Is there ushc a thing as acceptable losses in a nuclear war?

[MKSheppard]

There's an old expression in the nuclear strategy business that covers just this situation "one flies, they all fly".

Stuart, isn't that because of the way forces worldwide are currently structured, with a heavy emphasis on non-recallable, horribly vunerable strategic strike systems such as ballistic missiles in silos?

Because you can't recall the missiles in flight, and because they can't move like a carrier can at 30 knots, a bomber at 550 MPH, or a road mobile ICBM at 30 MPH; they are horribly vunerable to a decapicating first strike.

(Even mobile ICBMs on rail cars or heavy trucks like TOPOL-M are still pretty crippingly vunerable because you can't widely disperse them amongst your national rail/road network in times of peace, due to the requirements of security.)

So there's a heavy emphasis on "using" the vunerable weapons before they're destroyed, driving the escalatory chain.

Have you run any exercises in which silo based missiles were removed from the equation in favor of more bombers and SLBMs, and what were the results?

[Starglider]

Would a first strike be really that effective in destroying enemy retaliatory capability? I have always thought that early warning radars and space based IR sensors are meant to prevent that from happening. Suppose nation A launches first strike against nation B. Nation B detects missile launches and launches its own missiles on counterattack before enemy missiles hit and destroys their missiles on the ground resulting in MAD.

That's all very well for the US and Russia, facing each other over intercontinental distances with extensive space-based assets backed up by professional analysts and other intel sources. However nuclear weapons have been steadily proliferating to smaller and smaller states. I imagine Pakistan is rather less confident about getting its fixed-site missiles off before an Indian first-strike hits, but then India probably doesn't have the ability to track Pakistan's mobile launchers.

[phongn]

Would a first strike be really that effective in destroying enemy retaliatory capability? I have always thought that early warning radars and space based IR sensors are meant to prevent that from happening. Suppose nation A launches first strike against nation B. Nation B detects missile launches and launches its own missiles on counterattack before enemy missiles hit and destroys their missiles on the ground resulting in MAD.

From what I've gathered from Stuart, the established nuclear powers tend not to do launch-on-warning because of the possibility that their early-warning sensors are malfunctioning. Launch-on-confirmation means that systems that cannot by recalled or aborted (say, ICBMs and SLBMs) have to be able to survive the initial wave of hits - which may take out some proportion of missile silos and the command-and-control facilities needed to send launch orders to the SSBNs. A "first strike" indeed could be very advantageous.

[Eternal_Freedom]

So, Stuart, if the inevitable response to the use of a nuclear device is a full strategic exchange, does it follow that it is advantageous to equip as many units as possible with nuclear weapons, to deter the opponent from attacking as many units as possible?

If that is true, then the ultimate deterence strategy would be to give all military units nukes, and to allow the unit commanders to use them in response to conventional attacks from enemy forces. That way, no opponent would attack one of your military units, because the response would be a strategic exchange

[Stuart]

Would a first strike be really that effective in destroying enemy retaliatory capability? I have always thought that early warning radars and space based IR sensors are meant to prevent that from happening. Suppose nation A launches first strike against nation B. Nation B detects missile launches and launches its own missiles on counterattack before enemy missiles hit and destroys their missiles on the ground resulting in MAD.

Nobody ever worked on a launch-on-warning basis, the risks from technical or prcedural error were far too great. Using our two men with shotguns analogy, it's standing there with fingers on trigger and the slack taken off. The slightest flinch and the shotguns fire. Think it through, each side knows the other is operating on launch on warning. Each knows that the other suffers from repeated technical errors that cause false alarms. Each knows that the other will one day make a mistake and launch on one of those false alarms. Therefore, the only reasonable course is a bolt-from-the-blue attack in the hope of getting some of his stuff on the ground.

I remember some time ago when I watched a documentary about Cold War and one guy said that we are really lucky that there were no nuclear level meteorite strikes during various Cold War tensions between US an Soviet Union because a meteorite explosion in confusion could be easily interpreted as nuclear attack end led to full scale nuclear war. Is this true? Suppose a Tunguska event took place during Cuban missile crisis when everybody had finger on the trigger. What is the chance that this would cause full scale nuclear exchange?

