SOCWhat is that guy smoking? The F-22 program was never “suspended”. Flight testing was curtailed for a while because they were using the PW-powered YF-22, but it crash landed. But the F-22A program didn’t skip a beat, Lockheed just had to complete the first EMD prototype for flight test work to resume.
SOCWell, I think the idea behind Safeguard made sense.
First, system was placed to defend an ICBM field. Now, ICBM launch silos should in theory be unaffected by high-altitude nuclear blasts (thinking EMP effects here) as they are hardened and in most cases designed (in theory, not gonna volunteer to test it) to survive a “near miss” of a nuclear warhead. That means that if Safeguard protects that ICBM field, it can be used for a counterstrike, or retained to provide post-conflict deterrent capability.
The question then becomes whether or not the system would work in the first place. I think it would have been effective. Spartan missiles woul dhave used large-yield nuclear detonations to wipe out incoming warheads and MIRV formations in space. The stupid-quick Sprint missiles would’ve handled any leakers endoatmospherically. What you have to consider is the fact that if Russia fired, say, 1000 warheads at the USA, the system does not have to defeat 1000 warheads. All it has to do is obliterate those targeting the ICBM field. As the silos are hardened anyway and since nuclear warheads are not precision weapons, even if a few warheads do get through you’ll still have a viable ICBM force remaining. Ergo, the system would appear to be sound.
In my opinion the decision to place it around the ICBM field denotes an actual “full nuclear exchange” role for the system. Put it around Washington and you will have a lot of negative EMP effects and whatnot on the city and the key infrastructure. So in that light I think they put it in the right spot. Russia has stated that their system won’t defeat a full-scale attack on Moscow, but is perfectly capable of handling a limited strike, so I think their system was perhaps not deployed with full-scale war in mind. Perhaps that is indicative of the true thinking of the Soviet government insofar as the chances of an all-out nuclear exchange were.
Some people might want to go on a limb and believe the Safeguard system was intended to blow up warheads targeted all over the place, but this isn’t possible. If a warhead is fired at San Francisco or Seattle, for example, it most likely wasn’t going to come anywhere near the engagement footprint of Safeguard, unless it is perhaps launched from a Delta IV off the coast of Maine! So, with that in mind, I think it provides quite a bit of insight into the different employment concepts driving both the US and Soviet ABM systems. Ours was intended for all-out war, theirs wasn’t. That’s not necessarily an oversight on the part of the Russians by any means; if you read my blog I go into their actual nationwide ABM defense programs that were separate from Systems A-35 and A-135.
SOCYou’re avoiding the question.
CO2 levels began to rapidly increase in the 1950’s.
In the 1960’s mean temperatures were consistently lower than average for the ENTIRE DECADE, save one year.
If CO2 emissions are in fact related to warming, the above data would seem to not fit that model.
Then there’s the fact that temperatures in the US have yet to reach the peak they did in the 1930’s.
I’ll poke larger holes in this later tonight after I get home, it’s rather easy and fun to do.
SOCYou’re avoiding the question.
CO2 levels began to rapidly increase in the 1950’s.
In the 1960’s mean temperatures were consistently lower than average for the ENTIRE DECADE, save one year.
If CO2 emissions are in fact related to warming, the above data would seem to not fit that model.
Then there’s the fact that temperatures in the US have yet to reach the peak they did in the 1930’s.
I’ll poke larger holes in this later tonight after I get home, it’s rather easy and fun to do.
SOCThe 1972 ABM treaty restricted the USA and USSR to one ABM site each, as I recall, no..?
Check out:
http://www.missilethreat.com/missiledefensesystems/id.55/system_detail.asp
No. The 1972 treaty limited each side to two deployment areas of no more than 100 launchers each, one around an ICBM field and one to protect the nation’s capital. The 1974 ABM Protocol limited this to one site each, identifying the US complex as the Safeguard complex around Grand Forks and the Soviet complex as System A-35 around Moscow. It was specified that each side could, one time only, change the location of their ABM site (i.e. the US could’ve taken down Safeguard and deployed an ABM to protect Washington, D.C, or the USSR could’ve moved the Moscow system to defend an ICBM field like Tatischevo). The ABM Treaty of ’72 also specifically mentioned the US and Soviet extant ABM systems, giving them legal status. The widespread nature of the systems was probably why they said “two deployment areas…” and not “two ABM sites…”.
SOCFact: the warmest year on record in the US was 1934.
Fact: there was a cooling trend in the 1960’s where nearly every year save one was below average.
Fact: CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere trended sharply upward beginning in the 1950’s.
