why so many missiles

[TheManWithAUsername]

Does anyone know the argument for having so many nuclear ICBMs? We're all familiar will how we can destroy the world 50 times over or whatever, and there are no countries with effective defenses. These things are worse than pennies.

I assume that there's near-universal agreement that this is wasteful, so I've always wondered how we got here. Is is just the usual corruption of Congress, or is there some justification?

[jsteele]

You could probably argue that nuclear missiles are never meant to be used, but simply bargained away. So, the more you have, the more you can give up in arms reduction agreements. Also, the more you make the other side(s) spend. That's fine as long as they are in a worse position to spend then you are -- a presumption that is more and more untenable every day.

But, my cynical side says its simply a result of military-industrial lobbying and the fact that military spending cannot be questioned by "serious" politicians. It is quite was for generals to request funding and congressmen to approve it. Both will be rewarded handsomely by the defense industry.

[Anonymous]

There actually is an answer to this question, Mr. Steele. Nuclear strategy is a well-developed body of thought. The purpose of nuclear weapons is to deter, never to be used. In order to deter, you need the ability to retaliate in the event that anyone attacks you first. Given how devastating a nuclear first strike would be, you need to have enough nuclear missiles to ensure that a sufficient number survive to preserve a second-strike capacity. So, you need more of them than you might think, it depends on your assumptions regarding how effective a first strike would be based on the size, accuracy, etc. of the enemy warheads. You *could* avoid this problem by launching your retaliatory strike before the first strike arrives, but if that were the strategy we'd probably all be dead by now, due to false alarms. The certainty of a robust second-strike capability is a stabilizing feature that goes a long way toward preventing a nuclear war.

[TheManWithAUsername]

Anonymous wrote:You *could* avoid this problem by launching your retaliatory strike before the first strike arrives, but if that were the strategy we'd probably all be dead by now, due to false alarms.

Are you speculating there, or do you know something about it? That is, have there been false alarms that would have resulted in retaliation if we didn't have such a large stockpile?

I'm surprised there are many false alarms at all, at our level of tech. Add to that that the false alarm would have to be of a massive first strike designed to take out our bases, and it seems very unlikely to me that such a mistake could occur even once. We're talking about the whole board lighting up a la Wargames, right?

There's more, though. Assume that you're right, that the point is to have the ability to second-strike after we've actually been hit by a massive first strike designed to take out our capacity to retaliate. That leaves at least two questions:
1) How would we in fact be able to retaliate, given "their" number of missiles?
2) Why would we bother? A strike large enough to take out most of our missiles would devastate the earth, not just this country, so we wouldn't have to retaliate.

(A third question is why we would want to ensure that the whole world, and not just our country, was destroyed, but I understand that that's part of the game of deterrence.)

[takoma]

TheManWithAUsername wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You *could* avoid this problem by launching your retaliatory strike before the first strike arrives, but if that were the strategy we'd probably all be dead by now, due to false alarms.

Are you speculating there, or do you know something about it? That is, have there been false alarms that would have resulted in retaliation if we didn't have such a large stockpile?

I'm surprised there are many false alarms at all, at our level of tech. Add to that that the false alarm would have to be of a massive first strike designed to take out our bases, and it seems very unlikely to me that such a mistake could occur even once. We're talking about the whole board lighting up a la Wargames, right?

There's more, though. Assume that you're right, that the point is to have the ability to second-strike after we've actually been hit by a massive first strike designed to take out our capacity to retaliate. That leaves at least two questions:
1) How would we in fact be able to retaliate, given "their" number of missiles?
2) Why would we bother? A strike large enough to take out most of our missiles would devastate the earth, not just this country, so we wouldn't have to retaliate.

(A third question is why we would want to ensure that the whole world, and not just our country, was destroyed, but I understand that that's part of the game of deterrence.)

I think you answered your own question. Although it would be crazy to retaliate, there is no deterrence unless the enemy believes you are hard-wired in advance to do automatically what would no longer make sense when the time actually arrives. That is why the term Mutual Assured Destruction was considered to have such an apropos acronym.

[TheManWithAUsername]

takoma wrote:

TheManWithAUsername wrote:(A third question is why we would want to ensure that the whole world, and not just our country, was destroyed, but I understand that that's part of the game of deterrence.)

I think you answered your own question. Although it would be crazy to retaliate, there is no deterrence unless the enemy believes you are hard-wired in advance to do automatically what would no longer make sense when the time actually arrives. That is why the term Mutual Assured Destruction was considered to have such an apropos acronym.

I answered that third question, yes - that was my point. Are you suggesting that answer applies to the questions?