In theory that's right; in practice we'd almost certainly have got away with it. The reason is a bit ironic; the threat was so obvious and so dangerous that people talked about it all the time. So, what the strike would have looked like was fairly well known and enough people were familiar with the possibility to recognize it and discount it.

Stuart, isn't that because of the way forces worldwide are currently structured, with a heavy emphasis on non-recallable, horribly vunerable strategic strike systems such as ballistic missiles in silos? Because you can't recall the missiles in flight, and because they can't move like a carrier can at 30 knots, a bomber at 550 MPH, or a road mobile ICBM at 30 MPH; they are horribly vunerable to a decapicating first strike. (Even mobile ICBMs on rail cars or heavy trucks like TOPOL-M are still pretty crippingly vunerable because you can't widely disperse them amongst your national rail/road network in times of peace, due to the requirements of security.) So there's a heavy emphasis on "using" the vunerable weapons before they're destroyed, driving the escalatory chain.

Absolutely. ICBMs were a terrible idea. Even the mobile ones (especially the mobile ones - deploying them is rather like shutting yourself and your family in one small room and then inviting the local thugs to toss hand grenades through the windows).

Have you run any exercises in which silo based missiles were removed from the equation in favor of more bombers and SLBMs, and what were the results?

I don't know of any; all the ones I was involved in were using existing force structures. That doesn't mean they didn't happen though; everything was tightly compartmented. Not secret (or I wouldn't be discussing it) but compartmented. I'd guess that such simulations were carried out though.

So, Stuart, if the inevitable response to the use of a nuclear device is a full strategic exchange, does it follow that it is advantageous to equip as many units as possible with nuclear weapons, to deter the opponent from attacking as many units as possible If that is true, then the ultimate deterence strategy would be to give all military units nukes, and to allow the unit commanders to use them in response to conventional attacks from enemy forces. That way, no opponent would attack one of your military units, because the response would be a strategic exchange.

Quite right - and that was US policy throughout the 1950s and well into the 1960s. In fact, U.S. policy was so far developed along those lines that US force structures were deliberately designed so that the units could only fight if they used nuclear weapons.. It was only in the middle-late 1960s that these policies were abandoned and "replaced" by flexible response. Look up "Pentomic Division" for example.

As a strategy it has plusses and minusses. The TBOverse stories are built around a world in which the strategy you describe was established, continued and used by the USA. The policy statement used is "The United States does not fight wars. It simply destroys its opponent". That's the first and only option, there is no other response level and the later stories highlight the problems that causes. The advantages as well; bereft of tactical, non-nuclear forces, the US defense expenditure is much less than it is in OTL and that translates to a better-off economy. But, the defense force is strategic-only.

[Simon_Jester]

So that means theoretically if North Korea strikes first and blows up few US military bases in East Asia or attacks Hawaii with nuclear weapons there is a real chance that situation could quickly go to hell instead of ending just with limited US retaliatory nuclear strike against North Korea.

The predictable US nuclear attack on North Korea will be a fairly close approximation of things "going to Hell" in any case, because we'd be looking at hundreds of thousands or millions of casualties all in one go.

If you meant to ask "will nuclear third parties become involved?" Dunno. Might depend on what plans are in place. For example, I don't know if it's feasible for the US to call up China and reach some kind of agreement with them before launching on North Korea; they would understandably not be able to tell whether missiles had been fired at them or at the Norks.

With North Korea, they have nukes but not many nukes, so they don't have a full-scale strategic deterrent. We might have a bit more flexibility in being able to take time to make a few phone calls to Beijing and Moscow to work something out before launching against North Korea. We would not have that flexibility in dealing with China or Moscow, because both of them can put large numbers of warheads in the air and due to hit us in about half an hour. That half hour interval limits our options.

You see, back in the day, everybody involved was quite clear that nobody actually wanted a nuclear war. What scared everybody was one would happen by accident. This is usually interpreted to mean a technical failure but that isn't quite the case (although, the Mighty God Mota knows, there were enough of those).

...Was that a Sixth Column reference?

Would a first strike be really that effective in destroying enemy retaliatory capability? I have always thought that early warning radars and space based IR sensors are meant to prevent that from happening. Suppose nation A launches first strike against nation B. Nation B detects missile launches and launches its own missiles on counterattack before enemy missiles hit and destroys their missiles on the ground resulting in MAD.

