Some Original Reporting - ICBM Alternative Uses

I was busy reading an article about how the US military is looking at the idea of turning some of our ICBMs (those would be the nuclear tipped missiles that were formerly aimed at the old Soviet Union in the good old days of mutually assurred destruction) into alternative devices.

What would the alternative uses be?

As Walter Pincus reports in today's Washington Post, Gen. Lord is preparing "alternative uses" for the ICBMs—such as arming them with non-nuclear warheads that can attack underground bunkers or any other target with stunning swiftness.

So, naturally I searched my old email and located this from December 9, 2002, which I will reprint in its entirety. The response from the Department of Defense [dlink@afis.osd.mil] is first, follwed by my original email [note that I have fixed and highlighted certain formatting only, the text is the same as the original]:

Recently you requested personal assistance from our on-line support
center. Below is a summary of your request and our response.
We will assume your issue has been resolved if we do not hear from you
within 120 hours.
Thank you for allowing us to be of service to you.


Subject
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Improving retaliatory strike capabilities


Discussion Thread
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Response (Directorate for Public Inquiry and Analysis) - 11/22/2002
10:53 AM
Dear Mr. xxxxxxx:

You raise some interesting ideas. Using ICBMs in this manner would, however, be incredibly expensive and run counter to some existing arms control agreements.

Customer - 11/22/2002 10:51 AM
Dear Mr. Rumsfield:

I am writing in reference to the lag time between strikes utilizing aircraft or cruise missiles launched from thousands of miles away in attacking hard targets. Many of these strikes are conducted using cruise missiles, which are subsonic, or aircraft strikes that take hours to reach their targets.

A swift response to strikes would be possible with the retrofitting of ICBMs with hardened conventional weapons packages. These new warheads, each with 500 pounds of explosives, would improve the ability to hit hardened targets or bunkers due to the incredible speeds attained by launch into suborbital trajectories. Instead of waiting hours for attacking targets, the targets can be attacked within 30 minutes from bases within the US.

The high accuracy of using ballistic missile technology is another plus, since jamming and effective defenses are not present in the potential theaters of conflict.

I would welcome further discussion on the matter and can be reached at lawhawk@yahoo.com.

Sincerely,

So, the costs associated with modifying the ICBMs were too great only three years ago, but now alternatives should be considered because the missile commands need something to do? Also, the same concerns raised about using ICBMs are again raised in the new piece in Slate [missile launches might be misinterpreted as nuclear first-strikes by the Chinese or Russians, which would be a real bad thing]. Except that the comments are being raised by the DoD in my email, not by the reporter in the WaPo or in Slate.

Interesting.

Only took the WaPo, Slate, and the DoD nearly three years to come to a conclusion that I wrote about three years ago. In D.C./Pentagon time, that must be a new kind of record.