I’ve legitimately been curious about this. The nuclear arms race has been a threat for so long, do western countries really not have a mitigation strategy for them?
I assume we could shoot down any intercontinental weapons, and any airplane that entered allied airspace would immediately be shot down before it could drop a nuke.
Intercontinental nukes basically can’t be shot down. This is because both sides can launch hundreds of rockets, each carrying multiple very small warheads. It’s basically impossible to intercept.
But can you not also just scale up the defense systems in parallel with the ballistic missiles carrying warheads? If we can expend billions for the construction of thousands of intercontinental missiles, can we then not also build tens of thousands of interceptors, maybe a handful for each potential incoming nuke?
Our missile defense systems are only really able to take down a few targets at best, and that unreliably. It’s REALLY hard to shoot down these kind of rockets.
Let’s say we do, wouldn’t it be smarter as the government to keep the rumor up that we would indeed be screwed but on the day they decided to go nuclear we just laugh and show them our power?
At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist, that’s why I’ve been curious.
I’m pretty confident we wouldn’t show our hand on that defense strategy, but there’s no way there’s not a plan for it. It’s obviously better for everyone to avoid a need for that strategy in case it doesn’t work perfectly.
It’s opposite MAD theorem. If neither side knows that there are countermeasures then neither side will launch a first strike, as they then run the risk of being knocked out in essence.
Ever play defcon? First to launch rarely wins there
Issue is that multiple countries have systems where it’s, “They launched nukes? We’ll launch all our nukes”
The mitigation is basically, “We will wipe you off the map if we think even ONE nuke is coming at us,” and this has nearly happened several times, only stopped because the system has a human at the final step, and humans when realizing they could end the world seem to hesitate
I’ve legitimately been curious about this. The nuclear arms race has been a threat for so long, do western countries really not have a mitigation strategy for them?
I assume we could shoot down any intercontinental weapons, and any airplane that entered allied airspace would immediately be shot down before it could drop a nuke.
Intercontinental nukes basically can’t be shot down. This is because both sides can launch hundreds of rockets, each carrying multiple very small warheads. It’s basically impossible to intercept.
But can you not also just scale up the defense systems in parallel with the ballistic missiles carrying warheads? If we can expend billions for the construction of thousands of intercontinental missiles, can we then not also build tens of thousands of interceptors, maybe a handful for each potential incoming nuke?
This isn’t a new idea, it’s been around sinde Reagan, and the consensus is that it’s just non-viable.
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It’s literally not, this is a known problem.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targetable_reentry_vehicle
Our missile defense systems are only really able to take down a few targets at best, and that unreliably. It’s REALLY hard to shoot down these kind of rockets.
You could probably shoot down 80% or maybe even 90%. But if the enemy launches a few hundred missiles at the same time then some might make it.
Let’s say we do, wouldn’t it be smarter as the government to keep the rumor up that we would indeed be screwed but on the day they decided to go nuclear we just laugh and show them our power?
At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist, that’s why I’ve been curious.
I’m pretty confident we wouldn’t show our hand on that defense strategy, but there’s no way there’s not a plan for it. It’s obviously better for everyone to avoid a need for that strategy in case it doesn’t work perfectly.
It’s opposite MAD theorem. If neither side knows that there are countermeasures then neither side will launch a first strike, as they then run the risk of being knocked out in essence.
Ever play defcon? First to launch rarely wins there
A 99% success rate for shooting down ICBMs would still be a catastrophic failure that would set us back hundreds of years.
We’re seeing it now in the middle eat and Ukraine. US Air Defense equipment is the best in the world but not impenetrable.
Not even considering that a nuclear submarine can just surface off the coast and destroy the nearest city.
Issue is that multiple countries have systems where it’s, “They launched nukes? We’ll launch all our nukes”
The mitigation is basically, “We will wipe you off the map if we think even ONE nuke is coming at us,” and this has nearly happened several times, only stopped because the system has a human at the final step, and humans when realizing they could end the world seem to hesitate