Well, the point of the exercise is that a first strike would be effective against enemy retaliatory capability if they don't launch before your first strike hits. Which is why they launch against your first strike, and why you must assume that they'd do so, and why they should (hopefully) assume that you will assume that they'd do so... net result, in theory, being that nobody even seriously considers launching that first strike.

Suppose a Tunguska event took place during Cuban missile crisis when everybody had finger on the trigger. What is the chance that this would cause full scale nuclear exchange?

Hmm. What I'd love to know is: how exactly would we know that except by examining several dozen parallel-universe Earths where the impact happened to find out?

As a strategy it has plusses and minusses. The TBOverse stories are built around a world in which the strategy you describe was established, continued and used by the USA. The policy statement used is "The United States does not fight wars. It simply destroys its opponent". That's the first and only option, there is no other response level and the later stories highlight the problems that causes. The advantages as well; bereft of tactical, non-nuclear forces, the US defense expenditure is much less than it is in OTL and that translates to a better-off economy. But, the defense force is strategic-only.

If I might try to unpack the consequences of that, and please correct me if I'm mistaken, having not read the books:

The TBO US, as you say, has effectively no strategic options between "do nothing" and "reduce enemy to radioactive parking lots surrounded by Iron Age refugee communities." The problem being that this doesn't leave you with good options for coercing an opponent you aren't willing to destroy- I imagine that it would have been difficult for the TBO US to pull off something equivalent to the 1989 invasion of Panama in an attempt to unseat Noriega after he became dangerously problematic for us. Or to intervene in a humanitarian crisis, as we did several times during the Clinton years (Haiti, Somalia, and Bosnia come to mind).

Because in a situation like that, we can't threaten to destroy the country outright; as Heinlein memorably put it it would be "like spanking a baby with an ax." We can't threaten to obliterate Panama to unseat Noriega- it might work, but what do we do if it doesn't work? Nuking Panama hurts us more than leaving Noriega in place would. Likewise, if Somali warlords are harassing humanitarian supply convoys, we can't very well nuke Somalia to get them to leave the convoys alone, for obvious reasons.

Even ignoring cases where the goal is regime change or humanitarian intervention, a nuclear strike is a very bad response to a domestic terrorist threat (which hasn't been a huge problem for the US, but could be for another nuclear power). Or, in some circumstances, to a foreign terrorist threat: nuking Pakistan to get at Al Qaeda is a great way to draw a nuclear response from the Pakistani government, even though the government is not an ally of Al Qaeda.

The practical upshot being that while this makes fighting foreign wars against an opponent no one will miss (like Nazi Germany) very cheap, it makes fighting wars to achieve limited objectives impractical, especially when the goal is to change conditions on the same territory you're fighting over.

[Iosef Cross]

China has a rather small arsenal compared with the US, the northern hemisphere isn't going to die out even after a full exchange.

Small is the size of what they tell people!

And to answer the OP: yes, just like in any other war. The problem is that it's hard to find a cause that would actually be worth it. Preventing imminent destruction of the US, for example, would probably be worth millions of deaths to the federal government, but neither north korea nor china actually have the capability to do that.

China can make thousands of nukes in months if needed. Nukes are rather cheap.

[Phantasee]

The practical upshot being that while this makes fighting foreign wars against an opponent no one will miss (like Nazi Germany) very cheap, it makes fighting wars to achieve limited objectives impractical, especially when the goal is to change conditions on the same territory you're fighting over.

I understand that was part of the purpose for having such a force -- nobody would fight you for fear of being nuked to oblivion, and on the other hand, the US would have been much less interventionist in its recent history. There would have been no invasions of Iraq, no Viet Nam Wars, and no invasions of Panama.

Which, from some perspectives, both foreign and domestic, is a good thing.

[Starglider]

China can make thousands of nukes in months if needed. Nukes are rather cheap.

Oh really? What's your source for this massive uncommitted stockpile of plutonium / highly enriched uranium? Or did you imagine that enrichment plants and breeder reactors can magically ramp up to x100 their normal capacity overnight?

The TBO US, as you say, has effectively no strategic options between "do nothing" and "reduce enemy to radioactive parking lots surrounded by Iron Age refugee communities."

