UK Aircraft delivered nuclear weapon

Well maybe, yes, but at horrific expense…. Far cheaper to squirrel them away somewhere with all the attendant advantages that would / could bring. Maybe it’s just me but I don’t think even “Noo Labour” in their prime and pomp would be that short sighted……. Would they??

I might be wrong but weren’t they deep serviced in the early nineties? That’d leave them with an awful lot of stable “Shelf life”

Regards,
Frank

All scrapped – all too old and outdated compared to reasonably modern standards. Here is the last prior to dismantling.

Recycle them?

Well maybe, yes, but at horrific expense…. Far cheaper to squirrel them away somewhere with all the attendant advantages that would / could bring. Maybe it’s just me but I don’t think even “Noo Labour” in their prime and pomp would be that short sighted……. Would they??

I might be wrong but weren’t they deep serviced in the early nineties? That’d leave them with an awful lot of stable “Shelf life”

Regards,
Frank

True, but say, for instance, that a missile is lauched at Iran because Iran created a dirty bomb that it detonated in the UK. How could you be sure Russia wouldn’t be alarmed by the lauch of a trident, and retaliate by mistake?

Shall we play a game ? 😀

Recycle them?

Just my twopenneth:

I should be very surprised if the pits from we.177 aren’t held in deep, secure store somewhere – after all, what else do you do with them??

Whether there are casings / other internals available for rapid build is another matter…..

Regards,
Frank

Well I assumed that Russia can track launch position and target. Simply seeing a single launch shouldn’t be enough to set them off.

I cross my fingers, but I wouldn’t bet my life (and my country’s life) on it. People and governements tend to do very unreasonable things whenever nukes are concerned, to say nothing of the case when nukes are actually flying…

Well I assumed that Russia can track launch position and target. Simply seeing a single launch shouldn’t be enough to set them off.

I also said we’d never use trident in the sub-strategic role, so I still don’t think we need to waste money on the sub-strategic role.

I agree one can just decide to forego using nukes in a tactical manner and just use them for MAD.

Let’s be honest if we were ever considering just a tactical strike, it’d likely not be against a peer with ballistic detection technology and the ability to retaliate in kind, otherwise the situation would escalate to strategic MAD pretty quick (as everyone always knew it would if the Cold War went hot). So if we assume that to be true and we were desperate for a sub-strategic level weapon for someone below a peer level opponent we could still use trident since they are unlikely to be able to detect and respond.

True, but say, for instance, that a missile is lauched at Iran because Iran created a dirty bomb that it detonated in the UK. How could you be sure Russia wouldn’t be alarmed by the lauch of a trident, and retaliate by mistake?

But again, I don’t think we’d ever use nukes for anything but MAD, so we don’t need to waste money we don’t have. In a perfect world we wouldn’t need any nukes, in a slightly less perfect world we’d have more money for defence and could afford to waste money on an air launched missile and launch system, but we don’t, so we can settle for what we have now.

Using nukes only for MAD is fine. I was just making the point that strategic assets can’t be turned into tactical assets that easily for political reasons.

Nic

If a trident is launched at a foe, you can be sure the foe won’t react as if it knew it as “just” a tactical level warhead strike; such a launch would most probably trigger a reprisal of strategic magnitude.

So there needs to be air launched nukes for that reason alone. To avoid the target to detect a launch of strategic missiles and to react in kind.

Nic

I also said we’d never use trident in the sub-strategic role, so I still don’t think we need to waste money on the sub-strategic role.

Let’s be honest if we were ever considering just a tactical strike, it’d likely not be against a peer with ballistic detection technology and the ability to retaliate in kind, otherwise the situation would escalate to strategic MAD pretty quick (as everyone always knew it would if the Cold War went hot). So if we assume that to be true and we were desperate for a sub-strategic level weapon for someone below a peer level opponent we could still use trident since they are unlikely to be able to detect and respond.

