Chance Vought SSM-N-9/RGM-15 Regulus II

[Bill Garvin]

Thinking of the various possiblities for such an advanced weapons system coupled with even a LITTLE out-of-the-box thinking in the late '60s and through the '70s could have possibly saved a lot of later spent money and resources to develop similar but less capable assets today. Randy

An interesting possibility would have been a Regulus II fitted with a multi-role mission bay so the missile could carry a reconnaissance pack, an ELINT pack or multiple warload options (cluster bombs for area attack for example). I've heard hints that such things may have been considered, probably in an effort to save the program but I've never seen anything written down that would say yea or nay to them.

 

[Howedar]

Figure 6-3 shows a second design presumably for use beginning with USS Long Beach (CLGN-160/CGN-9) placing five Regulus II missiles in a main deck hanger.

To be honest, that seems unlikely. The quarterdeck (fantail for USAsians) of the CLGN-160 class wasn't arranged that way, which would have conflicted with the Talos installation. That might have been an early arrangement, but I'd suggest it's more likely to be a proposal for a more comprehensive rebuild of an existing CA.

Edit: If you look at the drawing, it actually indicates 'existing fantail hangar', a fitting that the CLGN-160 class certainly didn't have, so this must be a proposed modification of something or other.

Note the dashed lines. I believe the aforementioned picture is intended to indicate two different proposed arrangements, with the actual launcher proper being common between the two types. I cannot imagine so inefficient a layout as having two wildly different hangars and handling arrangements on one hull.

This fits nicely with the huge square superstructure block right ahead of the amidships opening (later used for ASROC) on CGN-9...

 

[Stargazer]

There are time, (more often than not actually ) I really think that the whole "inter-service" rivalry thing has seriously crippled the US's military in many ways. The fact that it STILL tends to get in the way of various programs speaks volumes on endurance of outmoded priorities.

The USAF really SHOULD have not only considered but adopted the Reg-II for an ALCM role! Thinking of the various possiblities for such an advanced weapons system coupled with even a LITTLE out-of-the-box thinking in the late '60s and through the '70s could have possibly saved a lot of later spent money and resources to develop similar but less capable assets today.

Randy

Not just that, but Vought simply never was favored by the USAAC/USAAF/USAF. I have always wondered what it was about Vought that posed a problem. Until they purchased the A-7 Corsair II, there NEVER was a single Vought-built aircraft in the Air Force inventory. Only two aircraft were ever tested: the XO-28 (a spinoff of the Corsair biplane) in the early 1930s and the XC-142 (which was Tri-Service anyway, and also involved Hiller and Ryan). Two types over a period spanning 40 years! Even Vought's last fighter design, the V-1600, ended up as the General Dynamics F-16 and Vought's name was heard no more...

 

[sferrin]

The USAF shoulda bought a land-based Crusader III. Imagine it's performance if you removed the need for carrier landing and takeoff.

 

[SOC]

What happens when non-military agencies get their hands on cruise missiles:

You have got to be kidding me

 

[Skyraider3D]

What happens when non-military agencies get their hands on cruise missiles:

You have got to be kidding me

I guess e-mail has its benefits! ;D

 

[Michel Van]

What happens when non-military agencies get their hands on cruise missiles:

You have got to be kidding me

I guess e-mail has its benefits! ;D

be lucky we got E-mail :
otherwise
most front gardens would be full of crater by Missile-Mail...

 

[sferrin]

 

[Grey Havoc]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Chance-Vought-Regulus-II-Missile-Desk-Model-Topping-Models-/121079195873?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c30e1e8e1

This auction is for a vintage Chance Vought Regulus II missile desk model. This model was made by Topping Models in the 1950's for Chance Vought. It measures 16 1/2" long and 5 1/2" wide. One of the front canards has had a portion chipped off. Otherwise the model is in really good condition. These are rarely seen!

 

[Grey Havoc]

http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2018/05/10/a-view-from-the-deep/ (Scroll down)

 

[Grey Havoc]

Amiral Nomy had other ideas in order to deploy soonest missiles (and nuclear weapons) at sea:

• in 1958, he had Vought SSM-N-9 Regulus II assessed for deployment on board the two PA54 carriers and the PA59 carrier project, only for Regulus II to be terminated by the USN in December 1958;

 

[Grey Havoc]

What happens when non-military agencies get their hands on cruise missiles:

You have got to be kidding me

I guess e-mail has its benefits! ;D

be lucky we got E-mail :
otherwise
most front gardens would be full of crater by Missile-Mail...

https://www.reddit.com/r/WarshipPorn/comments/gyy530

(Erroneously referred to as a Regulus II missile.)

Some more background:

That Time the USPS Launched a Missile Full of Letters Off a Navy Submarine

A brief history of missile mail.

www.popularmechanics.com

 

[uk 75]

The Long Beach with Regulus 2 inspired the Revell kit artists and the German waterline ship modelmaker Hansa. I include the images here as they illustrate this topic.

