from the remember-that-story-this-past-weekend? dept.
A few days ago, on August 8, there was an explosion on a barge in the White Sea near Nyonoksa, Russia. That explosion tragically killed seven people, nuclear engineers and technicians working on a project. The project was described as "an isotopic power source for a liquid engine installation," but let's be completely clear here: they were developing the nuclear propulsion system for a genuinely brutal and terrible weapon.
That weapon is known as 9M730 Burevestnik, known to NATO as the SSC-X-9 Skyfall, but is perhaps best understood as a modern rebirth of a terrifying American weapon concept from the 1960s known as the Flying Crowbar.
The Flying Crowbar was a nuclear-powered scramjet missile, capable of flying at hypersonic speeds with an almost indefinite range, spewing extremely radioactive exhaust and nuclear bombs all over the place.
[...] While this accident is absolutely a tragedy because of the loss of life and the significant radiation exposure in the area, the blow to the development of the 9M730 Burevestnik missile is not the tragic part.
The Burevestnik is not a defensive weapon; it's a weapon to attack at long range and spread death and destruction all along its path, even over people that have no involvement in whatever bullshit reason this thing was launched for.
Wikipedia entries on 9M730 Burevestnik and Flying Crowbar (aka Supersonic Low Altitude Missile).
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:46AM (14 children)
If it isn't brutal and terrible it isn't much use as a weapon. I can't think of any weapons in any nation's arsenal that aren't.
That's the "D" part of MAD. Which sort of makes it defensive.
Is it morally unjustifiable? Yes, but no more than anything else in the NBC locker.
At least I don't (yet) hear any politician claiming that global thermonuclear wars are easy to win.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:35AM (10 children)
Not sure how true this is, but I have heard that one of the problems with Hyper-sonic missiles is that they disrupt MAD by being fast enough that a response to a first strike cannot be made until after the missile has reached it's target. Thoughts?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Coward, Anonymous on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:09AM (1 child)
Supposedly, half of all US strategic missiles are in submarines. Those would not be disrupted.
(Score: 1) by purdy on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:23PM
Actually, your SWAG of half is pretty accurate.
The US has 14 SSBNs (aka Boomers), a max of 10 of which are at sea at any given time. (They usually operate on something like 80 days on/35 days off. Each SSBN carries 20 Trident II D5 missiles. Each Trident can carry 8 - 14 warheads depending on the MIRV version. (The newer MIRV V carries only 8 warheads but larger.)
So that gives you about 2200 warheads at sea at any given time with a theoretical max of 3920 if you scrambled all the SSBNs (which would be impossible to do) and they all had the old MIRV IV Tridents. In reality both those numbers are high.
The US nuclear arsenal is estimated at around 4000-4500 warheads so about 2000 in the boomer fleet is a pretty good guess.
Source:
https://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_display.asp?cid=4100&tid=200&ct=4 [navy.mil]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by zocalo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:22AM
IIRC, the US removed independant launch authority from their SSBNs some time ago as part of the mutual stepping back from MAD, but there may be some scenario left whereby the crews could still launch if they are certain that a nuclear first stike has occurred and that the official authorisation to launch a retaliatory strike cannot possibly be issued. I have no idea what the Russian process is, but I suspect it's similarly robust and involves whatever they are calling the onboard "Political Officer" now; it might be MAD, but no one was crazy enough to not try and prevent it all kicking off by mistake.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:17AM
MAD isn't truly disrupted by hypersonic missiles. You might be able to realize the moment that hypersonic missiles are launched with satellites. Even if many of your cities are wiped off the map before you can give the order to return fire, more than enough nuclear assets needed to wipe out the enemy will survive. If that isn't true now, it will be if the stockpile starts increasing again with modernized weapons.
If Russia takes another decade to develop these weapons, what will the U.S. get in the meantime? Can Russia even afford this development?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @10:22AM (2 children)
Who would care then? Enjoying nuclear winter or fallout that's coming back anyway?
The point of MAD is there is NO WINNERS. Even if you "win", you lose. 100% lose.
https://www.wagingpeace.org/nuclear-weapons-do-not-keep-us-safe/ [wagingpeace.org]
https://interestingengineering.com/broken-arrows-the-worlds-lost-nuclear-weapons [interestingengineering.com]
The world would be safer if only North Korea had nuclear weapons. The reason is simple math. We will accidentally kill ourselves if we continue like this. There will be no avoiding that.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:57PM (1 child)
Yeah, we've already come close quite a few times with one soldier outright disobeying the SOP to avert nuclear war.
We should really make Dr. Strangelove mandatory viewing.
(Score: 2) by Farmer Tim on Thursday August 15 2019, @04:21PM
Came for the news, stayed for the soap opera.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:42PM (1 child)
That's what a doomsday machine is for. No human intervention necessary.
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Thursday August 15 2019, @06:01PM
My understanding is that the Russians built one. It's called Perimetr, is the subject of the book Doomsday Men by P.D. Smith.
