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I'm no expert on this but here's my concern: Could this lead to a weakening of our strategic deterrent down the line?
A basic ABM system (like we have/are developing) has a good chance of intercepting a reasonable amount of missiles. Meaning that if a country develops one, another country should have hundreds to be able to overwhelm it and have enough left over to be a deterrent. You have to consider also that we could not launch all of them simultaneously. Our strategic vehicles (subs, bombers, icbms) would not all survive the enemy's attacks. Not to mention a good portion of our warheads will not detonate correctly or will miss their targets.
What's the magic number then? People get paid a lot to figure this out but I'd guess several hundred to deal with the above considerations. If we make a cut of 80%, we'll have 300 or so left. That's borderline.
Oh, and who cares if there are more warheads that are not deployed-that takes hours/days whereas nuclear warfare is measured in minutes.
This is hilarious. How many nukes do we need? Once the world's destroyed, the other 1000 nukes you wingnuts are whinning about wont be needed. Kind of hard to wipe out humanity twice.
Oh, and who cares if there are more warheads that are not deployed-that takes hours/days whereas nuclear warfare is measured in minutes.[/quote]
We have the ability to launch an ICBM in a matter of minutes. The entire idea of having silos is to survive first-strikes so they can be launched in the first place.
And an ICBM takes some time to travel. Modern missiles travel at around 15k MPH. It would take at least half an hour for most ICBMs to make it to the U.S. And there are only a handful of countries with ICBMs to begin with. It is a pointless political gesture, because nuclear weapons just aren't what they used to be. One has to be more worried about the guy sneaking in a 400lb warhead in the back of a pickup truck than the guy launching it via rocket.
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