 

[uk 75]

A bit of a tangent but I think the Regulus 2 may also have influenced RN planners when they looked at a large missile to replace Bucaneer aircraft if the RN gave up carriers. Long Beach and its Talos and Regulus fit was the ultimate Western Navy cruiser design in the late 50s.

 

[Dilandu]

A bit of a tangent but I think the Regulus 2 may also have influenced RN planners when they looked at a large missile to replace Bucaneer aircraft if the RN gave up carriers. Long Beach and its Talos and Regulus fit was the ultimate Western Navy cruiser design in the late 50s.

Seconded!

 

[Archibald]

Thinking of the various possiblities for such an advanced weapons system coupled with even a LITTLE out-of-the-box thinking in the late '60s and through the '70s could have possibly saved a lot of later spent money and resources to develop similar but less capable assets today. Randy

An interesting possibility would have been a Regulus II fitted with a multi-role mission bay so the missile could carry a reconnaissance pack, an ELINT pack or multiple warload options (cluster bombs for area attack for example). I've heard hints that such things may have been considered, probably in an effort to save the program but I've never seen anything written down that would say yea or nay to them.

I heard a similar idea by Elmayerle a veeeery long time ago (2007 !) at Whatifmodelers, about the Navaho cruise missile.

That would have been completely awesome for Vietnam. While Firebee drones were recovered, D-21B had an ejectable hatch to recover its camera and film. Didn't worked too well...

 

[Grey Havoc]

ORIGINAL CAPTION: An SSM-N-9 Regulus II missile is maneuvered aboard the USS Grayback.


ORIGINAL CAPTION: Another view of a Regulus II on USS Greyback emphasizes the scale of these early strategic missiles.

The Oddly Shaped USS Grayback Was A Cold War Submarine Like No Other

The remarkable sub's story includes launching fighter-sized cruise missiles, attempting to rescue Vietnam War PoWs, and getting painted bright orange.

www.thedrive.com

 

[Grey Havoc]

Thinking of the various possiblities for such an advanced weapons system coupled with even a LITTLE out-of-the-box thinking in the late '60s and through the '70s could have possibly saved a lot of later spent money and resources to develop similar but less capable assets today. Randy

An interesting possibility would have been a Regulus II fitted with a multi-role mission bay so the missile could carry a reconnaissance pack, an ELINT pack or multiple warload options (cluster bombs for area attack for example). I've heard hints that such things may have been considered, probably in an effort to save the program but I've never seen anything written down that would say yea or nay to them.

I heard a similar idea by Elmayerle a veeeery long time ago (2007 !) at Whatifmodelers, about the Navaho cruise missile.

That would have been completely awesome for Vietnam. While Firebee drones were recovered, D-21B had an ejectable hatch to recover its camera and film. Didn't worked too well...

Northrop's Northrop's N-196 competitor for Weapon System-131B (what would ultimately become the Hound Dog missile) may be of some interest to ye then:

Northrop's N-196 - The Passed-Over Hound Dog

The number of missile and rocket proposals developed by the various aerospace companies during the 1950s and early 1960s was tr...

ghostmodeler.blogspot.com

 

[Dilandu]

ORIGINAL CAPTION: Another view of a Regulus II on USS Greyback emphasizes the scale of these early strategic missiles.

Yeah, considering that Soviet submarines at this time could already launch supersonic cruise missiles from container tubes -


- the... archaic technology of Regulus program became quite appalling.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

The difference was that the Russian missiles had ranges at that time on the order of 50 to 200 miles versus Regulus II with a 1000 mile range and was intended solely as a nuke delivery system in lieu of having an IRBM-type missile available. Once Polaris was available, Regulus became obsolete.

The SS-N-3 Shaddock (P-5 Pyatyorka) shown above could theoretically range to about 250 miles, but without a means to target accurately, it was only good as a nuke delivery system against a large city or other large target where errors in navigational position would make no real difference.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Once Polaris was available, Regulus became obsolete.

Not quite. Regulus II and Polaris were after all originally intended to be operated side by side. They were complimentary, with the former being a pretty accurate, primarily counterforce weapon, and the later being a relatively inaccurate, almost solely countervalue weapon. Their respective target lists only lightly overlapped. The real reason that Regulus II was cancelled (along with a whole range of important USN programs & projects) was to help cover rather large continuing cost overruns on the Polaris program (without tipping off the President, Congress, or the Secretary of Defense to the true state of affairs in the process). It is still debatable whether or not Polaris was actually worth the all the sacrifices in the end, even if it did ultimately lead to a quite useful SLBM capability and by extension the US nuclear triad.

 

[jstar]

I would have thought the SS-N-3 would be more equivalent to the Regulus I SSM-N-8 in performance?

