Using A Nuclear Tipped SAM against your enemy

Yes I have just read the latest British secret projects installment.;) I was under the impression that part of the idea behind Bloodhound 3 was as a tentative ABM missile?:confused:

On a side note does anybody have any more info on the RAE missile 8 ABM missile studies briefly mentioned in that book?:confused:

Chris Gibson does have that idea that Bloodhound 3 was mainly intended as an ABM, though just like his comments about the XRD 1 in the book, some of them are wrong in a lot of respects.

In the case of XRD 1, Yes a lot of problems were encountered during 1957, Ramjet flameouts were common when the missile started to maneuver and there were problems with the electronics and cabling (the original wiring insulation melted due to aerodynamic heating). Yes the Ramjet problems were fixed by reducing the G that the missile could pull and aerodynamic girds in the ramjet intakes to smooth the airflow into the combustion area (the fix came off Bomarc, which had the same problem). One item of the electronics was transistorized, that being the PRF selector unit, which was the bit that was failing all of the time, the rest of the missile’s electronics used valves. No XRD1 ever flew with a flare piloted ramjet that I know of (the flare piloted ramjets flew on the early XTV4 and 5’s (BB-1, BRJ-2’s), with the intention of a fuel piloted ramjet from the start of the program (which became the BRJ5 / Thor 100 series and was flying in the late XTV5’s).

The XRD2 airframe design was started before the problems with the XRD1 came to light, and the primary reason for the redesign of the missile was to reduce weight, the XRD 1 being based on the XTV 5.

Bloodhound 1 was never cancelled, though the original order was cut by 100 as it was always going to be got as a lead-in system for a CW missile system (which in May 1957 was going to be Thunderbird II thanks to the cancellation of Blue Envoy). Work on CW Bloodhound had been started in late 1951, due to the fact that Ferranti had picked up on all of the limitations that a pulse radar guidance system would have, though at the time the Army wanted a SAM system ASAP, and the technology to do a CW system was too far away so Ferranti started on both, with the majority of the effort on the pulse side (Red Duster was originally an Army project).

Originally Ferranti hoped to have a prototype CW Bloodhound flying by 1956, needless to say that didn’t happen, though that is why they were able to offer a CW Bloodhound in early 1958. Bloodhound 2A and 2B (as they were originally called) were offered at the same time, the 2A was the CG Nuke and the 2B was the CW conventional and they were designed to complement each other in that the 2B killed the bomber and the 2A killed the bomb. The 2B system became the Mk 2 and the 2A became the Mk 3. The Mk 2 was going to be chopped for the Thunderbird II for money reason, until the RAF complained that seeing that the Mk 3 and Mk2 used similar equipment in a lot of respects, it was pointless buying a completely different system to do the job of the Mk 2 (Solly Zuckerman wanted to save money on R+D). In the end the Mk 3 got canned because of the shortage of fissile materiel (and money).

Bloodhound 3 may have used the FPS-16 or Blue Anchor as a Target Tracker, However the Missile tracker would have been the T-83 Yellow River, as used on Bloodhound 1 with modifications. The original T83 equipment had two radar transmitter / receiver systems, a S –band system for target acquisition and an X-band on for target tracking and missile illumination. In the case of BH3, the S-band system was used for missile gathering and as a command link. While the X-band system was used for missile tracking via a coded transmissions to a transponder fitted to the missile and vice versa.

The main reason for Nuclear tipped SAM’s in the 60’s were to counter high speed, low RCS targets like long range stand off weapons (Hounddog, AS-4, Blue Steel, etc). With a head on closing speeds of Mach 5 plus, there was a good chance that results of the conventional SAM warhead detonation (Blast, Fragments or Conrod hoop) would miss the target due to the delays in fuzing causing the weapon to explode to the rear of the target (Patriot v Scud in 91, being the classic case). The Nuclear Warhead overcame this problem. In the UK, there were plans in 1958-60 to field two new weapon systems, QF169 and RO166. QF169 became Bloodhound 2 with CW SARH guidance and a conrod warhead. RO166 would have become Bloodhound 3 with command guidance and a Nuke warhead. The reason for 2 systems, Bloodhound 2 to kill the Bomber, Bloodhound 3 to kill the bomb (bomb is this case being a stand-off ASM in flight). The primary reason Bloodhound 3 got the chop was that there was not enough fissile material production in the UK to meet the demands for both defensive and offensive weapons and the offensive deterrent forces got priority.

Yes I have just read the latest British secret projects installment.;) I was under the impression that part of the idea behind Bloodhound 3 was as a tentative ABM missile?:confused:

On a side note does anybody have any more info on the RAE missile 8 ABM missile studies briefly mentioned in that book?:confused:

The main reason for Nuclear tipped SAM’s in the 60’s were to counter high speed, low RCS targets like long range stand off weapons (Hounddog, AS-4, Blue Steel, etc). With a head on closing speeds of Mach 5 plus, there was a good chance that results of the conventional SAM warhead detonation (Blast, Fragments or Conrod hoop) would miss the target due to the delays in fuzing causing the weapon to explode to the rear of the target (Patriot v Scud in 91, being the classic case). The Nuclear Warhead overcame this problem. In the UK, there were plans in 1958-60 to field two new weapon systems, QF169 and RO166. QF169 became Bloodhound 2 with CW SARH guidance and a conrod warhead. RO166 would have become Bloodhound 3 with command guidance and a Nuke warhead. The reason for 2 systems, Bloodhound 2 to kill the Bomber, Bloodhound 3 to kill the bomb (bomb is this case being a stand-off ASM in flight). The primary reason Bloodhound 3 got the chop was that there was not enough fissile material production in the UK to meet the demands for both defensive and offensive weapons and the offensive deterrent forces got priority.

The US operated the Nike Hercules / Zeus SAM in the 1950s and 1960s which had the option of being armed with a nuclear warhead for knocking out formations of Soviet bombers in the event the Cold War went hot.

The SA-5 (S-200) also had a variant with a 25 kiloton nuclear warhead if I recall correctly.

The only sensible use of such a missile (ie SA-10 with a nuke warhead) would be to down a large group of targets that are obviously not going to fly within reach of a full volley of missiles… perhaps it will be flying past or if the SAM site is running low on missiles, or perhaps if a swarm of UAVs or cruise missiles are detected out to sea heading inland.

Well back during the good old days the US and Canada had nuclear-only Bomarcs with ranges of up to 450 miles. Had they needed to be used it’s entirely likely US Bomarcs could have been going off over Canada. And of course Spartan ABMs.

I don’t think there would be as much of an uproar if a major nuclear power (US, Russia, China, France or UK) used a nuke in an ABM role against an attack on it’s territory. Really the only damage would be from EMP effects.

I can see it as a major escalation if India or Pakistan used them at all or if anyone used as an anti aircraft weapon or if Israel tipped the Arrow with it, but that’s because there’s no elbow room there and the tensions are seemingly always high.

It would also move that site up to #1 on the frag list.