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US Modernizes Nuclear Arsenal With Smaller, Precision-Guided Atomic Weapons (nytimes.com)
HughPickens.com writes: The NY Times reports that the Pentagon has been developing the B61 Model 12, the nation's first precision-guided atom bomb. Adapted from an older weapon, the Model 12 was designed with problems like North Korea in mind: Its computer brain and four maneuverable fins let it zero in on deeply buried targets like testing tunnels and weapon sites and its yield can be dialed up or down depending on the target, to minimize collateral damage. The B61 Model 12 flight-tested last year in Nevada and is the first of five new warhead types planned as part of an atomic revitalization estimated to cost up to $1 trillion over three decades. As a family, the weapons and their delivery systems move toward the small, the stealthy and the precise.
And some say that's the problem. The Federation of American Scientists argues that the high accuracy and low destructive settings means military commanders might press to use the bomb in an attack, knowing the radioactive fallout and collateral damage would be limited. Increasing the accuracy also broadens the type of targets that the B61 can be used to attack. Some say that a new nuclear tipped cruise missile under development might sway a future president to contemplate "limited nuclear war." Worse yet, because the missile comes in nuclear and non-nuclear varieties, a foe under attack might assume the worst and overreact, initiating nuclear war. In a recent interview, General James Cartwright, a retired four-star general who last served as the eighth Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says the overall modernization plan might change how military commanders looked at the risks of using nuclear weapons. "What if I bring real precision to these weapons?" says Cartwright. "Does it make them more usable? It could be."
And some say that's the problem. The Federation of American Scientists argues that the high accuracy and low destructive settings means military commanders might press to use the bomb in an attack, knowing the radioactive fallout and collateral damage would be limited. Increasing the accuracy also broadens the type of targets that the B61 can be used to attack. Some say that a new nuclear tipped cruise missile under development might sway a future president to contemplate "limited nuclear war." Worse yet, because the missile comes in nuclear and non-nuclear varieties, a foe under attack might assume the worst and overreact, initiating nuclear war. In a recent interview, General James Cartwright, a retired four-star general who last served as the eighth Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says the overall modernization plan might change how military commanders looked at the risks of using nuclear weapons. "What if I bring real precision to these weapons?" says Cartwright. "Does it make them more usable? It could be."
Aren't fallout and collateral damage the main problems people have with nuclear weapons? Without those factors The Bomb wouldn't have that enormous stigma attached to it, it would be just another bomb, albeit larger. Since the Cold War is over, and since everyone involved knows that smaller tactical nukes exist, there's no reason that the response to any and all non-testing nuclear explosion has to be full-on empty the silos.
1) China and Russia are likely to do the same thing eventually. Russia in particular is pumping a lot of money into modernizing their nukes. Do we really want to end up having to catch up here?
2) This might make China and Russia less likely to start some crap if they fear that the US might nuke them in retaliation. There are a lot of countries that would be really happy if both China and Russia would calm down right now.
The FAS also claimed that more-precise weapons back in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s would cause nuclear war.
And that a missile defense system would cause nuclear war (except for the one the Soviets built and still use, of course).
Oddly enough, over the last half-century, none of the things the FAS said would increase the chances of a nuclear war actually caused a nuclear war. The things that nearly caused WWIII were things they never actually mentioned...
Um, the more you dial it down, generally the dirtier the explosion. For a given bomb, higher yields equate to more complete fission of the fuel and higher neutron fluxes that are better at transmuting the heavy actinides into lighter, shorter-lived products. Likewise, the bigger the bomb, the smaller the fallout relative to its yield - they're more effective at dispersion and more of the power comes from fusion, less from fission. For example, the Tsar Bomba was a remarkably clean bomb despite its tremendous yield, while the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (low yield, low percentage burn, pure fission) were very dirty.
He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
The term collateral damage when applied to nukes is kind of meaningless.
Not at all. In the context of "Total War" collateral damage would be harm done to to you or your allies. Destruction of an entire enemy city and nothing else would be zero collateral damage. You are attempting to destroy their will and ability to make war. You break the their means of production, you break their will to fight when they realize their homes and loved ones cannot be protected thru their military efforts. The destruction of non-combatants and infrastructure is valid and I would argue even moral warefare tactic if you yourself are in fact under mortal threat, maybe even if the threat you face falls well below that level.
