5 ms·

» This warning time is crucial because that's all you got to decide whether you are under attack or not. For ballistic missiles launched from enemy territory yo

by mcny 8y ago

» This warning time is crucial because that's all you got to decide whether you are under attack or not. For ballistic missiles launched from enemy territory you get half an hour and it means a bunch of people can gather data and figure out if it's real or fluke and make informed decision. You can't make informed decision in 2 minutes and it is extremely dangerous because it does not give you any capability to verify anything or ask anybody. I apologise in advance for the naivety and the insensitivity but what kind of an idiot would give a go ahead for a strike like this knowing that an unprovoked strike on a major civilian population center in Russia will almost assuredly lead to a response from multiple Russian ICBM locations that we keep worrying about the North Koreans. If there was a fleet of a dozen or more space shuttles either "permanently" in the air or ready to fly at a moment's notice, I can see how that would change the equation but one space shuttle can't just dip, deliver a payload, climb up to rinse and repeat on five or more cities, can it?

kijin 8y ago
A modern ICBM is able to deliver payloads to multiple targets at the same time. The technology is called MIRV [1], and U.S. has had it since the early 70s. Since a space shuttle has a much larger payload than an ICBM and is also much more maneuverable, the Soviets probably couldn't exclude the possibility that it can deliver enough payloads to wipe off several cities and/or military bases in a single pass. They were already having trouble developing effective countermeasures to MIRV; a shuttle would have been a nightmare. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targetable_reentry_vehicle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targeta...
lmilcin 8y ago
I appreciate your completely logical question. The short answer is: for the same reason somebody would want to shoot ICBMs at enemy population centers. The longer answer as I understand it: after WWII both USA and USSR invested incredible amount of resources in bid to achieve supremacy or at least maintain parity with the other. During that race anything that achieved results was on the table and both sides did funky stuff to surprise enemy, all the time. Space race was viewed as a cover up story for advanced rocket and surveillence research. Given the amount of resources and the current situation I think it was natural for russians to think there is something else going on with Space Shuttle. We know the dimensions of Shuttle bay and its capabilities were dictated by military requirements so it definitely isn't out of question. It would certainly be completely stupid for Russians not not assume the worst because in that kind of race the one that is not prepared looses. Russians are same people as Americans. They have proven many times they are unwilling to attack USA, thanks to the balance of power and multitude of people who prevailed in difficult situations. That doesn't mean they will not use any dirty trick to get advantage but using dirty tricks in this game is a legitimate way to maintain parity which is the objective of the game.
MichaelMoser123 8y ago
# what kind of an idiot would give a go ahead for a strike like this In theory there is the possibility of a decapitation strike - destroy the he command and control centers so that they can't retaliate. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decapitation_strike https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decapitation_strike
- Tsubasachan 8y ago
  The Soviets knew that theory. They had mobile launchers all across the USSR and submarines on standby. And the idea that only the president can launch nukes is false. There were contingency plans.
  - ohithereyou 8y ago
    Just wait until you hear about Wing Attack Plan R and the strategic mine shaft gap.
  - matthewdgreen 8y ago
    As I understand it, the Soviets had mobile contingency plans, but they were also afraid of delegating launch capability to the field -- for the very pragmatic reason that a rival power center (e.g., a portion of the military) could rebel and exploit it. This put a lot of pressure on central leadership to respond to possible missile warnings rapidly, since a decapitation strike could actually succeed. Allegedly the answer was Perimeter (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand), which allowed delegation with a bunch of technical safeguards added.
darkpuma 8y ago
I can't recall the source during the moment, but I read that during the cold war it was decided that targeting major population centers was more ethical than targeting nuke-capable military installations. This is counter-intuitive until you consider that population centers are worthless targets if you're planning on launching a decapitating first strike, therefore targeting major population centers signals to the opponent that you are poised for a retaliation strike, not a first strike. This is more ethical because it makes a nuclear war less likely to occur.
- lmilcin 8y ago
  I like you pointed it out. Cold War has its own, counter-intuitive logic. It is governed by game theory. If war is bad then why US invests so much in war machine? Well, probably because investing nothing is historically bad way of maintaining peace. You are just inviting a bully to come and take your toys. Looking from this point of view isn't it strange that so many people treat Russia as villanous because it invests so much in their military (or it has been investing)? I really wonder why people think it is ok for US to militarize itself but for USSR or Russia to do that it is somehow bad. I, of course, intentionally omit what the country is doing with its power, it is one thing to have military and the other thing what are you using it for. Now, if US sends its troops abroad to subject some country, is it so difficult to think that USSR may feel threathened? If the way to keep peace is to keep parity and one party is trying to upset the parity the other has no other choice than to respond. This game has many paradoxes and I feel people have not enough willingness to look at some geo-political events through the lens of a longer game. We may say we want to bring democracy to Venezuela but what Russia is seeing is their power slipping. Right now they have precious little friendly land close to mainland US and they have no prospects of gainging more. At the same time, US is expanding NATO with more and more countries close to Russia border. Why is it so difficult to figure out this makes them very uneasy? Wouldn't some kind of response be expected? Why would US be surprised by it? Up until now the game was to keep parity and now the parity is slowly eroding away. This absolutely must cause a response from Russia because the theory says they have to fill the void some way. Electronic warfare? Hacking? Meddling in elections? Each side wants, understandabl, to mobilize its population in this struggle and there is no better way than to paint the enemy as a villain. I just wish we keep healthy amount of population on all sides capable of seing through cheap propaganda.
pulisse 8y ago
> I apologise in advance for the naivety and the insensitivity but what kind of an idiot would give a go ahead for a strike like this knowing that an unprovoked strike on a major civilian population center in Russia will almost assuredly lead to a response from multiple Russian ICBM locations that we keep worrying about the North Koreans. One of the early applications of game theory was to develop your point into a strategic doctrine[1]: If there are two adversaries with the capacity to annihilate each other and with mutual knowledge of each other's capacities, then not initiating conflict is a stable equilibrium. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction
dspillett 8y ago
> If there was a fleet of a dozen or more space shuttles either "permanently" in the air or ready to fly at a moment's notice While this was never achieved in practise, not even close, regular and possibly short notice flights were part of the reusable shuttle's design intentions. > but one space shuttle can't just dip, deliver a payload, climb up to rinse and repeat on five or more cities, can it? I doubt it, but all that is needed for the enemy to be intimidated is that they think it might be possible. The shuttle couldn't dip in and out of atmosphere even once, there wasn't the fuel on-board to allow aborting re-entry and landing. It could have dropped once though and hit (or at least aimed for) at least one target. Finding a safe landing zone ("safe" both in in terms of the ability of the craft to survive and the ability to receive the craft and its crew) would be difficult after that) could be quite a challenge, but that doesn't rule out s desperation attack or even a suicide attack.