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Thursday August 15 2019, @06:03PM
Ironically the entire reason Russia wants nuclear powered cruise missiles, nuke drone subs, and other advanced weapons is because we've developed anti-ICBM interceptors, missile interceptors, and very good anti-stealth AA.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:19AM
Shush, you fool! What if Trump hears you, you want the equiv of the trade war but with nukes?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:32PM
So a hypothetical weapon that just instantly terminates every life at some defined area, without affecting anything else (including the health of anyone outside that area) would be useless because it's not brutal? I suspect the military would love such a weapon.
Yes, such a weapon would be terrible. But it would not be brutal and terrible.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:35PM
I believe that was in terms of the risk of unintentional side-effects or risks. It may target military bases for example, but wipe out vast suburbs in the process by spraying them with exhaust that slow-cooks the population.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:04AM (8 children)
That aside, why would Russia stretch for this sorta thing? They have way more nukes than ... they have even more than the US, and nobody tries to bully them militarily.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:27AM
Because.... bad guys!!!1111111111
(Score: 4, Interesting) by mendax on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:32AM (3 children)
Trump says [thinkprogress.org] in another one of his Twitter storms that the United States already has weapons like this insane Russian weapon. Perhaps he's spilling the beans on some super secret program, or perhaps he's lying again. Read the article and decide for yourself.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:38PM
He's referring to his mouth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:07PM
Trump always has to have the "best" things, so I wouldn't put any stock in what that guy says, especially when comparing what "he" has to what "they" have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:05PM
We had a SLAM program waaaaay back in the 60s called Project Pluto. Its all old tech now but the basic premise is the same: A nuclear powered rocket with a near indefinite loiter capability at low altitude that can deploy multiple independent warheads.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:34AM
It's quite probable they didn't stretch for this sort of thing. The SLAM really was an insane weapon, but even more insane were the attempted Russian equivalents, which used direct-cycle engines. Truth is, we have no idea what the Russians were testing in Nyonoska, nor do we really know that the Burevestnik is or does. So the article really is just breathless hyperbole. Any reasonable analysis would point to anything but what the article is claiming, since a weapon like that makes no sense.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @10:09AM
Because sometimes saber rattling needs to be more than just words. Mind you, saber rattling is usually just so the "fearless leader" can put on a show for the locals. But once in a while they need to strike a little fear into outside nations (either directly or indirectly).
Having another type of weapon in your arsenal means your adversaries need to have a way to defend against it. The arms race isn't just about having many much more missiles. It's about forcing your adversaries to spend their resources playing catch-up so they can't do the same to you.
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:21PM
They need new technologies to maintain the balance of power.
The Russian nuclear triad is ICBMs, subs, and strategic bombers. We have anti-ballistic missile technology, the SONUS network to track subs, and very good anti-stealth AA.
That's why they are digging in the cold war crazy barrel.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Bot on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:53AM (4 children)
The truly insane thing is authoring an article that is too simple for a primary school audience.
Yes that missile is a damned coward weapon.
The mines are damned coward weapons too.
If you stretch the concept, even the cannon is a damned coward weapon. Matters should be settled by armies meeting in arranged locations at dawn. None of that hide and seek fuckery that goes on since Napoleon, none of that lack of rules that dates back at least to the romans and the macedonians.
End of the primary school rant, back to adults.
Weapons in the 21 century are: money (millisecond access to any asset in the planet, the mob obeys to money, the top managers obey to money, the opposition like the religions and the commies are nonetheless primarily concerned with money), the womb (a traditional weapon), strategic environment defacement (pollution, weather manipulation), nanotech, attach to the nervous system using waves, and whatnot.
Who develops and uses these systems unsurprisingly pushes anti-militarism (and calls it pacifism). Frankly I see no difference between being pushed to death by a Truly Insane Weapontm vs. becoming unfit for the new society for the lack of a computer to brain interface, but maybe you meatbags have different tastes.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:41AM
Knives are for cowards. Real men fisticuffs each other skulls until someone drops.
compiling...
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:25AM (1 child)
Really? Since TFA anchors us in bellicose topics, you know that caring for a wounded/disabled soldier causes one army higher costs than an able one?
Works for civil societies too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:50PM
You miss the point.
The point is technology is now giving a great advantage to those who can afford it in a competitive society that kicks the loser to the curb.
So a roundabout way of killing them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @10:12AM
This from a device that can't even get itself out of its packaging material. Let's take away your cyber capabilities and pit you against a George Foreman grill. Let the best 110v entity cook my lunch.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:25AM
.. and that, kids is why we don't do testing in production.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Rich on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:46AM (5 children)
So far it's been implied that the Russian 9M730 missile follows the Pluto blueprints. It just occured to me, that if it indeed is so, it cannot reasonably explain how it killed the crew. If it had a ramjet, it would need to be at speed before the reactor is started up. Hence either radioactivity or dead crew.
Nothing so far indicates that the missile is hypersonic. Whatever has been circulated in pictures hinted at more or less regular V1-descendant cruise missile layout. This gives me the overall impression that it probably just has a nuclear-heated turbojet. Direct cycle, I would assume, because in its capacity as doomsday weapon, you'd want it easy and reliable, but not really care of a bit radiation along the way. A few kilos of Plutonium in ceramic liners would make a hell (literally) of a burner. Mentioned "liquid" fuel component might still be a first stage booster (which is a bit odd, because the 3M54 uses more practical solid fuel), and that would explain the observed damage after an "oops" when trying to run up the turbojet.