There was for example little or no "collateral damage" when we bombed Japan, or for that matter Dresden.
Considering Syria today and the siege warfare taking place, I am not even so sure its all that great the UN and various groups are getting food aide in. If the public was starving so to would eventually the combatants (though probably only after mass non-com casualties because after all the solders will be the last not to eat they have guns after all). Short of starving I am not sure what it will take to get these various groups to give up the fight. By getting food in their we prolong the siege, and the bloodshed.
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We've had precision guided nuclear capable weapons systems for years.
Just to pick one ( since it was my particular specialty for years ): the Tomahawk Cruise Missile.
The Block III variant came in four fantastic standard flavors that could be ship, air and even sub-surface launched:
109A - Nuclear Tipped with a W-80 Warhead. Dial-a-yield of 5kt or 150kt. ( Google the W-80 for more info )
109B - Anti-ship flavor. Conventional warhead.
109C - Land-attack flavor. Conventional warhead.
109D - Land-attack flavor, sub-munitions dispensing warhead.
This is just the Tomahawk. I haven't kept up with the other cruise missile variants, gravity or guided smart-bombs, or even
the advances ( if any ) in the ballistic missile platforms.
So, I'm not entirely sure what all the fuss is about since we've had selective yield weapons since at least the late 70's.
Personally, since there is no putting the genie back in the bottle, I would prefer a much smaller yield high precision device
over the city-flattening strategic overkill ones that defined the Cold War era.
Folks may argue that the desire to use them would increase since they're not as terrible as their strategic brethren, but some
of these weapons are older than many of the folks reading this and have had this capability the entire time. Yet, we haven't been
tossing them around en-masse during our many, many conflicts around the world over the years. Unlikely we're going to start now.
It's so accurate you can shoot it right down a building's chimney, before it detonates and levels the city.
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Non-nuclear devices like the FOAB can do much the same.
Conventional napalm destroyed Japanese & German cities, and killed as many people as the first atomic bombs, yet it doesn't have the stigma.
Quite the opposite. Collateral damage is a huge issue with nukes. Haven't you ever heard of Nuclear Winter? Destroying the ability of the entire planet to sustain life, and for years to come, is about the biggest glaring example of collateral damage you could ever come-up with.
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It means you can get it down the entrance tunnel or ventilation shaft of that deep bunker before detonating - destroy the bunker with a smaller warhead than a ground level nuke would need to penetrate.
As far as nuclear weapons go, the Hiroshima bomb was pretty darn small. (Not as small as "tactical nukes," but small.) Hydrogen bombs such as the B83, which is at 1.2 megatons the most powerful US nuclear bomb in active service (let alone discontinued or experimental weapons such as the 25-megaton B41 or the 50-megaton Tsar Bomba) are perfectly capable of completely destroying even large cities. For example, Wikipedia says the B41 could destroy reinforced structures in an 8-mile radius and houses in a 15-mile radius. For perspective, if such a weapon were targeted at Lower Manhattan, it would totally destroy everything from Newark to Queens (and houses all the way to Yonkers and Hempstead)... before considering things like fires. Admittedly, you might need more than one if you were targeting a really spread-out area like greater LA.
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There was for example little or no "collateral damage" when we bombed Japan, or for that matter Dresden.
There was huge amounts of what we today call collateral damage, but back then they didn't use the term "collateral damage".
Now it's "collateral damage" because we're killing a bunch of civilians or destroying civil infrastructure we'd rather not.
Then it wasn't collateral damage because we MEANT to kill civilians and destroy civil infrastructure because we believed that breaking the enemy's ability and will to fight would aid our war effort and shorten the war.
That's why it's called total warfare (or scorched Earth warfare) -- you don't want the enemy to have ANYTHING that enables them to fight, and that includes a population able to function at any meaningful level of productivity, and they aren't very productive if they are starving, homeless and lacking any infrastructure that enables them to be productive.
This was the partial goal of the allied military and very much part of the post-war pacification of Germany, where deliberate allied policies forced the population into famine and stripped them of much of their industrial capacity. Make no mistake, there was no accidental, collateral damage to German civilians, it was a deliberate policy during and after the war to crush the German population into submission.