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What we have recently seen from China is actually just a missile sponge of large silo fields of ICBMs being built so that even if America does strike first, Chi

What we have recently seen from China is actually just a missile sponge of large silo fields of ICBMs being built so that even if America does strike first, China still has a nuclear deterrent in the form of the missiles not wiped out. It's hard to take out a lot of targets even if they are relatively soft. https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1212970/a-second-silo-field/ https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1212970/a-second-sil...

krunck 4y ago
Regan proposed this in the 80s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dense_Pack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dense_Pack
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  Wasn't "dense pack" the scaled version? The previous concept was to just build huge fields of silos that were mostly empty I thought.
openasocket 4y ago
There are a variety of different approaches to counter the ABM and ragged second strike scenario, China is investing in several. * Just build more nukes. Adding more warheads, especially ground-launched ones, is cheaper than adding more interceptors to the ABM shield, so it's always a losing game. Thankfully, no one seems to be pursuing this route, since that is massively destabilizing. * Make it harder to take out all of your missiles in a first strike. Your link is an excellent example of this. Building additional silos is even cheaper than building additional missiles, and then you can play a shell game where you don't know which silo houses a missile and which does not so you have to strike at them all. There are other basing options available, like road-mobile launchers, which China and Russia have both invested in, though this is easier with shorter range ballistic missiles. And of course there are ballistic missile submarines, which give most survivable second-strike capability, but are much more expensive to operate. * Use a delivery system that is harder to intercept, which I mentioned before. China has tested using both hypersonic glide vehicles and fractional orbital bombardment, in fact both at the same time (https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1213655/a-fractional-orbital-bombardment-system-with-a-hypersonic-glide-vehicle/ https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1213655/a-fractional... ).
- chipsa 4y ago
  > Adding more warheads, especially ground-launched ones, is cheaper than adding more interceptors to the ABM shield Assumes facts not in evidence. An accidental ICBM launch is catastrophic. An accidental ABM launch is merely expensive. This drives anything associated with ICBMs to a much higher cost, just to assure that it will launch when commanded, and won't launch when not commanded. Interceptors are generally smaller (due to the smaller kill vehicle), which also helps with the cost. GBI, last I looked, was about $90M per missile. GBSD is currently looking at about $660M per missile ($264B for 400 missiles). This doesn't actually compare how much a Russian ICBM would cost, but that's irrelevant, in a sense, since they wouldn't be paying the same for an ABM interceptor either. > hypersonic glide vehicles and fractional orbital bombardment These both have severe penalties to the actual number of warheads launched on a given missile. Now instead of having 6 missiles, for example, to hit a given set of targets, you might need 18 missiles. Which drives up the cost of ICBM system. Both of them can also be defended against (GBI can't manage against FOB with the current single defense site, but a potential expansion could bring the radars and launchers required to be able to defend against a southern approach). Hypersonics are very fast in the atmosphere, which helps limit their radar visibility, but the same thing makes it impossible to deploy effective decoys, and makes them extremely bright in IR, which is something we already look at from space. I don't think we have anything that can currently do it, but it's definitely on the list of things we're looking at.
  - openasocket 4y ago
    Your math is a little off on the prices. Recall that the GBSD will release 10-12 MIRVs, which means the ABM shield has to intercept 10-12 targets, not one, for every ICBM. And standard operating procedure is to fire 4 interceptors at each target to ensure a hit. That means for each GBSD we need 40 interceptors, making it over 5 times more expensive to intercept a GBSD than the GBSD itself. Of course, just comparing missile costs isn't the best, they do not operate on their own. Each interceptor needs a silo, ground crew, intercept radars, etc. ICBMs need silos and ground crews also. The cost to operate an ICBM or ABM shield over its lifetime will dominate the total costs compared to the initial missile price.
dirtyid 4y ago
In PRC's case, it's also just a generic nuclear build up because the hereto alleged ~300 nukes was minimal (really poverty) deterrance posture that became no longer tenable now that war with US is possible. Other parts of triad is being worked on as well. Apart from geopolitics, what drove PRC nuke buildup was US modernizing warheads for better detonation timing so less missiles needed for hardened targets = same controlled stockpile can strike 2-3x more targets. It wasn't better missile defense, but better missile offense. I'd argue better missile defense drive adversaries to develop better missiles tech which are dual use and will enhance their conventional capabilities and perhaps create more vunerabilities overall.

