quote:If you knock a nuke 10 clicks off target, guess what.....you STILL destroy the target.
That is probably not true for average nukes. If you're talking about the 50-megaton "Tsar Bomba" (noting that this was a fission-fusion-fission device, not what we usually think of as a 'nuke', which is just one-stage fission) that the Soviets built for propaganda purposes, then yes; and if you're talking about a city the size of London, then ok, you don't need to hit the city center to kill a few million. But for ordinary nukes of the kind that are mass-produced and suitable for delivery by ordinary rockets, and especially against hardened military targets, ten kilometers is a plain miss. At Hiroshima, there was "severe damage to buildings," noting that these were relatively flimsy wood-built structures for the most part, out to about 1.5 km; that's a reasonable benchmark for the sort of bomb that's easy to produce and deliver.
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quote:At Hiroshima, there was "severe damage to buildings," noting that these were relatively flimsy wood-built structures for the most part, out to about 1.5 km; that's a reasonable benchmark for the sort of bomb that's easy to produce and deliver.
I guess that depends on how you define "ordinary nukes that are easy to mass produce". Any fusion weapon is going to have a much much greater yield than the fission bombs dropped on Japan. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima had yield of 15 Kilotons. The warheads on the Trident missiles (which were by the way mass produced) have a yield of 5 megatons -- more than three hundred times that of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Assuming that the destruction radius scales by yield squared, we are talking about a radius of 25 km for a Trident missile.
But that's really only if we are talking about attacking civilian targets. Back in the days of MAD (mutually assure destruction), the strategic goal was not to wipe out people but to knock out all the guys nuclear weapons so they could not retaliate. The Trident missiles, which were launched from submarines were much less accurate than their land based counterparts so they had to have a much higher yield to be able to reliable take out hardened targets.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
What KoM said, most deliverable warheads Iran is likely to produce and deply, likely would be in the KT range. MT range nuclear warheads are harder and more expensive to maintain and secure; and have less requirements out of the missiles.
That intercepting missiles is difficult is not in contention, but claims of 0-10% 'accuracy' aren't ironically accurate in of themselves. A lot of the literature I've read, including for the AEGIS system currently available all have capabilities that can intercept a reasonable (one could say 'optimal' possibly) missile strikes. Are they 97% likely to succeed? Maybe not, but at the same time they aren't ineffective, that just isn't supported by the evidence or they're widespread deployment.
Also please note that I mentioned Patriot as an example and in fairness one I said as a positive effective example; to address Lyrhawn's baffling snark. However Patriot isn't obviously the fullest extent of American ABM capability and in fact the documents linked largely express their concerns with ICBM interception, there's much higher success against IRBMs; and in fact had a 100% success rate in iraqi Freedom
The point is that Saudi's only option in the case of Iran becoming a nuclear weapons state is not to get nuclear weapons themselves; but in actuality the USA can offer them a range of options to 'bribe' them to not pursue nuclear weapons themselves.
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quote:At Hiroshima, there was "severe damage to buildings," noting that these were relatively flimsy wood-built structures for the most part, out to about 1.5 km; that's a reasonable benchmark for the sort of bomb that's easy to produce and deliver.
I guess that depends on how you define "ordinary nukes that are easy to mass produce". Any fusion weapon is going to have a much much greater yield than the fission bombs dropped on Japan. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima had yield of 15 Kilotons. The warheads on the Trident missiles (which were by the way mass produced) have a yield of 5 megatons -- more than three hundred times that of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Assuming that the destruction radius scales by yield squared, we are talking about a radius of 25 km for a Trident missile.
Presumably you mean square root rather than square; at any rate the destructive radius goes as the cube root, which brings the Trident down to ten km or so against civilian buildings in the style of 1940s Hiroshima. However, making a fusion weapon is a much more difficult engineering challenge than making a fission one - not so much to get one to go off, but in making one that can be delivered by missile. Iran would be likely to go through the same development every other nuclear power did, with fission weapons first.
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I suppose I better cancel my own order for a missile defense system. But I'm still terified that Obama is going to take away my 2nd Ammendment rights!
According to Scalia, so long as your missile defense system is shoulder mounted, it's covered.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:At Hiroshima, there was "severe damage to buildings," noting that these were relatively flimsy wood-built structures for the most part, out to about 1.5 km; that's a reasonable benchmark for the sort of bomb that's easy to produce and deliver.
I guess that depends on how you define "ordinary nukes that are easy to mass produce". Any fusion weapon is going to have a much much greater yield than the fission bombs dropped on Japan. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima had yield of 15 Kilotons. The warheads on the Trident missiles (which were by the way mass produced) have a yield of 5 megatons -- more than three hundred times that of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Assuming that the destruction radius scales by yield squared, we are talking about a radius of 25 km for a Trident missile.
