|
|
|
|
|
|
by edanm
786 days ago
|
|
|
> It's an awful book. In the scenario, the US does launch SLBMs from a submarine close to North Korea, and they hit in minutes. But for some reason the author thought that's is plausible that the US would also launch 50 land based ICBMs. Why? See my other comment, but to summarize - because they worry that an incoming attack would destroy the land-based ICBMs before they have a chance to launch them, taking out one third of the Nuclear Triad. I don't think this was the book making up stories - the book is half fiction, half interviews with actual people who worked on these plans and gave inside info on them. This unfortunately appears to be a realistic scenario. |
|
|
We are used to mentally think of the Earth as seen in a sideways 2D projection. But if you look down from above the North Pole, you can appreciate how different an ICBM trajectory that goes from North Korea to Washington is from one that goes to Wyoming, Montana or North Dakota. There is no way to mistake one for the other, and the author does not even claim that this happened in her scenario; the incoming ICBM was fairly quickly identified as targeting something on the East Coast.
Which brings us to another thing. Geography is very funny, but it happens that an ICBM from NK to Washington overflies thousands of miles of Russian territory. An ICBM from Wyoming to NK overflies mabye a fifth as much, because it flies over a lot over the Bering Sea and the Sea of Ohotsk. Why are the Russians not worried when the NK ICBM overflies their country, but they are willing to commit suicide when the US counter overflies does the same, but over a much shorter distance? Well, they should not be worried in either case, because a missile can't just drop down in midflight, but an author that thinks satellites can fall from the sky can also think that a missile in suborbital flight can take 90 degree turns.