Comment by KennyBlanken | Hacker News Reader

Comment by KennyBlanken | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

My point was that nuclear missile development gets a blank check and I cited the over-six-figure intertial guidance units in 80's and 90's era missiles as an example of this.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here?

Accuracy is incredibly important because you don't put a nuke somewhere to kill people; you put it there to destroy infrastructure. More specifically nuclear missile silos, and bomb shelters (well, the people inside them.)

Reducing the CEP means you can use a smaller nuclear yield to get the job done, which is preferable for a number of reasons, including politics, but also allowing for more targets in a strike.

The very latest US ICBMs are suspected of having sub-100m CEP. CEP for ICBMs is "bad" enough that it is typical for planners to figure three warheads per target, but accuracy is rumored to be getting good enough where that is no longer necessary.

> you don't put a nuke somewhere to kill people; you put it there to destroy infrastructure. More specifically nuclear missile silos, and bomb shelters (well, the people inside them.)

It depends.

"Counter-force" strikes aim to destroy the ability to respond or attack with nuclear weapons, not infrastructure per se. So that's just silos, warhead storage sites, submarines in port, airfields, etc. The US is doctrinally counter-force for about half a century. This doctrine is also reflected in technological choices: lower yields and higher precision mean lower fallout, collateral damage, and fratricide when hunting for silos, but aren't that useful for city busting.

"Counter-value" strikes are pure destruction of cities and killing of people. Russia seems to have this doctrine [1]. This is a very inflexible doctrine, because you can't credibly threaten to execute a counter-value attack on the US over things that don't seem to be worth a response in kind (like a defeat in Ukraine). It's much cheaper though.

> The very latest US ICBMs are suspected of having sub-100m CEP

Apparently the precision is good enough for photos like the one on page 23 here https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1557069

[1]: At least strategically. There is a hybrid strategy of targeting military-related infrastructure, which Russia seems to have adopted for less-than-strategic forces according to recent leaks https://www.ft.com/content/237e1e55-401d-4eeb-875b-03fe68f81... .

Reply on news.ycombinator.com