[Anonymous]

TheManWithAUsername wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You *could* avoid this problem by launching your retaliatory strike before the first strike arrives, but if that were the strategy we'd probably all be dead by now, due to false alarms.

Are you speculating there, or do you know something about it? That is, have there been false alarms that would have resulted in retaliation if we didn't have such a large stockpile?

I'm surprised there are many false alarms at all, at our level of tech. Add to that that the false alarm would have to be of a massive first strike designed to take out our bases, and it seems very unlikely to me that such a mistake could occur even once. We're talking about the whole board lighting up a la Wargames, right?

There's more, though. Assume that you're right, that the point is to have the ability to second-strike after we've actually been hit by a massive first strike designed to take out our capacity to retaliate. That leaves at least two questions:
1) How would we in fact be able to retaliate, given "their" number of missiles?
2) Why would we bother? A strike large enough to take out most of our missiles would devastate the earth, not just this country, so we wouldn't have to retaliate.

(A third question is why we would want to ensure that the whole world, and not just our country, was destroyed, but I understand that that's part of the game of deterrence.)

As to question 1, because you don't need that many missiles to devastate your attacker, only a few have to survive. The question is how to you ensure that is the case, and there is a good argument that it requires an awful lot of redundant capability. As to question 2, what if your adversary doesn't see it the same way? Tough to rely on that from a deterrence perspective.

I believe there have been a number of near misses due to false launch alarms. I don't have the details at my fingertips, though.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:There actually is an answer to this question, Mr. Steele. Nuclear strategy is a well-developed body of thought. The purpose of nuclear weapons is to deter, never to be used. In order to deter, you need the ability to retaliate in the event that anyone attacks you first. Given how devastating a nuclear first strike would be, you need to have enough nuclear missiles to ensure that a sufficient number survive to preserve a second-strike capacity. So, you need more of them than you might think, it depends on your assumptions regarding how effective a first strike would be based on the size, accuracy, etc. of the enemy warheads. You *could* avoid this problem by launching your retaliatory strike before the first strike arrives, but if that were the strategy we'd probably all be dead by now, due to false alarms. The certainty of a robust second-strike capability is a stabilizing feature that goes a long way toward preventing a nuclear war.

Perhaps surprisingly, I am aware that there is such a thing as nuclear strategy. In fact, as a university student, I took a course on exactly that topic. But, there are holes in your logic. According to you, we have to wait until impact to fire our missiles. That is, in fact, not the case. But, let's follow your logic. If we wait until impact, our country will have been destroyed and all of our domestically deployed missiles destroyed right along with it. So, right off we can say that domestically deployed missiles have no usefulness with regard to mutually assured destruction. Why do we have so many? Why do we have any at all?

Submarines serve as our retaliatory mechanism. As such, we only need enough submarine-based missiles to destroy the world to have an effective MAD strategy. The rest are superfluous. Except as bargaining chips.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There actually is an answer to this question, Mr. Steele. Nuclear strategy is a well-developed body of thought. The purpose of nuclear weapons is to deter, never to be used. In order to deter, you need the ability to retaliate in the event that anyone attacks you first. Given how devastating a nuclear first strike would be, you need to have enough nuclear missiles to ensure that a sufficient number survive to preserve a second-strike capacity. So, you need more of them than you might think, it depends on your assumptions regarding how effective a first strike would be based on the size, accuracy, etc. of the enemy warheads. You *could* avoid this problem by launching your retaliatory strike before the first strike arrives, but if that were the strategy we'd probably all be dead by now, due to false alarms. The certainty of a robust second-strike capability is a stabilizing feature that goes a long way toward preventing a nuclear war.

Perhaps surprisingly, I am aware that there is such a thing as nuclear strategy. In fact, as a university student, I took a course on exactly that topic. But, there are holes in your logic. According to you, we have to wait until impact to fire our missiles. That is, in fact, not the case. But, let's follow your logic. If we wait until impact, our country will have been destroyed and all of our domestically deployed missiles destroyed right along with it. So, right off we can say that domestically deployed missiles have no usefulness with regard to mutually assured destruction. Why do we have so many? Why do we have any at all?

Submarines serve as our retaliatory mechanism. As such, we only need enough submarine-based missiles to destroy the world to have an effective MAD strategy. The rest are superfluous. Except as bargaining chips.

If you've studied it, Mr. Steele, I am surprised at these questions. Launch on warning vs. launch on impact was a well-debated question during the Cold War. I am reasonably confident that launch on impact was U.S doctrine for most of the Cold War. (Not so for the U.S.S.R., I believe.) If launch on warning is your doctrine, you don't need very many missiles at all. But then you've got a very tough use-or-lose decision in the 20 or so minutes from a launch detection to impact. Not as stable for deterrence, in my opinion.