 

[Dilandu]

The difference was that the Russian missiles had ranges at that time on the order of 50 to 200 miles versus Regulus II with a 1000 mile range and was intended solely as a nuke delivery system in lieu of having an IRBM-type missile available. Once Polaris was available, Regulus became obsolete.

Well, but you must admit, that our approach was more pragmatic: yes, our P-5 (Shaddock) was limited to 600 km range, but it was much more compact, could be launched two minutes after surfacing, could be salvo-fired, and also served as a basic for P-6/P-35/P-500 Bazalt/P-1000 Vulkan missile family.

 

[Dilandu]

I would have thought the SS-N-3 would be more equivalent to the Regulus I SSM-N-8 in performance?

To be exact, it was inbetween. P-5 (SS-N-3) was supersonic - but only capable of Mach 1,25-1,5. It also have a range only of about 2/3 of Regulus. On the other hands, it could be launched MUCH faster and easier (being stored in launch tube, filled with nitrogen), was fully autonomous after launch (required no input from submarine, so was significantly safer to use and immune to jamming), and was able to penetrate air defenses better due to the low flight altitude (while Regulus needed to fly relatively high to stay line-of-sight with guiding submarine, P-5 could fly as low as 500 meters, efficiently making her rather hard to intercept).

 

[Tzoli]

Yes the Regulus II was quite a serious project as a large number of USN Surface combatant designs was envisioned with it even some Cruiser conversions.
Iowa, Alaska, Cleveland conversions or new constructions like the Long Beach

 

[Dilandu]

Yes the Regulus II was quite a serious project as a large number of USN Surface combatant designs was envisioned with it even some Cruiser conversions.
Iowa, Alaska, Cleveland conversions or new constructions like the Long Beach

Regulus II main problem was, that it did not offer sufficient advantage over USAF missile program to validate its existence. By late 1950s, Navy was competing not with manned bombers and land-launched cruise missiles, but with IRBM's and ICBM's. And here Regulus II could offer little. The major problem was the air defense penetration probability; Regulus II was neither fast enough nor high-flying enough to avoid S-75 SAM, could not fly low-altitude, and could not be salvo-launched (at least not from submarines), so the air defenses could not be even saturated.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

Once Polaris was available, Regulus became obsolete.

Not quite. Regulus II and Polaris were after all originally intended to be operated side by side. They were complimentary, with the former being a pretty accurate, primarily counterforce weapon, and the later being a relatively inaccurate, almost solely countervalue weapon. Their respective target lists only lightly overlapped. The real reason that Regulus II was cancelled (along with a whole range of important USN programs & projects) was to help cover rather large continuing cost overruns on the Polaris program (without tipping off the President, Congress, or the Secretary of Defense to the true state of affairs in the process). It is still debatable whether or not Polaris was actually worth the all the sacrifices in the end, even if it did ultimately lead to a quite useful SLBM capability and by extension the US nuclear triad.

That was the same idea as the USAF had with missiles like Atlas and Titan versus Navajo / Snark. The two services having a pretty obvious rivalry going on about missions at the time. Both services were looking at the ballistic and aerodynamic (cruise) missile delivery systems to determine which was a better means of nuclear attack.
Regulus, obviously more successful than Navajo, was cancelled because the government couldn't fund both ballistic missiles and cruise missiles for the nuclear delivery mission. It was also demonstrated that the ballistic system was sufficiently accurate and much faster at delivery with really no defense or countermeasure against it versus the vulnerable to air defense cruise missile making the former a better choice.

The Soviet solution at the time with cruise missiles was to give the nuclear mission to the same family of missiles they were using for anti-ship work. It was just an additional mission tacked on.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

As an interesting side note, two Bell P-63 were modified as test aircraft for the remote control systems associated with the Regulus program.

P-63 Kingcobra: post-WWII service

A successor to the P-39 Airacobra, the Bell P-63 Kingcobra never saw combat in American colors but was heavily exported via Lend-Lease during WWII, and was used on three continents after the confli…

wwiiafterwwii.wordpress.com

 

[NMaude]

Good stuff from the NTRS:

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073442_1965073442.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073469_1965073469.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073693_1965073693.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073715_1965073715.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073790_1965073790.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930088343_1993088343.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930088736_1993088736.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930088882_1993088882.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20090025471_2009023874.pdf

Or type Regulus in the searc box of http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp

Would you please post the titles of each of the of technical reports for those URLs please as none of the links work

 

[Dilandu]

The Soviet solution at the time with cruise missiles was to give the nuclear mission to the same family of missiles they were using for anti-ship work. It was just an additional mission tacked on.

