made a very imprudent decision.

And that's exactly what happened.

The Soviet's made an imprudent decision? No, they didn't. Or are you just agreeing with me that it was prudent for us to build more launchers to keep Soviet leaders vulnerable? If so, then fine. That was my overall point from the beginning, anyway.

 

[mike3]

In this sense deployment of small nuclear weapons is highly desirable. A 1kt warhead, for example, packs the explosive power of a fleet of B-52s and is small enough to be fired from a field gun, for example. True, fallout is a much greater concern with small weapons, but their primary use is deterrence anyway - and knowing using these weapons will not lead to catastrophic results worldwide (their fallout is not nearly big enough for that) makes them a much more useful weapon of war, and as such, a much more powerful deterrent.

1. Does this mean you thought Bush's "mini nuke" program was a good idea? What did you think about the "RNEP" project (Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator)?

2. If you're going to use nukes that small, why not just use a big conventional bombing "awe" campaign instead with air raids on the given targets? What's the advantage of a nuke here? The cost, speed of deployment and effect?

That's an entirely different question. By being prepared to kill them in response you're essentially holding them hostage. If the enemy (whomever it is) wants to inflict mass casualties onto you, he must also accept that an even greater number of his own people will also die. Some might consider it acceptable, but most won't - especially if the response would be total annihilation.

McHrozni

Wouldn't such a "total annihilation" response cause the "nuclear winter" scenario just mentioned? In which case you'd be killing people that had nothing at all to do with the "enemy".