You forgot 'land a small force of M60 tanks and watch them get shot up by the local Arabs before retreating'.

[phongn]

Small is the size of what they tell people!

Even the largest arsenals at the height of the Cold War would be insufficient to induce nuclear winter. And yes, small is what they tell people and they surely have every incentive to be honest about it?

China can make thousands of nukes in months if needed. Nukes are rather cheap.

Even if they could accomplish such a feat in short-order, they would still have to produce the delivery systems, expand their command-and-control systems, train people to use them, the list goes on and on.

[Stuart]

China can make thousands of nukes in months if needed. Nukes are rather cheap.

Don't be absurd. We're having a serious discussion here.

[Stuart]

I understand that was part of the purpose for having such a force -- nobody would fight you for fear of being nuked to oblivion, and on the other hand, the US would have been much less interventionist in its recent history. There would have been no invasions of Iraq, no Viet Nam Wars, and no invasions of Panama. Which, from some perspectives, both foreign and domestic, is a good thing.

This is exactly the logic the TBOverse USA uses to justify its force structure. If the USA has a large army, it'll get involved in things that it shouldn't. So, no large Army and a largely isolationist USA

To quote a character in one story. "If they're not a threat, we shouldn't be there. If they are a threat, they shouldn't be there."

[Eternal_Freedom]

Stuart, if I understand correctly, youa re saying that no nation builds nuclear weapons with the intent of actually using them, but rather the intent of deterring attack?

Nuclear weapons as world peacekeepers. Seems counter-intuitive

Then again, as WOPR says in "Wargames" - "An interesting game. The only winning move, is not to play"

[CaptainChewbacca]

Nuclear weapons are a 'bargaining chip' in world affairs. Having them makes people take you seriously, because they know if you go to war you're going to be going to war with nukes, so the incentive to keep you from going to war is MUCH higher.

That's why North Korea wants them. They don't want to nuke our cities, they want to be able to rattle their saber every 6 months to get a billion extra dollars.

[Stuart]

Stuart, if I understand correctly, youa re saying that no nation builds nuclear weapons with the intent of actually using them, but rather the intent of deterring attack? Nuclear weapons as world peacekeepers. Seems counter-intuitive

A lot of the nuclear game is counter-intuitive; that's what makes it so interesting. Here's another one for you. The classic choice in nuclear strategies is "counter-city" and "counter-force". These are exactly what they sound; a counter-city strategy primarily drops nuclear weapons on cities, a counter-force strategy targets enemy missile and other strategic forces (it needs to be said right now that these are shorthand for a wide variety of strategies that have different target sets but the lesson still holds). Now, targeting cities is a ruthless example of killing huge numbers of civilians while counter-force avoids that cataclysmic end result. So, counter-force is better right? Only, it doesn't work out that way. Counter-city (actually taking out targets that happen to be co-located with cities) uses primarily high airbursts. These are the most efficient and affective way of inflicting the required level of damage on that particular target set. High airbursts are relatively clean and produce very little fallout. However, the target set in counter-force are very hardened (they are designed to ride out precisely this kind of attack) and they require large ground bursts to physically scour the missile silos out of the ground. These are unbelievably filthy and result in long plumes of lethal fallout. Typically such a plume will be 25 - 50 miles wide and 100 - 400 miles long (that's the dimensions of the bit you won't survive if you're in it). There will be literally hundreds of said plumes across the country and they will cause a staggering number of deaths from radiation poisoning. So, we end up witha situation where an attack aimed at civilians causes fewer civilian deaths than an attack that is aimed at weapons. How's that for counter-intuitive.

Nations get nuclear weapons because they give the country owning them a cap on the extent to which they can be defeated. Without them, a country can, in theory, be completely overrun and subjugated. With them, they can turn to their attacker and say "fine, you're winning the war. Now, if you win any more, we'll use our nukes. Why shouldn't we? You're leaving us nothing more left to lose. You might destroy us but we're on the verge of that anyway but we'll leave you wishing you'd never won and vulnerable to the first other country that had a grudge to settle. So let's negotiate an end to this now.

Why do you think the Israelis have nuclear weapons and the Arabs want those weapons gone?