by mcny 8y ago

kijin 8y ago

A modern ICBM is able to deliver payloads to multiple targets at the same time. The technology is called MIRV [1], and U.S. has had it since the early 70s. Since a space shuttle has a much larger payload than an ICBM and is also much more maneuverable, the Soviets probably couldn't exclude the possibility that it can deliver enough payloads to wipe off several cities and/or military bases in a single pass. They were already having trouble developing effective countermeasures to MIRV; a shuttle would have been a nightmare. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targetable_reentry_vehicle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targeta...

lmilcin 8y ago

I appreciate your completely logical question. The short answer is: for the same reason somebody would want to shoot ICBMs at enemy population centers. The longer answer as I understand it: after WWII both USA and USSR invested incredible amount of resources in bid to achieve supremacy or at least maintain parity with the other. During that race anything that achieved results was on the table and both sides did funky stuff to surprise enemy, all the time. Space race was viewed as a cover up story for advanced rocket and surveillence research. Given the amount of resources and the current situation I think it was natural for russians to think there is something else going on with Space Shuttle. We know the dimensions of Shuttle bay and its capabilities were dictated by military requirements so it definitely isn't out of question. It would certainly be completely stupid for Russians not not assume the worst because in that kind of race the one that is not prepared looses. Russians are same people as Americans. They have proven many times they are unwilling to attack USA, thanks to the balance of power and multitude of people who prevailed in difficult situations. That doesn't mean they will not use any dirty trick to get advantage but using dirty tricks in this game is a legitimate way to maintain parity which is the objective of the game.