krunck 4y ago

Regan proposed this in the 80s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dense_Pack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dense_Pack

sidewndr46 4y ago
Wasn't "dense pack" the scaled version? The previous concept was to just build huge fields of silos that were mostly empty I thought.

openasocket 4y ago

There are a variety of different approaches to counter the ABM and ragged second strike scenario, China is investing in several. * Just build more nukes. Adding more warheads, especially ground-launched ones, is cheaper than adding more interceptors to the ABM shield, so it's always a losing game. Thankfully, no one seems to be pursuing this route, since that is massively destabilizing. * Make it harder to take out all of your missiles in a first strike. Your link is an excellent example of this. Building additional silos is even cheaper than building additional missiles, and then you can play a shell game where you don't know which silo houses a missile and which does not so you have to strike at them all. There are other basing options available, like road-mobile launchers, which China and Russia have both invested in, though this is easier with shorter range ballistic missiles. And of course there are ballistic missile submarines, which give most survivable second-strike capability, but are much more expensive to operate. * Use a delivery system that is harder to intercept, which I mentioned before. China has tested using both hypersonic glide vehicles and fractional orbital bombardment, in fact both at the same time (https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1213655/a-fractional-orbital-bombardment-system-with-a-hypersonic-glide-vehicle/ https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1213655/a-fractional... ).

chipsa 4y ago
> Adding more warheads, especially ground-launched ones, is cheaper than adding more interceptors to the ABM shield Assumes facts not in evidence. An accidental ICBM launch is catastrophic. An accidental ABM launch is merely expensive. This drives anything associated with ICBMs to a much higher cost, just to assure that it will launch when commanded, and won't launch when not commanded. Interceptors are generally smaller (due to the smaller kill vehicle), which also helps with the cost. GBI, last I looked, was about $90M per missile. GBSD is currently looking at about $660M per missile ($264B for 400 missiles). This doesn't actually compare how much a Russian ICBM would cost, but that's irrelevant, in a sense, since they wouldn't be paying the same for an ABM interceptor either. > hypersonic glide vehicles and fractional orbital bombardment These both have severe penalties to the actual number of warheads launched on a given missile. Now instead of having 6 missiles, for example, to hit a given set of targets, you might need 18 missiles. Which drives up the cost of ICBM system. Both of them can also be defended against (GBI can't manage against FOB with the current single defense site, but a potential expansion could bring the radars and launchers required to be able to defend against a southern approach). Hypersonics are very fast in the atmosphere, which helps limit their radar visibility, but the same thing makes it impossible to deploy effective decoys, and makes them extremely bright in IR, which is something we already look at from space. I don't think we have anything that can currently do it, but it's definitely on the list of things we're looking at.
- openasocket 4y ago
  Your math is a little off on the prices. Recall that the GBSD will release 10-12 MIRVs, which means the ABM shield has to intercept 10-12 targets, not one, for every ICBM. And standard operating procedure is to fire 4 interceptors at each target to ensure a hit. That means for each GBSD we need 40 interceptors, making it over 5 times more expensive to intercept a GBSD than the GBSD itself. Of course, just comparing missile costs isn't the best, they do not operate on their own. Each interceptor needs a silo, ground crew, intercept radars, etc. ICBMs need silos and ground crews also. The cost to operate an ICBM or ABM shield over its lifetime will dominate the total costs compared to the initial missile price.

dirtyid 4y ago

In PRC's case, it's also just a generic nuclear build up because the hereto alleged ~300 nukes was minimal (really poverty) deterrance posture that became no longer tenable now that war with US is possible. Other parts of triad is being worked on as well. Apart from geopolitics, what drove PRC nuke buildup was US modernizing warheads for better detonation timing so less missiles needed for hardened targets = same controlled stockpile can strike 2-3x more targets. It wasn't better missile defense, but better missile offense. I'd argue better missile defense drive adversaries to develop better missiles tech which are dual use and will enhance their conventional capabilities and perhaps create more vunerabilities overall.