Also, I must note that I disagree with the quoted tone that it is not a "defensive weapon", which makes it sound like angry Ivan is going to slaughter innocent children any day. It's a second strike thing of course, you'd only launch that thing on doomsday, or maybe one day after. In reality they probably came up with it, because the atomic scientists had to be employed with something, and some sandbox games figured out that it would divert US funds from offensive weapons to building a defensive line in the southern US, if they had a credible threat to attack from there. From this view, it would even be important that the 9M730 is subsonic and can be shot down.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:25PM (4 children)
The design concept calls for a reactor with little/zero shielding, if the solid/liquid fuel boosters which take it up to the speeds where the bugger of a ramjet can function go boomski, then you've lots of lovely vapourised fissile material and chunkier bits from said reactor spread over a wide area for everyone to enjoy..
So both dead crew and radioactivity are quite possible..
(Score: 2) by Rich on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:52PM (3 children)
No, it wouldn't cause anything near the radiation-over-time profile in that town. That looks like short-lived decay and neutron-activation products. If they'd lose the fresh reactor with uranium fuel in a big explosion, that'd amount to a salvo of A-10 ammo (a bit more, because it's HEU). With plutonium, the local crew would have an issue with the radiotoxicity and they'd all die of cancer, but not that fast.
There's no point in a static test-run of a ramjet, because it can't cool itself. But it would work with a turbojet. With the few puzzle pieces we have, my best guess is that they had an atomic turbojet, spun it up for a static test, and shut it down again. Vibrations during testing broke a liquid fuel line, and leaking fuel was ignited by the still-hot engine. That would make the press release with the "liquid fuel" and "isotopic power source" a perfectly correct statement, because at this point, the power was not from fission, but by short-time decay isotopes.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:20PM
Sounds "reasonable". A subsonic cruise missile with indefinite range carrying an atomic warhead would be a reasonable second-strike weapon. The problem would be targeting. This is always a problem with cruise missiles, but one designed to reach "anywhere on Earth" rather raises the extent of the problem, particularly since you sure won't be able to count on satellites for navigation.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by BeaverCleaver on Friday August 16 2019, @03:22AM (1 child)
Project Pluto static-tested nuclear ramjets. They just had to use a (big) store of compressed air to simulate flight. Mandatory wikipedia link: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pluto [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by Rich on Friday August 16 2019, @08:23AM
Indeed, but that was a big test bench. They could not have run it up in the completed SLAM at a launch site. I was writing under the assumption that the Russians were about to do a test launch, or two, because there were reports about a no-fly zone and sightings of a specific shelter for the missile. Also, the no-fly-zone hints at that some airborne unit was to be tested, rather than an underwater thing.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:47AM (4 children)
No such thing. If you allow a government to represent you, you are personally responsible for what it does. Also, turning a civilian population against its leaders or breaking the will of the leaders by killing lots of civilians is a very old and very effective strategy.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:38PM (1 child)
This is not about the people of the attacking country. It is not even about the people of the attacked country. This is about people who have the misfortune of living in a country geographically located between the attacking and the attacked country.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:14PM
That's an issue with nukes regardless of the delivery method. It's also a damned good incentive for them to diplomatically pressure anyone in a position to fuck the world up to not do that.
A lot of folks don't get that nukes are not weapons in sane hands, they're tools that can be used to keep things on a diplomatic footing rather than escalating to further bloodshed. Cuba was a fine example of that, or Crimea if you want a somewhat more recent and infinitely more bastardly example.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 15 2019, @03:25PM (1 child)
That assumes you have much of a choice. As a so-called libertarian, you should know better how forceful governments are.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday August 16 2019, @01:56AM
Man, even the French could overthrow their government and they're a bunch of cheese-eating surrender-monkeys.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by garfiejas on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:03PM
I commented on the explosion the other day, but this story reminded me of this https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/28180/b-52-would-have-nuked-soviet-air-defenses-on-the-way-to-their-targets-using-these-missiles [thedrive.com], long range, literally designed to nuke everything with variable yield warheads that lit up its radar on its way to the target, nuke its target(s) and nuke everything that was still radiating EM on its way back to base. Thankfully taken out of service in the early 90's, but there are some awesome images in the article.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:06PM
Not a rocket, but a torpedo. Status 6 "Poseidon", NATO funny codename "Kanyon".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:05PM
since learning about "MAD" and cold war and now i still read about happening wars, i picture the earth and two opposing giants standing on it, leaning towards each other, grabbing each others hands, looking down and squashing whatever they don't like between their toes ...
to continue with this picture, it seems one of the giants has amassed quiet a bit of squished debris and is threatening the solid stance. if the "explosion news" is indeed about a nuclear powered rocket/missile/planet-killer then it is just the effort of the other giant to re-stabilize the stance. afterall, toes need to squish as comfortably as possible...
(Score: 2) by donkeyhotay on Wednesday August 14 2019, @09:14PM
Don't you mean the Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator?