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Subject: US vs China: nuclear war? - an impossibility
Iron Logician    1/17/2004 4:52:43 PM
A few reasons from a scientist point of view: 1) Regardless whether or not the US builds missile defense shield, China continues to build more missiles that carry neclear war head(s). China possesses more than half of the world's known rare earth mineral deposit containing both Lanthanide and Actinide Series (Pu and U in the latter). Mobile land and sub-based missiles will likely survive the first strike. It is unclear how many they have built (its first one was almost 40 years ago, then H-bomb, and neutron bombs) how many more they will build. China's economy if based on PPP (purchasing power parity) estimate is already many times bigger than ex-USSR. So it is safe to presume that it can at least easily make as many as ex-USSR in the coming years. 2) 10,000 nuclear explosions in China are NOT sufficient to vitrify the land owning to geological and geographical complications, eg, China has far more mountains than US. Theoretical calculation suggests that such vitrification process requires roughly 192,0000 explosions. However, the nuclear fall-out (ie, airborne radioactive particles) will drift acoss pacific ocean and deposit in the US mainland, destroying every live-stock on the way. Everyone knows why a balloon can drift from China to the US, not the other way around. 3) The most compelling reason, perhaps, is the fact that after the first strike, the remaining Chinese missiles will be launched towards all major US cities and industrial centers. Despite the missile defense shield, a certain % will pass, land, and explode. The impact of 9/11 was shocking to most in the world (eg, most Americans probably delayed their retirement for a few years!); one cannot imagine the impact of nuclear explosions. Western civilization values human life and prosperity far more than Eastern civilization, such an nuclear exchange will certainly result in the destruction of both civilizations or the return of the dark age for many years to come; nevertheless, the rich or haves have much more to lose than the poor or have-nots. The US or American people is highly unlikely to take such risk of a certain known outcome. Good life is just too important.
 
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Zhang Fei    A nuclear-tipped ABM system against a Chinese ICBM strike   1/18/2004 7:44:33 PM
This is a story from 2002. Rumsfeld was reported to have revived the idea of nuclear tipped interceptors. This is pretty much a last ditch defense, but is perfectly feasible in the event that nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles are launched from Chinese soil. US nukes are said to be retargettable at the drop of a hat. How difficult would it be to retarget them to detonate 60 miles above the atmosphere, in the path of the Chinese nukes? In retaliation, the US could launch waves of nuclear-tipped cruise missiles against hundreds of Chinese targets, a mere hundreds of feet above ground. Once you filter out WaPo's inevitable liberal bias, it starts looking like a plan: Nuclear-Tipped Interceptors Studied Rumsfeld Revives Rejected Missile Defense Concept by Bradley Graham The Washington Post Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has opened the door to the possible use of nuclear-tipped interceptors in a national missile defense system, reviving an idea that U.S. authorities rejected nearly three decades ago as technically problematic and politically unacceptable. William Schneider Jr., chairman of the Defense Science Board, said yesterday that he had received encouragement from Rumsfeld to begin exploring the idea as part of an upcoming study of alternative approaches to intercepting enemy missiles. "We've talked about it as something that he's interested in looking at," Schneider said in an interview. The Pentagon experimented with nuclear-armed interceptors in the 1950s and 1960s and, for a short time in the mid-1970s, deployed an anti-missile system that relied on them. But the notion of nuclear explosions going off high overhead to block incoming missiles proved unsettling for many people. And the prospect that ionized clouds and electromagnetic shock waves associated with the explosions could end up blinding radar on the ground and scrambling electronic equipment eventually helped kill the plan. Since then, defense officials have focused on developing interceptors to destroy targets without the need for explosives, relying instead on the force of direct impact, a concept known as "hit to kill." Driving the new interest in arming interceptors with nuclear devices is the problem of dealing with decoys and other measures that an enemy might use to confuse an interceptor, Schneider said. The hit-to-kill approach depends on interceptors picking out the real enemy targets and homing in on them. By contrast, nuclear-armed interceptors need not distinguish actual targets from clusters of decoys but could rely on explosive power or radiation to wipe out everything in the vicinity. One other arguable advantage of nuclear interceptors, Schneider suggested, is their potential for ensuring destruction of missile-borne biological warfare agents such as anthrax. President Bush has made clear his interest in pursuing technological solutions to missile defense, removing long-standing constraints by deciding last December to withdraw the United States from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with Moscow. The Pentagon has embarked on experimental anti-missile programs, including land- and sea-based interceptors as well as airborne lasers and space-based weapons, with the hope of having at least a rudimentary capability in place by fall 2004. But until now, defense officials had shied away from the nuclear option. An extensive Pentagon review of missile defense alternatives undertaken in the first months of the Bush administration raised the possibility of nuclear-tipped interceptors, according to two officials familiar with the review. But the idea failed to make the list of programs worth funding. Its return comes in the context of other recent signs of the administration's general readiness to consider broader uses of nuclear weapons. A Pentagon review of U.S. nuclear policy, concluded late last year, put new emphasis on possible nuclear strikes against Third World adversaries and backed development of low-yield nuclear bombs to hit hardened or deeply buried targets. Russia, which built a missile defense system around Moscow in the 1960s that survives to this day, relied from the start on nuclear-armed interceptors. Although U.S. defense experts regard the Russian system as anachronistic, Russian military officials worry that the United States will eventually adopt the nuclear approach, according to Pavel Podvig, editor of an authoritative book about Russian strategic nuclear forces published last year by the Center for Arms Control Studies in Moscow. "They believe strongly that you cannot get an effective missile defense system using hit-to-kill," Podvig said. The Defense Science Board, set up in the 1950s, is a senior advisory body that reports to the secretary of defense on technological, operational and managerial matters. One of its task forces already is looking at some aspects of missile defense, including command and control systems, international cooperation and co
 
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Zhang Fei    Interestingly enough, even the peaceniks concede that nuclear-tipped interceptors would work   1/18/2004 9:02:16 PM
As usual, the peaceniks have their own warped spin on reality. John Isaacs of Council for a Livable World seems to believe that Americans would rather see their cities destroyed rather than deal with enemy ICBM launches with nuclear-tipped interceptors. The question has to be asked - what planet does this guy Isaacs live on? Excerpted from a letter issued by this peacenik group: It may be that the only effective anti-missile warhead is nuclear warhead, requiring a nuclear detonation over Alaska or North Dakota. Such a system may well prove unacceptable to many citizens of this country and Canada who would suffer the consequences. According to Harold Agnew, former Los Alamos National Laboratory director in the July 31, 1998 New York Times, "The only effective warhead for any real missile defense has to be nuclear."
 
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EastWind_81    Nuclear interceptors: an old idea (it can work but at what cost?)   1/18/2004 10:02:23 PM
Nuke-tipped interceptors were deployed in the 1970s to protect Minutemen silos from Soviet preemptive strikes. Massive opposition from the scientific community prevented it from nationwide deployment, eventually even the silo-protection system was dismantled. I agree nukes are the best solution to defend cities from immolation, but being a country so heavily dependent on satellites - most not hardened from such intense radiation - it's easy to see why US has been reluctant to pursue this path. Keep in mind: any ABM system will rely on radar & infrared to detect enemy ICBMs, & there's no better way to compromise these sensors than high-altitude nuclear explosions - if not by destructive EMP than at least by impairing their vision & hence their ability to track the next wave of incoming ICBMs.
 
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Final Historian    RE:Nuclear interceptors: an old idea (it can work but at what cost?)   1/18/2004 11:06:57 PM
True, but against the PRC there likely won't be a second wave. As NG pointed out, China's nuclear arsenal is rather limited in terms of ICBMS.
 
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Zhang Fei    Military grade American equipment, including satellites, are hardened against EMP   1/18/2004 11:37:12 PM
US satellites will not be affected by EMP from nuclear blasts - all military grade equipment is hardened against EMP. (Even civilian satellites are shielded against radiation from outer space). There seems to be a Chinese misconception about EMP as some kind of all-purpose shield against American retaliatory nuclear strikes. American military equipment - both conventional and nuclear - is designed to fight and win a nuclear war. Period. Even if we take out the satellite factor*, the US has listening posts all around China's periphery. The point is that satellites are not the only means of American surveillance of Chinese missile launches. This redundancy of American surveillance efforts frustrates the Chinese high command, which is why Chinese forces are continually harassing American surveillance efforts. But the fact that these efforts present the Chinese with threats on all fronts are exactly why US surveillance efforts go on. * This is what I'd call the chop socky factor - China's magical ability to make American satellites disappear.
 
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Nanheyangrouchuan    RE:Military grade American equipment, including satellites, are hardened against EMP   1/19/2004 6:12:13 AM
The nuke interceptors don't have to be high yield, especially if you have alot of them. While it is true that satellite signals would be cut off, it may be only temprorary as prevailing winds would carry off the ionized particles.
 
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EastWind_81    Does US know exact size of China's ICBM arsenal?   1/19/2004 4:25:30 PM
I doubt anyone knows with certainty. In response to 100-200 NMD interceptors it's conceivable China would build at least another 100-200 ICBMs - there are few technical or economic restraints on a much larger arsenal, as even US policymakers who assume China still has only 20 single-warhead ICBMs admit.
 
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Nanheyangrouchuan    RE:Does US know exact size of China's ICBM arsenal?   1/19/2004 9:33:16 PM
China may already have more than its official number of 450 hidden in "the great tunnel".
 
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RaptorOverUrHead    RE:Does US know exact size of China's ICBM arsenal?   1/20/2004 4:43:11 PM
 
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Final Historian    RE:Does US know exact size of China's ICBM arsenal?   1/20/2004 9:39:45 PM
This should be taken with a grain of salt, mind you, but it does point out several important facts. The first, and most important of which, is China's stock of fissile material.
 
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