[Kane Starkiller]

The Chinese know that popping a nuke over a U.S. CVBG will result in massive damage to their country and the total destruction of their strategic deterrent (either by American preemption or Chinese use). This will leave China completely exposed to a Russia that has quite a few scores of its own to settle.

I know about some border skirmishes between Soviet Union and China and claims that China considers Primorye region to be rightfully theirs but what could make China think Russian attack would be likely as soon as their strategic forces get blown up? Or rather why are Russians so certain that China will expect an attack coming from Russia?


On a different note how would the development of pure fusion bombs (like laser induced) without long term fallout change the nuclear calculus?

[Stuart]

I know about some border skirmishes between Soviet Union and China and claims that China considers Primorye region to be rightfully theirs but what could make China think Russian attack would be likely as soon as their strategic forces get blown up? Or rather why are Russians so certain that China will expect an attack coming from Russia?

The Chinese see the Russians as people who have already snatched a large lump of Chinese territory, have no intention of giving it back and have already considered using nuclear weapons against China. They firmly believe that, given the chance, the Russians will grab some more and if China weakens, that grab will come sooner or later. So, if China is devastated by a nuclear strike, they believe the Russians will attack. So, the Chinese, when doom approaches, will try and weaken Russia as much as possible by hitting their Far Eastern forces. The Russians know the Chinese think that and so . . . . . .

On a different note how would the development of pure fusion bombs (like laser induced) without long term fallout change the nuclear calculus?

It won't. Mostly we planned things to keep contamination down to a minimum anyway. they'd just make that easier.

[Simon_Jester]

The practical upshot being that while this makes fighting foreign wars against an opponent no one will miss (like Nazi Germany) very cheap, it makes fighting wars to achieve limited objectives impractical, especially when the goal is to change conditions on the same territory you're fighting over.

I understand that was part of the purpose for having such a force -- nobody would fight you for fear of being nuked to oblivion, and on the other hand, the US would have been much less interventionist in its recent history. There would have been no invasions of Iraq, no Viet Nam Wars, and no invasions of Panama.

Well, there was no Cold War to begin with, since Russia was our friend. But what I'm getting at is that whether the US chooses noninterventionism or not, in a setting where it vastly favors the strategic nuclear force over the tactical forces, it will have nonintervention imposed on it by the lack of assets to intervene with.

The TBO US, as you say, has effectively no strategic options between "do nothing" and "reduce enemy to radioactive parking lots surrounded by Iron Age refugee communities."

You forgot 'land a small force of M60 tanks and watch them get shot up by the local Arabs before retreating'.

I haven't read the books; I was doing the analysis a priori.

Way I figure it, an option that you can predict will fail isn't really an option...

On a different note how would the development of pure fusion bombs (like laser induced) without long term fallout change the nuclear calculus?

Remember Stuart's earlier comments on fallout... I think they were in this thread. Fallout from ground bursts comes in large part from irradiated material on the ground getting sucked up into the fireball. Fission byproducts are radioactive, sure, but they make up a tiny minority of the overall fallout from a ground burst. So pure fusion bombs wouldn't make ground bursts cleaner, and they wouldn't make airbursts much cleaner because they're relatively clean already.

[Starglider]

On a different note how would the development of pure fusion bombs (like laser induced) without long term fallout change the nuclear calculus?

Remember Stuart's earlier comments on fallout... I think they were in this thread. Fallout from ground bursts comes in large part from irradiated material on the ground getting sucked up into the fireball. Fission byproducts are radioactive, sure, but they make up a tiny minority of the overall fallout from a ground burst. So pure fusion bombs wouldn't make ground bursts cleaner, and they wouldn't make airbursts much cleaner because they're relatively clean already.

As a side note, futuristic/sci-fi strategic warheads could get around this by using aneutronic fusion, e.g. He3 or boron fuel. This is a lot harder to ignite than the DT fusion that current hydrogen bombs use, but if you want to be able to destroy hardened targets without contaminating the surrounding area they might make sense. Antimatter bombs are also effectively fallout-free.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Yeah, but antimatter bombs come with the unfortunate problem of being difficult to transport in case they blow up. At least nukes have to be intentionally detonated.

From what I remember of the nuclear physics module I did at A level, fusing boron or he-3 wouldn't be as effective. More energy needed to set it off, less energy released. Something to do with binding energy per nucleon and how it rises really wuickly until you hit Iron-56, and up to Fe-56 the fusion reaction gives diminishing returns.

