In otherwords, it hits its target anywhere within a 10,000 km circle in about 20 minutes.
That makes it as close to a counterforce weapon as it gets, its literally capable of launching and catching weapons in their silos before they can launch, since the command to launch probably takes about 20 minutes.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
I still don't think an "omni bomb" is going to win you a nuke war. Might take us ten seconds longer to obliterate them than it does them to us. But I'm just going by what kept my bed dry when I was a kid in the '80's.
I still don't think an "omni bomb" is going to win you a nuke war. Might take us ten seconds longer to obliterate them than it does them to us. But I'm just going by what kept my bed dry when I was a kid in the '80's.
This does represent a massive change in how a nuclear war would be fought more then anything else. Its now concerning that Russia has done a generational leap forward in terms of their quieting on their ballistic missile subs, advanced their SSN's and now are releasing a super high speed stealth missile with extreme range and explosive capability, the question is how accurate can this rocket be.
At the very worst it certainly makes a decapitation strike more realistic, evacuating the president out of the blast range would be impossible as would the rest of American leadership, it also makes it possible to take out a lot of the American Nuclear Force before they can get off of the ground.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
I still don't think an "omni bomb" is going to win you a nuke war. Might take us ten seconds longer to obliterate them than it does them to us. But I'm just going by what kept my bed dry when I was a kid in the '80's.
You just took me back to watching Threads on our B&W TV when I was 13. I found if horrifying.
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Captain James P. DeCOSTE, CD, 18 Sep 1993
This does represent a massive change in how a nuclear war would be fought more then anything else. Its now concerning that Russia has done a generational leap forward in terms of their quieting on their ballistic missile subs, advanced their SSN's and now are releasing a super high speed stealth missile with extreme range and explosive capability, the question is how accurate can this rocket be.
At the very worst it certainly makes a decapitation strike more realistic, evacuating the president out of the blast range would be impossible as would the rest of American leadership, it also makes it possible to take out a lot of the American Nuclear Force before they can get off of the ground.
Damnit. Circle of worry. Russians. y2k. Terrorists. Global warming. Now back to Russians.
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Wonder why it's liquid filled, wouldn't adding time to fuel the missile defeat the purpose of a prompt global striking weapon?
You can't really get the same range or speed on a solid rocket system. Plus from what I understand the fuel tends to go bad or crack fairly quickly.
With the Russians more fully into secured communications and the use of closed systems, its not like the old days where you could intercept messages about the enemy fueling his rockets.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
As an add on because the Russians just seem to be going crazy on weapons development they tested the Zircon short range cruise missile which flies at about 4000 miles an hour. Just to compare the American Tomahawk flys at about 550 miles an hour.
This weapon is primarily designed to be fired off of the Yasen class submarines. Their nuclear powered Kirov battlecruisers will be refitted to carry 80 of these missiles by 2022.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
If something like this is used, the term war crime, or international criminal court is irrelevant.
It is a pure civilian city busting weapons, its not built as a threatre weapon or battlefield weapon.
I would argue that beyond deterrence this thing is designed as a first strike weapon.
I'm not sure if this weapon would be useful in a first strike scenario against a NATO country. As soon as satellites watching Russia detect launches a prompt counterstrike would begin. There's no point in a first strike if there's a high probability of an effective retaliation.
For a first strike from one major nuclear power onto another you need stealth bombers or something more creative like hiding bombs in smuggled shipping containers.
I'm not sure if this weapon would be useful in a first strike scenario against a NATO country. As soon as satellites watching Russia detect launches a prompt counterstrike would begin. There's no point in a first strike if there's a high probability of an effective retaliation.
For a first strike from one major nuclear power onto another you need stealth bombers or something more creative like hiding bombs in smuggled shipping containers.
This weapon is stealthy and is designed to be fired from mobile launchers, which has always been the difficulty in dealing with the Russians.
Also remember that this weapon can reach it target at a maximum range in about 20 minutes, so your talking about the US command structure being able to gather intelligence and be able to get a decision in a short period of time and launch the missiles. If there's any kind of delay or the briefing or decision takes too long these missiles could punch significant holes in the American targeting package as the real heavy long range missiles that the Americans have are silo based. On top of that the Russians have spent a lot of years now developing their 5th generation submarines which are built to hunt down American Boombers, on top of that the Americans have sharply reduced their at sea submarine missile capabilities they are down to about 18 Ohio class submarines now as they converted or retired the rest. The new line of missile boats won't be online until 2029.
That really leaves cruise missiles launched from aircraft and naval ships, but those aren't the really big warheads that are designed for counterforce, but are more designed for tactical instead of strategic targets.
On top of that when you have a missile that can take out a area the size of France it likely means the evacuation of the American command structure would probably not be successful. It also means that the Russian missiles don't have to be super accurate to take out the missile fields, long range air force bases and sub bases
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
This weapon is stealthy and is designed to be fired from mobile launchers, which has always been the difficulty in dealing with the Russians.
Also remember that this weapon can reach it target at a maximum range in about 20 minutes, so your talking about the US command structure being able to gather intelligence and be able to get a decision in a short period of time and launch the missiles. If there's any kind of delay or the briefing or decision takes too long these missiles could punch significant holes in the American targeting package as the real heavy long range missiles that the Americans have are silo based. On top of that the Russians have spent a lot of years now developing their 5th generation submarines which are built to hunt down American Boombers, on top of that the Americans have sharply reduced their at sea submarine missile capabilities they are down to about 18 Ohio class submarines now as they converted or retired the rest. The new line of missile boats won't be online until 2029.
That really leaves cruise missiles launched from aircraft and naval ships, but those aren't the really big warheads that are designed for counterforce, but are more designed for tactical instead of strategic targets.
On top of that when you have a missile that can take out a area the size of France it likely means the evacuation of the American command structure would probably not be successful. It also means that the Russian missiles don't have to be super accurate to take out the missile fields, long range air force bases and sub bases
Everything I've seen on this new missile system suggests it's silo based, if you've seen otherwise I'd be interested in reading that. It's one hell of a deterrent but not an effective first strike system. Even with mobile or sea launches the US satellites in geostationary orbit see everything, especially a booster.