But again, I don’t think we’d ever use nukes for anything but MAD, so we don’t need to waste money we don’t have. In a perfect world we wouldn’t need any nukes, in a slightly less perfect world we’d have more money for defence and could afford to waste money on an air launched missile and launch system, but we don’t, so we can settle for what we have now.

And Trident isn’t all or nothing. It can have as little as one warhead placed, with the rest being decoys, with the warhead of variable yield right down to tactical levels. I just can’t see it ever being used in a sub-strategic role.

If a trident is launched at a foe, you can be sure the foe won’t react as if it knew it as “just” a tactical level warhead strike; such a launch would most probably trigger a reprisal of strategic magnitude.

So there needs to be air launched nukes for that reason alone. To avoid the target to detect a launch of strategic missiles and to react in kind.

Nic

I don’t recall taking part in that survey but I’d certainly be willing for a small one to be used.

Can i also sign the petition but i wouldnt want it to harm devina, the better half would kill me if she found out i signed such a thing..

i’ve been wondering about this too.

it seems likely that the Royal Navy is going to have to trade some of its nuclear capability to keep the two carriers, and this made me think airlaunched and tactical for the deterrent.

But i now see its not much of a deterrent…

I just found a very detailed and interesting site on UK nuclear weapons? It has lots of rare pictures as well.
http://nuclear-weapons.info/vw.htm

Sea harrier FRS1 with WE177 and 2 (sidewinders?)

Wasp helicopter with WE177A Training round. I didn’t even know the wasp could carry this

Sea Vixen releasing a WE177.

Tornado dropping WE177. This would be a great picture in colour.

There are load more pictures at the bottom of page.

Just to add to what Jonesey said, one of the great advantages of Trident is the missiles range, it puts the carrying submarine further away from its targets therefore making it harder to find- it was a major issue for the Soviets in the late eighties.

I would have thought ASMP, my hypothetical meteor (Mach 4) or a custom mach 4/5 missile in salvo would still be fairly tricky to take out.

Tricky to take out if you dont have the right countering systems. If you have twenty batteries of the latest Russian S-300 variant and look-down radar coverage over the target though its going to be a tall order to get much through. Such a defence can be defeated, of course, but thats usually accomplished by large scale saturation efforts againt one point in the network – something that we wont be able to do with nuclear ordnance!.

What about cheaper subs carrying only 4 tridents in the sail (i read this mooted somewhere at some stage) or a land based installation (cue one hell of a bun fight over where to site them) as the ultimate back-up, with the airlauched systems for more ‘tactical’ or ‘back-up’ uses?

The number of missiles isnt really what costs a lot about submarines. Its the size of the missiles and the need for the submarine to be very advanced in accoustic ‘stealth’ terms. An SSBN is useless if its easily located and tracked by the opposition, it therefore must be at the very forefront of technology to defeat any opponent (or friends!) ability to find it. If you have spent the money on building big enough to fit SLBM’s in and getting the required technology in the hull limiting it to just a few missiles is nuts. Especially when there are targets that have ABM defences that may require more than 4 missiles worth of RV’s to breach.

There may be mileage in a new ‘small SLBM’ or perhaps an aeroballistic weapon like the US RATTLRS if the range can be pushed up a bit. Such a weapon could be fitted to a modified SSN saving a whole sum of money on SSBN development. In concert with sufficient land-based weapons to saturate a defended target that would be a likely practical solution. Problem is that developing the ‘small-ICBM’ would cost as would the land-based missiles. Then we have the issue, as you observe, of where to site land-based strategic-ICBM’s. Given the SNP’s horror at the bombers sat at Faslane you can imagine the reaction if we started drilling big holes in the Highlands!!.

Point taken.

I would have thought ASMP, my hypothetical meteor (Mach 4) or a custom mach 4/5 missile in salvo would still be fairly tricky to take out.

