Scott Kenny
ACCESS: USAP
- Joined
- 15 May 2023
- Messages
- 11,553
- Reaction score
- 14,151
The US has a larger threat faced at present, since it's highly unlikely that China is going to launch at Britain and/or France.Then probably USA should agree to reduce the number of American deployed warheads on the same number as Britain and France have deployed?
The US minimum deterrence means having subs available to target Russia, China, North Korea (possibly shared with China), and probably India and Pakistan as well. Note that I said available to target, not targeting.
So that might theoretically be as low as 8 boats, but the USN has said 12 is their minimum. And that's with the Columbia-class never needing a midlife refit. The Ohios needed a midlife refueling, so that meant 14 boats under whichever START it was that forced the retirement of 4x SSBNs into SSGNs. When the Ohios were first designed in the 1970s, the requirement was 18 boats each with 24 birds.