Air Force Eyes Return of Mobile Nuclear Missiles
By Bob Brewin
of Nextgov.com
WASHINGTON
-- The Air Force has dusted off plans more than two decades old to
place fixed nuclear missiles on rail cars or massive road vehicles to
protect them from a surprise attack.
The service also wants to
explore alternatives to traditional missiles to carry nuclear warheads,
which could include hypersonic aircraft capable of crossing the Atlantic
Ocean in an hour, said Phillip Coyle of the Center for Arms Control and
Nonproliferation, a former associate director for national security and
international affairs in the Obama administration’s Office of Science
and Technology Policy.
On Monday, the Air Force Nuclear Weapons
Center at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M., kicked off a study on
modernizing or replacing its current fleet of Minuteman 3 nuclear
missiles housed in underground silos in Montana, North Dakota and
Wyoming. The work includes potential upgrades to the command and control
system.
The center said it wants industry and academic help in
analyzing the future of its Minuteman 3 nuclear missiles. The options
include no upgrades, incremental fixes, new missiles stored in silos,
and new mobile or tunnel-based systems.
In 1984, the Air Force
began developing a small intercontinental ballistic missile called the
“Midgetman,” which was carried on a massive, blast-resistant 200,000-lb.
wheeled vehicle. The project was canceled in 1992 after the Cold War
ended.
In the late 1980s, the Air Force also hatched a plan to
place 50 missiles formerly stored in silos on rail cars deployed to
seven states. This project was canceled in 1991 after the Air Force
shifted funding to nuclear bombers.
In September 2011, the Center
for Strategic and International Studies reported that China had
developed a mobile missile system, the same month Russia indicated it
planned to revive its rail car based missile program, which began in
1983 but was scrapped in 2006.
Coyle said he was concerned that
proliferation of mobile missile systems could lead to another arms race.
“The Air Force will need to be careful that they don't stir up a
hornets nest with proposals for mobile basing or advanced concepts other
than the traditional booster and re-entry vehicle. The former could
cause Russia or China to redouble their efforts on mobile basing of
ICBMs, set off a new kind of arms race, and weaken U.S. defenses,” Coyle
said.
He added that if the Air Force decides to pursue
hypersonic aircraft to deliver nuclear warheads, this could confuse
nuclear-armed countries such as Russia, which would not be able to
determine if supersonic aircraft traveling at 4,000 miles per hour were
carrying conventional or nuclear warheads, and potentially react with a
nuclear strike.
1 comment:
"Midget Man" canceled at the end of the cold war because of no identifiable threat to fixed-land or sea based missiles. What has changed? Just the in-command military officer who is too young to know about the 20-year-old history of his supposed field of expertise, and doesn't believe that history matters.
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