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Yes, but non-peer threats like North Korea are a growing concern. I've seen powerpoint slides about GMD / Aegis / THAAD and press releases about successful tes

Yes, but non-peer threats like North Korea are a growing concern. I've seen powerpoint slides about GMD / Aegis / THAAD and press releases about successful tests. I'd imagine that's the threat profile they hope to cover and I imagine they have less internet hype than SPRINT simply because the good videos are all still classified.

wat10000 2y ago
GMD is meant to counter threats like North Korea. There aren’t enough interceptors to stop a strike even from China, but more than enough to stop an attack by NK.
- maxglute 2y ago
  >more than enough to stop an attack by NK. Maybe a few years ago. Recent estimates for NK is ~40 fissile material for warheads and similar number of icbms, which incidentally is around how many gmd interceptors US has. Ideally need >1 interceptor for each incoming, so matter of NK dud rates.
- mandevil 2y ago
  You are out of date. North Korea currently deploys enough warheads to exhaust the current GMD system. The problem is that adding another warhead (MRV or MIRV) is much much cheaper than building a whole new interceptor (and adding a decoy is cheaper still). The Hwangsung-17 almost certainly has MIRV capability (the Hwangsung-15 can put a single nuclear weapon anywhere in the United States, the only reason to go bigger is to MIRV it). The North Koreans put 12 of them in a recent parade, so that's at least 36 warheads, plus however many Hwangsung-15's they built. And unless you are doing boost phase interception (like the ABL, which was ultimately canceled do to being too vulnerable) it will just always be easier to put 3 warheads on a missile than you can build three new interceptors (technically, given the way GMD works, you ought to build 12 new interceptors- the plan with GMD is to launch four interceptors per target, so our current 44 interceptors provides protection against 11 targets total). The defenders are breaking windows with guineas, which just isn't sustainable unless you have an absolutely enormous economic advantage over the adversary. And even then North Korea has already built enough to overmatch the existing US missile defense systems. At 4 warheads per Hwangsung-17, the ones in the parade alone exhaust the GMD system even if they fire 1 interceptor per target instead of 4. Which I suspect was why the North Koreans paraded exactly that many missile launchers in 2023. This basic bit of economics is why Richard Nixon signed the ABM Treaty in the first place. Idiots who thought that no one would ever be as smart as they were pulled the US out, and the result has been the utter destruction of most of our arms control treaties for negative benefit.

wat10000 2y ago

GMD is meant to counter threats like North Korea. There aren’t enough interceptors to stop a strike even from China, but more than enough to stop an attack by NK.

maxglute 2y ago
>more than enough to stop an attack by NK. Maybe a few years ago. Recent estimates for NK is ~40 fissile material for warheads and similar number of icbms, which incidentally is around how many gmd interceptors US has. Ideally need >1 interceptor for each incoming, so matter of NK dud rates.
mandevil 2y ago
You are out of date. North Korea currently deploys enough warheads to exhaust the current GMD system. The problem is that adding another warhead (MRV or MIRV) is much much cheaper than building a whole new interceptor (and adding a decoy is cheaper still). The Hwangsung-17 almost certainly has MIRV capability (the Hwangsung-15 can put a single nuclear weapon anywhere in the United States, the only reason to go bigger is to MIRV it). The North Koreans put 12 of them in a recent parade, so that's at least 36 warheads, plus however many Hwangsung-15's they built. And unless you are doing boost phase interception (like the ABL, which was ultimately canceled do to being too vulnerable) it will just always be easier to put 3 warheads on a missile than you can build three new interceptors (technically, given the way GMD works, you ought to build 12 new interceptors- the plan with GMD is to launch four interceptors per target, so our current 44 interceptors provides protection against 11 targets total). The defenders are breaking windows with guineas, which just isn't sustainable unless you have an absolutely enormous economic advantage over the adversary. And even then North Korea has already built enough to overmatch the existing US missile defense systems. At 4 warheads per Hwangsung-17, the ones in the parade alone exhaust the GMD system even if they fire 1 interceptor per target instead of 4. Which I suspect was why the North Koreans paraded exactly that many missile launchers in 2023. This basic bit of economics is why Richard Nixon signed the ABM Treaty in the first place. Idiots who thought that no one would ever be as smart as they were pulled the US out, and the result has been the utter destruction of most of our arms control treaties for negative benefit.