3 ms·

Well you can probably look at most of the two U.S. bases right on Google Maps. It's certainly defended against conceivable land attack but as mentioned in the o

by mpyne 13y ago

Well you can probably look at most of the two U.S. bases right on Google Maps. It's certainly defended against conceivable land attack but as mentioned in the other comment, there's not a lot you can do to make it invulnerable to nuclear strikes.

malandrew 13y ago
Norad is protected against a 30 megaton nuclear explosion. What level of protection do you need to be protected from the greatest conceivable explosion today? Do any facilities in the world meet the criteria for protection from a direct detonation of this magnitude? If not, what is the most fortified installation in the world and how close does it get to being protected from any conceivable attack today?
- hga 13y ago
  No, not at all. In fact, we supplemented ground bunkers with airborne command and control systems at the same time we started building the Cheyenne Mountain complex. It's axiomatic that you don't place all your eggs in one basket if you care very much about survival, as we used to. E.g. sometime around 1970 I think we judged the Soviets would be able to land very powerful nukes with sufficient simultaneity at both of Cheyenne Mountain's exterior entrances, negating the passive defense of the blast door entrance. Sub pens would be a much more difficult problem; note also the relative incompressiblity of water compared to air. If you're really really serious about this sort of thing, you need a defense in depth of active defenses. For deterrence it doesn't matter if all or even any of them work in practice, just that the perception that your strikes will very possibly fail. And/or if you maintain enough targets, enough systems, with interlocking constraints making a time-on-target for all of them well neigh impossible, well, that's why we still maintain the triad.
  - rdl 13y ago
    In reality there's also a lot of politics (both congressional districts/states, and inter-service rivalry) to the Triad. Especially for the Army's piece (tactical weapons), which I think we've mostly phased out, and IMO manned bombers for the most part.
    - hga 13y ago
      While by definition you're partly correct, the triad itself, which never had an Army competent, is carefully designed to make sure of significant serious retaliatory return. Bombers are critically important because you can launch them in all sorts of circumstances including ones short of war without their necessarily even being able to have their warheads go boom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_action_link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_action_link). They're also obviously not vulnerable to ABM systems except the dual use ones. Or various gambits that make the space though which ballistic missiles have to travel hostile, e.g. zero intelligence "gravel". When the stakes are survival, redundancy is your friend.

by mpyne 13y ago

malandrew 13y ago

Norad is protected against a 30 megaton nuclear explosion. What level of protection do you need to be protected from the greatest conceivable explosion today? Do any facilities in the world meet the criteria for protection from a direct detonation of this magnitude? If not, what is the most fortified installation in the world and how close does it get to being protected from any conceivable attack today?

hga 13y ago
No, not at all. In fact, we supplemented ground bunkers with airborne command and control systems at the same time we started building the Cheyenne Mountain complex. It's axiomatic that you don't place all your eggs in one basket if you care very much about survival, as we used to. E.g. sometime around 1970 I think we judged the Soviets would be able to land very powerful nukes with sufficient simultaneity at both of Cheyenne Mountain's exterior entrances, negating the passive defense of the blast door entrance. Sub pens would be a much more difficult problem; note also the relative incompressiblity of water compared to air. If you're really really serious about this sort of thing, you need a defense in depth of active defenses. For deterrence it doesn't matter if all or even any of them work in practice, just that the perception that your strikes will very possibly fail. And/or if you maintain enough targets, enough systems, with interlocking constraints making a time-on-target for all of them well neigh impossible, well, that's why we still maintain the triad.
- rdl 13y ago
  In reality there's also a lot of politics (both congressional districts/states, and inter-service rivalry) to the Triad. Especially for the Army's piece (tactical weapons), which I think we've mostly phased out, and IMO manned bombers for the most part.
  - hga 13y ago
    While by definition you're partly correct, the triad itself, which never had an Army competent, is carefully designed to make sure of significant serious retaliatory return. Bombers are critically important because you can launch them in all sorts of circumstances including ones short of war without their necessarily even being able to have their warheads go boom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_action_link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_action_link). They're also obviously not vulnerable to ABM systems except the dual use ones. Or various gambits that make the space though which ballistic missiles have to travel hostile, e.g. zero intelligence "gravel". When the stakes are survival, redundancy is your friend.