What about cheaper subs carrying only 4 tridents in the sail (i read this mooted somewhere at some stage) or a land based installation (cue one hell of a bun fight over where to site them) as the ultimate back-up, with the airlauched systems for more ‘tactical’ or ‘back-up’ uses?

As you say – still a big bang – perhaps more in keeping with any possible usage of the weapon.

I do agree with that…which is my biggest driver for thinking its a bad idea. Do we really want the powers that be having an inkling that they have ‘easy-use’ nukes close at hand!.

Are nuclear capable missiles allowed to be exported? Is there not something in a treaty – perhaps only to non-nuke nations. How big is an ASMP relative to storm shadow, what is its range.

No treaty restrictions apply. You cant proliferate to a current nuclear capable state!. ASMP and Stormshadow are about the same length, but, ASMP is slimmer and lighter. Range is listed at 80km-300km dependent upon launch profile – the difference being the flight performance. Stormshadow is subsonic while ASMP is listed as M2-3. Against land targets minimising the window of engagement for countering air-defence systems will be the key factor in getting the warhead on target.

I would have thought a proliferation of such air launched missiles on the carriers and on land would be a good deterrent as it would be difficult to take them all out in one go. Possible a few nuke tipped tomahawks carried by an expanded fleet of Astutes.

Deterrence is based on the assuredness of getting a warhead to target. No matter what the enemy does, within reasoned limit, nothing will stop those targets being obliterated so finding alternate courses of action, to force, becomes the necessity.

ASMP’s and nuclear-tipped cruise missiles are emminently interceptable therefore they offer no real deterrence factor. An opponent just has to ring his most sensitive sites with double-digit SAM batteries and airborne radar to render ‘our’ nuclear strike capability impotent. Therefore no significant threat exists and the limits on the target states actions are removed. Deterrence fails and we need then to, expensively, build up a conventional force to offset potential aggression like-for-like.

The only assured way, with our current technology, to get a nuclear warhead onto a target, anywhere in the world, is with ICBM re-entry vehicles and in sufficient number to saturate ABM defences where they exist. The side benefit to that is that, as ICBM’s come with bucketfulls of range, we dont need many of them or many launch platforms. A system with lesser-range needs more platforms deployed more of the time and so, consequently, the ‘cheaper missile’ could very simply be a more expensive solution!.

As you say – still a big bang – perhaps more in keeping with any possible usage of the weapon.

Are nuclear capable missiles allowed to be exported? Is there not something in a treaty – perhaps only to non-nuke nations.

How big is an ASMP relative to storm shadow, what is its range.

I would have thought a proliferation of such air launched missiles on the carriers and on land would be a good deterrent as it would be difficult to take them all out in one go. Possible a few nuke tipped tomahawks carried by an expanded fleet of Astutes.

Apparently the big problem is being able to guarantee hitting north korea if required. I assume trident can do this from relatively close to the UK (over the north pole I assume) – a tomahawk based solution would necessitate patrol areas in the pacific. The tomahawk solution should be cheaper – perhaps more boats would be available for multiple patrols.

Problem with that is the 7″ diameter of the missile. Same problem the US had with their 155mm nuke arty shell – the supercritical mass achieveable is quite small. You would be looking at a yield in the tenths of a kiloton at best.

Still a rather large bang naturally, but, for the purposes usually perceived for such weapons its on the low end of useful.

Better bet would probably be a straight off-the-shelf buy of a few dozen ASMP missile airframes off the French and fit our own warheads to them. Mating them up with the GR4 force wouldnt be a dramatic proposition either!.

i was not suggesting a nuke warhead be fitted to meteor for A-A use. It just happens to be a fast, light and easily carried missile – unlike Storm shadow. It would fit on Typhoons missile recesses and the F35s weapon bays, allowing the Phoon for example to carry 2 nukes, 2 AAms, 2 asraams and fuel tanks but still supercriuse.

Perhaps less solid propellant could be carried to allow for more warhead – 50miles would still give a reasonable stand-off – certainly better than freefall.