There is no basis for your assumption that all U.S. domestically deployed missiles would be destroyed by the first strike -- that is the point of the large stockpiles, to ensure the survivability of a second-strike capability.

Subs are great, but if you put all your eggs in that basket, what if there is a technology that makes them vastly more vulnerable than you assume? By the 1990s that is probably the case, but could you really be so sure in 1975 that the U.S.S.R. didn't have the capability to take them out. That's why U.S. doctrine called for the triad -- missiles, subs, and bombers, each with different capabilities and advantages.

[TheManWithAUsername]

jsteele wrote:Submarines serve as our retaliatory mechanism. As such, we only need enough submarine-based missiles to destroy the world to have an effective MAD strategy. The rest are superfluous. Except as bargaining chips.

The bargaining chip idea doesn't really make sense. Either they have value - and therefore also value as chips - or they don't, unless for some reason the other side wildly overestimates their value. Also, given the stakes, there wouldn't be too many circumstances in which you'd give up anything of value.

[TheManWithAUsername]

Anonymous wrote:I believe there have been a number of near misses due to false launch alarms. I don't have the details at my fingertips, though.

That's really horrifying, if correct. You'd think maybe we'd fix that up as a high priority. Were any of these near misses in the last few decades?

[TheManWithAUsername]

Anonymous wrote:Subs are great, but if you put all your eggs in that basket, what if there is a technology that makes them vastly more vulnerable than you assume? By the 1990s that is probably the case, but could you really be so sure in 1975 that the U.S.S.R. didn't have the capability to take them out. That's why U.S. doctrine called for the triad -- missiles, subs, and bombers, each with different capabilities and advantages.

But it's almost 40 years later now.

The whole thing is very suspect. Wait until we're hit, even though our detection is presumably immensely better than just a few decades ago. Be prepared for the disabling of our subs and bombers - more precisely, be prepared for the development of technology that gives them great confidence that they will take out most of those alternatives. All that to accommodate the possibility of a major power concluding that it would work well for them to drop hundreds of nuclear warheads somewhere on earth.

[jsteele]

TheManWithAUsername wrote:

jsteele wrote:Submarines serve as our retaliatory mechanism. As such, we only need enough submarine-based missiles to destroy the world to have an effective MAD strategy. The rest are superfluous. Except as bargaining chips.

The bargaining chip idea doesn't really make sense. Either they have value - and therefore also value as chips - or they don't, unless for some reason the other side wildly overestimates their value. Also, given the stakes, there wouldn't be too many circumstances in which you'd give up anything of value.

Whether it makes sense or not, the only thing our nuclear missiles have been used for is bargaining chips. The START Treaty cut our number of missiles in half. START II eliminated MIRVs (but the Russians pulled out), SORT further reduced the number of warheads, and New START will reduce the number of launchers by half.

If every missile is needed as the poster above seems to believe, then why did we give up half, and then half again? Obviously, every missile wasn't needed. That supports my suggestion that missile purchases were an easy and generally unopposed method of filling defense industry coffers.

[Anonymous]

The size of the stockpile had a lot to do with the uncertainty of the technology and a lack of understanding of what constituted a credible MAD. For it to work, both parties have to believe in it. And that is tough when good information is not available. The Russians were behind, and they didn't have much reliability or accuracy, but so they went for volume. We went through several phases where we doubted our deterrence. Some was real (we didn't know how reliable our system was) some was perceived (remember the bomber gap that the Soviets faked, and then the missile gap in the 1960 campaign) Then there was the specter of ballistic missile defense and intermediate range/ tactical nuclear weapons that made everything even more scary. ABM had the potential to upset MAD. And intermediate range missiles meant that a global nuclear conflict could start with a strike too small to justify a full retaliatory strike, but which could cause everything to mushroom out of control.

In the end, three things helped us to control the nuclear arms race. (1) We became more confident in the capabilities of our systems, (2) we reduced the threat of ABM systems through sub launched missiles, which are too quick and low to counter, and through the ABM treaty, and (3) we signed the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which eliminated a category of weapon that destabilized MAD.

The legacy is a frightening amount of nuclear weaponry on one hand. On the other, we have reduced our capacity by a factor of 3, and the Soviets have reduced theirs by a factor of 8. So it is progress, but from a crazy number built on politics, hysteria, and uncertainty of technology and deterrence theory.

[Anonymous]

This scares me even more. navytimes.com/news/2010/08/navy-uav-enters-dc-082510/

Robots will take over.