Presumably you mean square root rather than square; at any rate the destructive radius goes as the cube root, which brings the Trident down to ten km or so against civilian buildings in the style of 1940s Hiroshima. However, making a fusion weapon is a much more difficult engineering challenge than making a fission one - not so much to get one to go off, but in making one that can be delivered by missile. Iran would be likely to go through the same development every other nuclear power did, with fission weapons first.
Wouldn't it be easier to just throw the nuke in the back of a truck and drive it to your target?
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posted
If you intend to blow up a city, sure. Hardened military targets, you have to get a lot closer. The usual aim in a surprise first strike is to get your enemy's missiles or military bases, to force him to surrender. Hitting cities is a last resort, an attempt to cripple him so at least he won't be sending an occupying army to your shattered territory. Then you have to consider that if you're Iran, you likely want to hit more than one target in your first strike. So now you have to have several trucks, all of which need drivers who are either volunteers for a suicide mission - with all the notorious flakiness that goes with that - or else have an escape plan that at least the drivers believe in. And the bombs should go off at roughly the same time. And you need a period of relative peacefulness so that your enemy (in the shape of a dozen different customs agents at the border crossings) isn't inspired to be suspicious of trucks coming from your country with unfamiliar-looking machinery on the back.
The tradeoffs are different for a nation-state intending to survive and win a war, than they are for a terrorist group.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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posted
Blayne, I had a couple of points there, sorry if they got missed or I didn't outright state them clearly enough...
First was that knocking a missile off target by a bit isn't always going to be a "Success" for a system like the Patriot missile defense system.
Second, just because a government stated a specific success rate on a missile defense system doesn't mean it is true. Particularly when said missile defense system has not been tested in real combat, which is FAR harder to defend against than ANY possible testing scenario.
Third, that most of the tests of these types of systems are rigged so that the system has an optimal chance of success.
I know you were not talking specifically, or at least not exclusively, about the Patriot system when you first posted, but that was one of the only systems that has been used in real combat, and even the experts STILL don't agree on how effective it was after the fact. Imagine how much harder it is to accurately asses how a system would function before it is tested IRL circumstances! (also, other countries don't necessarily post actual results of the effectiveness of their own defense systems)
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
Sorry but I'm not buying the whole categorical rejection of government metrics until there's conclusive proof of otherwise.
Additionally your point cuts both ways, if we can't know its effectiveness we also can't know its lack of effectiveness; absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence afterall, meaning that Saudi Arabia has no convincing reason to reject a Patriot missile system deployment/sale in exchange for not pursuing nuclear weapons; a task that already has such high costs to it that it isn't that hard to convince them to do.
Again, given that Iranian weapons capabilities to deploy their hypothetical nuclear armament is going to be extremely limited for the forseeable future a ABM screen like Patriot or something like the Soviet S-300 series of interceptors have every reason to be convincing enough to provide adequate defence.
Also a miss where a nuclear armed IRBM like the Scud hits the desert instead of mecca is pretty much better than the alternative of where Saudi Arabia just nukes Tehran back.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Sorry but I'm not buying the whole categorical rejection of government metrics until there's conclusive proof of otherwise.
So you'll believe the russian government at pretty much whatever it says until someone decides to bite on the whole reverse burden of proof thing and hand you conclusive information about how a crumbling missile shield (which probably doesn't even really work anymore) cannot possibly claim a 100% success rate?
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Back to the subject of safety in Europe and the Middle east, I think this is quite a good depiction: http://9gag.com/gag/5170111Posts: 723 | Registered: Dec 2004
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posted
I used to cross the border between the Netherlands and Belgium frequently on my bike. My experience was that it's approximately equivalent to crossing between states in the US; no checkpoints, no fences, just a welcome sign. I had the same experience crossing between the Netherlands and Germany.
Posts: 2926 | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Sorry but I'm not buying the whole categorical rejection of government metrics until there's conclusive proof of otherwise.
There has been proof of it, multiple times, in almost every single complex weapons system. But you believe what you want, Blayne, despite the fact that I already showed you ONE LARGE example of a discrepancy between government's estimates and actual war accuracy.
Those of us who actually have actual military experience know better.
I agree it's better than nothing, but I disagree that it is adequate, or will be as effective as the people who paid for it want it to be.
Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
The germans will still occasionally stop buses crossing borders, but they're usually just looking for drugs and illegals coming from the east. But I haven't been stopped on the bus in years now- perhaps they no longer do it.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: The germans will still occasionally stop buses crossing borders, but they're usually just looking for drugs and illegals coming from the east. But I haven't been stopped on the bus in years now- perhaps they no longer do it.
What? No! They need to check your shoes, run their hands over your body, and scan under your clothes! Are they nuts?
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