MichaelMoser123 8y ago

# what kind of an idiot would give a go ahead for a strike like this In theory there is the possibility of a decapitation strike - destroy the he command and control centers so that they can't retaliate. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decapitation_strike https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decapitation_strike

Tsubasachan 8y ago
The Soviets knew that theory. They had mobile launchers all across the USSR and submarines on standby. And the idea that only the president can launch nukes is false. There were contingency plans.
- ohithereyou 8y ago
  Just wait until you hear about Wing Attack Plan R and the strategic mine shaft gap.
- matthewdgreen 8y ago
  As I understand it, the Soviets had mobile contingency plans, but they were also afraid of delegating launch capability to the field -- for the very pragmatic reason that a rival power center (e.g., a portion of the military) could rebel and exploit it. This put a lot of pressure on central leadership to respond to possible missile warnings rapidly, since a decapitation strike could actually succeed. Allegedly the answer was Perimeter (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand), which allowed delegation with a bunch of technical safeguards added.

darkpuma 8y ago

I can't recall the source during the moment, but I read that during the cold war it was decided that targeting major population centers was more ethical than targeting nuke-capable military installations. This is counter-intuitive until you consider that population centers are worthless targets if you're planning on launching a decapitating first strike, therefore targeting major population centers signals to the opponent that you are poised for a retaliation strike, not a first strike. This is more ethical because it makes a nuclear war less likely to occur.

lmilcin 8y ago
I like you pointed it out. Cold War has its own, counter-intuitive logic. It is governed by game theory. If war is bad then why US invests so much in war machine? Well, probably because investing nothing is historically bad way of maintaining peace. You are just inviting a bully to come and take your toys. Looking from this point of view isn't it strange that so many people treat Russia as villanous because it invests so much in their military (or it has been investing)? I really wonder why people think it is ok for US to militarize itself but for USSR or Russia to do that it is somehow bad. I, of course, intentionally omit what the country is doing with its power, it is one thing to have military and the other thing what are you using it for. Now, if US sends its troops abroad to subject some country, is it so difficult to think that USSR may feel threathened? If the way to keep peace is to keep parity and one party is trying to upset the parity the other has no other choice than to respond. This game has many paradoxes and I feel people have not enough willingness to look at some geo-political events through the lens of a longer game. We may say we want to bring democracy to Venezuela but what Russia is seeing is their power slipping. Right now they have precious little friendly land close to mainland US and they have no prospects of gainging more. At the same time, US is expanding NATO with more and more countries close to Russia border. Why is it so difficult to figure out this makes them very uneasy? Wouldn't some kind of response be expected? Why would US be surprised by it? Up until now the game was to keep parity and now the parity is slowly eroding away. This absolutely must cause a response from Russia because the theory says they have to fill the void some way. Electronic warfare? Hacking? Meddling in elections? Each side wants, understandabl, to mobilize its population in this struggle and there is no better way than to paint the enemy as a villain. I just wish we keep healthy amount of population on all sides capable of seing through cheap propaganda.

pulisse 8y ago

> I apologise in advance for the naivety and the insensitivity but what kind of an idiot would give a go ahead for a strike like this knowing that an unprovoked strike on a major civilian population center in Russia will almost assuredly lead to a response from multiple Russian ICBM locations that we keep worrying about the North Koreans. One of the early applications of game theory was to develop your point into a strategic doctrine[1]: If there are two adversaries with the capacity to annihilate each other and with mutual knowledge of each other's capacities, then not initiating conflict is a stable equilibrium. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction

dspillett 8y ago

> If there was a fleet of a dozen or more space shuttles either "permanently" in the air or ready to fly at a moment's notice While this was never achieved in practise, not even close, regular and possibly short notice flights were part of the reusable shuttle's design intentions. > but one space shuttle can't just dip, deliver a payload, climb up to rinse and repeat on five or more cities, can it? I doubt it, but all that is needed for the enemy to be intimidated is that they think it might be possible. The shuttle couldn't dip in and out of atmosphere even once, there wasn't the fuel on-board to allow aborting re-entry and landing. It could have dropped once though and hit (or at least aimed for) at least one target. Finding a safe landing zone ("safe" both in in terms of the ability of the craft to survive and the ability to receive the craft and its crew) would be difficult after that) could be quite a challenge, but that doesn't rule out s desperation attack or even a suicide attack.