Well, not exactly. It would be more correct to say, that we developed common solutions for both strategic and anti-ship cruise missiles. They weren't of the same model, the strategic missile (P-5) was longer than anti-ship one (P-6/P-35), more powerful nuclear warhead and have about a 50% more range. Albeit I should point that anti-ship P-6/P-35 missiles have anti-ground mode also.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

The difference was that the Russian missiles had ranges at that time on the order of 50 to 200 miles versus Regulus II with a 1000 mile range and was intended solely as a nuke delivery system in lieu of having an IRBM-type missile available. Once Polaris was available, Regulus became obsolete.

Well, but you must admit, that our approach was more pragmatic: yes, our P-5 (Shaddock) was limited to 600 km range, but it was much more compact, could be launched two minutes after surfacing, could be salvo-fired, and also served as a basic for P-6/P-35/P-500 Bazalt/P-1000 Vulkan missile family.

I agree there. At the time, and even today, the US military frequently wants systems that have gross levels of overkill on technology and aren't really feasible. The Russians often settled for 'good enough.'

 

[Richard N]

There is a very nice and shiny Regulus II at the Frontiers of Flight Museum at Dallas Love Field, Texas.

Missiles - Frontiers of Flight Museum

Most missiles are guided weapons, usually rocket powered, that are designed to carry a payload to a target and destroy it.

www.flightmuseum.com

 

[Richard N]

Saw it last week with some friends. The Vought Flying Pancake is still there along with a Lear Fan.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Wouldn't the Soviet equivalent of the Regulas II be the abortive P20 Cruise Missile? There is a sketch of a Project 627/November variant with an awkward hangar arrangement in a stretched sail that appears in Norman Polmar's Cold War Submarines. In addition to briefly describing the above, it also mentions an abortive Project 653 submarine which was to able to carry two P20s.

Sketches of both appear on deepstorm.ru, and the arrangements for missile handling can only be described as awkward.

 

[sferrin]

Wouldn't the Soviet equivalent of the Regulas II be the abortive P20 Cruise Missile? There is a sketch of a Project 627/November variant with an awkward hangar arrangement in a stretched sail that appears in Norman Polmar's Cold War Submarines. In addition to briefly describing the above, it also mentions an abortive Project 653 submarine which was to able to carry two P20s.

Sketches of both appear on deepstorm.ru, and the arrangements for missile handling can only be described as awkward.

Hopefully these haven't already been posted here. Didn't see anything.

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/soviet-p-20-missile.37871/#post-482041

 

[T. A. Gardner]

The P-20 looks more like a navalized version of Navajo than a Regulus II. That is a very large missile.

 

[Dilandu]

The P-20 looks more like a navalized version of Navajo than a Regulus II. That is a very large missile.

Well, it was supposed to have 2500-3000 km range on Mach 3 speed and 20000-30000 meters altitude, with 3-megaton warhead. I.e. she was about 30% more capable than Regulus-II in any characteristics. This required quite large size...

 

[T. A. Gardner]

The P-20 looks more like a navalized version of Navajo than a Regulus II. That is a very large missile.

Well, it was supposed to have 2500-3000 km range on Mach 3 speed and 20000-30000 meters altitude, with 3-megaton warhead. I.e. she was about 30% more capable than Regulus-II in any characteristics. This required quite large size...

That's the territory the Navajo was to operate in.



The big white part is the booster rocket to get the missile up to speed. This was necessary because the missile's engines were supersonic ramjets so needed to be up to speed before being engaged.
This gave it a top speed of about Mach 3 with a 3,500 mile (6,000 km) range at 77,000 feet (23 km) altitude.

 

[Dilandu]

That's the territory the Navajo was to operate in.

Not exactly - Navajo was supposed to have intercontinental range, while P-20 Sokol was limited to about a half of it.

The Soviet analogues of Navajo were La-350 "Burya" and M-40 "Buran":



Both were ramjet-powered high-supersonic intercontinental cruise missiles, designed to have a 8000+ km range on Mach 3+ speed and 25-30 km altitude. The "Burya" commenced eighteen flights, of which fifteen were successful. In final test, the 6500 km range was demonstrated. The whole intercontinental cruise missile program was cancelled in 1960, because progress in R-16 ICBM development (on storable fuel) made them not important.

 

[Skyraider3D]

Good stuff from the NTRS:

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073442_1965073442.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073469_1965073469.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073693_1965073693.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073715_1965073715.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650073790_1965073790.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930088343_1993088343.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930088736_1993088736.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930088882_1993088882.pdf

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20090025471_2009023874.pdf

Or type Regulus in the searc box of http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp

Would you please post the titles of each of the of technical reports for those URLs please as none of the links work

Yes that was 11 (!) years ago and they removed stuff, annoyingly. But I located those files on my hard drive, here you go! Some are too big for the forum, however (19650073693_1965073693.pdf, 19930088736_1993088736.pdf and 19650073469_1965073469.pdf). Screenshots of the title pages below: