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We can and we are making new warheads.SSBNs are but one leg of the triad. I'm talking about our nuclear infrastructure/capability in its entirety. We can't make new warheads. We can barely make pits. None of our ICBMs, existing or planned, are mobile. None of our ICBMs, existing or planned, are in the class of the DF-41 or SARMAT. None of our cruise missiles, existing or planned, are even supersonic let alone hypersonic. We have no tactical nuclear weapons aside from a small bomb that is over half a century old. Our largest nuclear weapon is barely a megaton. (Yes, yes, we all know about accuracy but if you need to hit a LARGE target you're forced to use multiple of your limited number of weapons instead of one.)The SSBNs seem pretty convincing to me. I think all of the existing programs (LRSO, SSBN, Sentinel, B-21) provide enough capability if they are sufficiently funded and fielded in the needed numbers. Maintaining peer deterrence is enough, IMO. It just needs to be expanded to two players, and I think existing programs can hit that target in time for the late 2020's when Chinese nuclear expansion starts to press up against US deterrence. IMO in the long run, Russia can't afford to maintain what it has in the 2030's.By having a robust deterrent instead of the anemic, decrepit one we have now.
The Value and Limits of Nuclear Deterrence
How should the United States deter adversaries from nuclear escalation?www.usni.org
I prefer more SLBM and bomber delivered. ICBM is not good to use for asia,and for Russia MRBM is enough.
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Wake me up when North Korea has a proper SSBN with long-range SLBMs
It’s almost like there are significant differences between North Korea and the US in relation to their existing and future nuclear forces and the potential threats they face, leading to differences to how these forces are configured and deployed…..
Best to assume it's all of them.
Best not to assume anything and do proper intel work to find out the real answer.
Obviously Scott’s approach, given current geostrategic realities, is correct WHILE making sure we are using all NATECH means at the same time to ultimately determine the exact extent of the threat.
Many (potentially most?) contributors and readers here probably wouldn’t agree that making such a massive assumption is the obvious correct course of action.
And the Chinese have gone to great lengths to increase their ability to detect, locate, and destroy those submarines. The Fat Leonard scandal, for example, wasn't just about winning contracts with the US Navy by bribing their officials, it was an intelligence gathering operation to understand the schedules and logistics of US naval vessels, including boomers. And that's just one dimension to that puzzle, espionage goes deep and that's not the only event that's compromised boomer operational security.
I'd rather have several hundred baskets scattered across an entire continent. All it takes is one breakthrough and those SSBNs are useless for anything but a first strike.
All mobile forms have disadvantages. A sub could be found and destroyed by another sub, but the day an orbital laser platform or NPB is created will be a sad day for land mobile launchers. Whatever the difficulties of finding a submarine, finding a 30m long wide-green load in a single country is a piece of cake by comparison.
It will be some time before there are lasers in orbit powerful enough to destroy an armored TEL under cover.
It depends on whether the submarine force can make the best use of the Pacific Ocean. The technical upgrade of SSBN must also be combined with a more effective operating concept.
Ground-based nuclear facility has no particular advantage in nuclear strategy unless it can launch a hypersonic weapon that can stay in space while conducting orbital bombardment at any time.
It's doable* now with money and you can be damn sure that the likes of China will be working on something.
It's not doable now. You need around a megawatt, or more, just to take out an antiship missile from a few miles away. Nothing like that even being dreamed about for space applications and you'd need far more to reach down from orbit to take out a much heavier built TEL. And "under cover" could be something as simple as trees. Or just put a reflective aluminum "roof" on your TEL. This is trivial stuff.
It is doable. A nuclear reactor weighing 10t can produce 50MWth, so about 25MWe.
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True, but the moment I start firing missiles into targets inside a nuclear-armed country, I start getting missiles back. The laser avoids this problem and also neutralises the issue even if it does occur.