Apart from that, how exctly would using a heavier fuel not irradiate things?

[Starglider]

From what I remember of the nuclear physics module I did at A level, fusing boron or he-3 wouldn't be as effective. More energy needed to set it off, less energy released.

Correct. You'd only do this if you specifically wanted clean groundbursts, i.e. for destroying hardened installations in a territory you wanted to occupy or borders your own territory. The lower energy/mass ratio probably isn't such a problem, the weight of the fusion fuel is a trivial part of the warhead weight so you can just use more, the higher energy barrier to getting the reaction going would be the main problem.

Apart from that, how exctly would using a heavier fuel not irradiate things?

He3 + He3 and p + B don't spray fast neutrons everywhere the way that most fusion reactions do.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Ah, I see. Hadn't thought of that. Is it possible to use He3 or Boron in reality, instead of H-2/3?

[Stuart Mackey]

Stuart, given all this talk of the abolition of nuclear weapons, has there been any thought, to your knowledge, of the nature of a world with out them?

[Stuart]

Stuart, given all this talk of the abolition of nuclear weapons, has there been any thought, to your knowledge, of the nature of a world with out them?

Lord yes. The problem is that one can't put a genie back in the bottle. We have them so that's a fact we have to deal with. All nuclear disarmament would achieve is to give the first country that manages to build some a really serious chance at world domination. For example; imagine the current Iranian situation taking place in a nuclear-free world. Does anybody really believe that the such a world would be any more effective at stopping the Iranians going nuclear than ours is? And how would Iran behave if it had a monopoly of nuclear weaponry? In a world allegedly without nuclear weapons, only the bad guys would have them (bad guys here being defined as countries that would use them promiscuously to enforce their will).

However, just suppose that, for some reason, nuclear weapons were never developed and couldn't be developed? What would the strategic balance look like then? Well, we already know that other weapons of mass destruction were being developed and (in some cases) used. We also know that startegic bombing with conventional weapons hadn't worked but the idea was still (in theory) sound. The estimate was that we would have seen massive investment in biological and chemical warfare and those arts would be far more developed than they are today. A guy called Edwin Corley actually picked the idea up and used it for a novel (The Jesus Factor).

But, we never gave it serious thought. Genie's don't go back into the bottle.

[Stuart Mackey]

Lord yes. The problem is that one can't put a genie back in the bottle. We have them so that's a fact we have to deal with. All nuclear disarmament would achieve is to give the first country that manages to build some a really serious chance at world domination. For example; imagine the current Iranian situation taking place in a nuclear-free world. Does anybody really believe that the such a world would be any more effective at stopping the Iranians going nuclear than ours is? And how would Iran behave if it had a monopoly of nuclear weaponry? In a world allegedly without nuclear weapons, only the bad guys would have them (bad guys here being defined as countries that would use them promiscuously to enforce their will).

I think a lot would depend, perhaps on the future development of laser defenses/ABM systems, backed by very healthy conventional forces, but of course how does everyone who needs them, afford them? A nuclear armed Iran who's limited nuclear delivery systems are obsolescent would be much less of a threat as I cannot see them being able to develop serious power projection capabilities without a corresponding reaction by the rest of the world.

As for bad guys having nukes in a nuclear free world, well that concept is well proven by the dictatorships evading tonnage limitations in certain naval 'arms limitations' treaties between the wars.

However, just suppose that, for some reason, nuclear weapons were never developed and couldn't be developed? What would the strategic balance look like then? Well, we already know that other weapons of mass destruction were being developed and (in some cases) used. We also know that startegic bombing with conventional weapons hadn't worked but the idea was still (in theory) sound. The estimate was that we would have seen massive investment in biological and chemical warfare and those arts would be far more developed than they are today. A guy called Edwin Corley actually picked the idea up and used it for a novel (The Jesus Factor).

But, we never gave it serious thought. Genie's don't go back into the bottle.

My own thoughts on the matter of a WMD free world, the whole troika of WMD's, is this, we have seen that world and it was not a pretty one, and it more or less ended in 1945. As you say, genies don't go back into bottles, but given the post war world, have our lords and masters enough perspective to wonder if its even desirable?