Rocket science

[raytoews]

Any rocket scientist here.
North Korea seems to have all mobile launchers.
Can an ICBM be launched from a mobile launcher?

[DaleB]

You mean, like one of these (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballistic_missile_submarine)? Or are you talking about these (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MGM-134_Midgetman) or these (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT-2PM_Topol)?

[rwanttaja]

Any rocket scientist here.
North Korea seems to have all mobile launchers.
Can an ICBM be launched from a mobile launcher?

I'm a rocket engineer, not a rocket scientist. And yes, an ICBM can be launched from a mobile launcher...the Russian SS-25 is a good example, deployed in the '80s.

Ron Wanttaja

[raytoews]

Ah ha. Just an engineer. Not a scientist. :))
Thanks.

[raytoews]

Riigghhtt

[rwanttaja]

Ah ha. Just an engineer. Not a scientist. :))
Thanks.

The difference is pretty distinct:

An engineer says, "HOW does this work?"
A scientist says, "WHY does this work?"
A manager says, "WHEN will this work?"
...and a liberal arts major says, "Would you like fries with that, sir?"

Ron "Supersize that" Wanttaja

[rwanttaja]

I'm a rocket engineer, not a rocket scientist. And yes, an ICBM can be launched from a mobile launcher...the Russian SS-25 is a good example, deployed in the '80s.
I should mention that a small part of my engineering career was spent working on ICBM mobile basing (the original M-X concept), and another part was spent coming up with concepts to FIND mobile launchers. I've had a very conflicted life.

Ron "Hyperspectral R Us" Wanttaja

[Auburntsts]

I'm neither a rocket scientist or engineer but I was a USAF missileer (aka ICBM launch officer) and as has already been stated ICBMs can be and are mobile. In reality the payload type (nuclear, conventional. Etc), from a functional perspective, has no bearing on whether a given missile can be made into a practical and effective mobile launch platform.

[CraigCantwell]

Ron: Don't forget that we really pinged the old Soviet Bloc when we did the air launch demo of the ICBM.

[raytoews]

Im not an engineer or a scientist and all i know about ICBM is the one we visited south of Tucson and it was in a silo deep under ground. Very cool.
So Mr Un can roll them around the country and hide them, kind of like yall do with the subs.
What was the logic of building these silos all over the midwest?
That is one crazy bastard, what can he possibly get out of this except get the us and china in a fight. The Russians tried it with a nuke attack on Hawaii in the sixties and it bankrupted them. Maybe this is the Russians trying it again. Trouble with that plan is the US and China are so economically tied neither can afford to get into a fight. Somebody had a plan!

[rwanttaja]

Im not an engineer or a scientist and all i know about ICBM is the one we visited south of Tucson and it was in a silo deep under ground. Very cool.
So Mr Un can roll them around the country and hide them, kind of like yall do with the subs.
What was the logic of building these silos all over the midwest?
Primarily, technology. All the electronics are lighter, and decreases in payload weight have a significant effect on the amount of total "push" the rocket will need. Allows a reduction in the size of the rocket. Same thing happened with sub-launched missiles.

The second point was targeting. Our primary targets were a long way off, hence we needed bigger rockets that were less suited to mobile basing. Russia and China, on the other hand, had foes in close proximity (each other) and thus needed medium range ballistic missiles (MRBMs). So they put a lot of resources into mobile basing, which led to a lot of the technology being available when they decided they needed mobile basing for ICBMs.

A third point was mission: The US' missile force was primarily intended as a deterrent, as in, "throw everything you've got at us, we'll still be able to hit you back." Mobile basing is more of a crap shoot; the platforms aren't hardened, thus a saturation strike in a known basing area might have pretty good luck. Russian targeting never has been very good; a hardened, fixed site is probably a better approach when the enemy has less chance of actually coming close (vs. non-hardened mobile launchers).

Finally, there's the politics...the American voter probably wouldn't take kindly to seeing nuclear missile regularly cruising down I-94. The MX mobile basing was out in the desert, with dedicated roads, but we needed a longer-range missile to do it.

Ron Wanttaja

[robert l]

The difference is pretty distinct:

An engineer says, "HOW does this work?"
A scientist says, "WHY does this work?"
A manager says, "WHEN will this work?"
...and a liberal arts major says, "Would you like fries with that, sir?"

Ron "Supersize that" Wanttaja

And the poor guy that has to build it has to redo most of what the scientist and engineer came up with ! Well, in the commercial construction world anyway !!! LOL
Bob (ex Iron Worker)

[raytoews]

Excellent. Thank you.

[CDS]

The difference is pretty distinct:

An engineer says, "HOW does this work?"
A scientist says, "WHY does this work?"
A manager says, "WHEN will this work?"
...and a liberal arts major says, "Would you like fries with that, sir?"

Ron "Supersize that" Wanttaja


Recently, one of my old buddies, a chemical engineer, told me this joke:

What's the value of pi?
The scientist says, "3.14159..."
The mathemetician says, "The ratio of a circle's circumference to it's diameter."
The engineer says, "Well, it's just over 3, but lets use 5 just to be safe."
The salesman says, "3, but if you buy before the end of the month, I can let you have it for 2."

[TedK]

You mean like from a submarine?

[Auburntsts]

Im not an engineer or a scientist and all i know about ICBM is the one we visited south of Tucson and it was in a silo deep under ground. Very cool.
So Mr Un can roll them around the country and hide them, kind of like yall do with the subs.
What was the logic of building these silos all over the midwest?
That is one crazy bastard, what can he possibly get out of this except get the us and china in a fight. The Russians tried it with a nuke attack on Hawaii in the sixties and it bankrupted them. Maybe this is the Russians trying it again. Trouble with that plan is the US and China are so economically tied neither can afford to get into a fight. Somebody had a plan!

Because we developed silo based ICBMs as part of a larger capability known as the Nuclear TRIAD (ICBMs – SLBMs -- Bombers). Back in the 50’s and 60s, and really into the 90s, the most accurate missile systems were the ICBMs. They were also the least costly to maintain and operate and the fastest to react, at the cost of being the most vulnerable. But because 2 legs of the Triad were already mobile (SLBMs and Bombers), there was never a need for the US to develop mobile ICBMs. However, various mobile concepts were explored but none were ever adopted.

I spent 4 years living the dream as an ICBM launch officer from 1989 to 1993.

Todd Stovall
Defense Logistics Agency (DLA J-311)
Joint Logistics Operations Center
NIPR: todd.stovall@dla.mil
SIPR: todd.j.stovall.civ@mail.smil.mil
JWICS: tjstova@army.ic.gov
(COM) 703-767-1524 (tel:703-767-1524); (DSN) 312-427-1524 (tel:312-427-1524)