So now explain to me how CO2 in the atmosphere has created a uniform global warming, especially when the USA underwent a cooling trend at the exact same time CO2 emissions were being produced like gangbusters, and why it hasn’t been as warm as it was back in the 1930’s?
Here’s how seriously scientists have apparently been taking this, by the way:
SOCFact: the warmest year on record in the US was 1934.
Fact: there was a cooling trend in the 1960’s where nearly every year save one was below average.
Fact: CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere trended sharply upward beginning in the 1950’s.
So now explain to me how CO2 in the atmosphere has created a uniform global warming, especially when the USA underwent a cooling trend at the exact same time CO2 emissions were being produced like gangbusters, and why it hasn’t been as warm as it was back in the 1930’s?
Here’s how seriously scientists have apparently been taking this, by the way:
SOCThe Spartan/Sprint ABM system was fully legal under the ABM Treaty. It was deactivated after being operational for 24 hours due to the exorbitant operating costs associated with the network.
SOC[COLOR=red]Sheesh, enough already. Take all of this to a Eurofighter thread, or feel free to explain how debating QinetiQ’s positions regarding the EF-2000 have to do with news regarding the Rafale program.[/COLOR]
SOCSorry Mods, but I just had to continue the PAK-FA thread. :diablo:
No problem, if a thread gets closed because it hit the 20 page or 600 post limit, you guys are certainly free to start a new one.
SOCThats exactly it, there is four factors really,
1) Mach 3+ proved allot harder and more expensive than everybody expected.
2) The cold war chilled out, they call it detente or something but anyway the arms race slowed and high end projects got canned.
3) The expected Soviet Mach 3 bombers didnt exist in reality at that time to the extent that the western ones did (Avro 730 prototype was under construction when it was cancelled and of course the Valkyrie flew).
4) Everyone went low level with the improvements in missile based AD systems.
5) Interestingly though the Russians at the end of the cold war were pursuing high speed bombers, win the race to Greenland you know.;)
1. Yes and no. A gigantoid Mach 3 bomber was expensive (that being only part of why the Valkyrie was cancelled, though), but about 50 Blackbirds were produced. The problems the Blackbirds had early on during the A-12 test program were fixed without any major issues. It was more a case of “Oh, we need to put this here instead of over there” rather than “well now what, we have no idea how to get this to work”, if that makes sense. It took a little trial and error to get the engine inlet system to work right, but once they figured that out and the J-58 was flight-ready, Mach 3 became relatively routine for the Blackbird fleet.
2. In the mid 1960s? Not so much!
3. It wasn’t specifically Mach 3 bombers as it was intercontinental supersonic (around Mach 2) bombers. You are correct in stating that the threat never materialized though. The closest thing to it would’ve been the Tu-160, but that wasn’t so much a bomber as a strategic missile carrier (although a high-speed interceptor’s chances of getting to a BLACKJACK before it could fire its missiles would be an interesting line of discussion). The T-4 and the Tu-22M were conceived with blowing up aircraft carriers in mind anyway, not striking the US mainland.
4. Completely and totally irrelevant when discussing the F-12 program: it was never going to be flying over enemy territory to begin with.
5. Speaking of which I just re-read Red Storm Rising, great read 😀
they having no defence against the USA’s ICBMs either
Moscow is protected against a limited ICBM strike by the System A-135 ABM network. And they did try to develop nationwide ABM systems, check this out:
http://geimint.blogspot.com/2007/06/russian-strategic-defense-part-2-abm.html
http://geimint.blogspot.com/2007/08/sary-shagan-birthplace-of-abm.html
SOC[color=red]20 page limit hit, thread assassinated.
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=72173 [/color]
SOCMidland Counties informed me that Volume 4 – Mikoyan MiG-21 will not be published until February 2008!
Maybe they meant it won’t be published in the US until early ’08. Specialtypress.com still lists a September 2007 release date, and they get their stock from British publishers, avoiding the delay in waiting for the book to be published over here.
SOCYou’ve marked the wrong airfield at Tambov. The one to the NE is the civilian airport, the airbase with the UBL is on the SW outskirts of the city.
Huh. I marked the one that Scramble gave the coordinates for, guess they were wrong.
I’m working on an update for the russianairfields.com KMZ, by the way. They’ve got quite a few airbases omitted, while others they mention are probably little more than old WW2 airfields. Although the number of ‘dead’ airbases in the fUSSR is massive.
Make sure you let me know when you’ve got that finished, I’d like to take a look at it.
SOCI’d love to if I had one. 🙁 (I wish Airtime Publishing would print some more as there was about a dozen of them I wanted when they quit offering the back issues.)
The USAF Museum at Wright-Patterson sometimes has a bunch of back issues in the gift shop.
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