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Submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) is a ballistic missile capable of delivering a nuclear warhead that can be launched from submarines. Modern variants usually deliver multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRVs) each of which carries a warhead and allows a single launched missile to strike several targets.
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History
As early as 1934, H. G. Wells predicted, in his The Shape of Things to Come, the use of submarines carrying "long-range air torpedoes with directional apparatus".[citation needed] Though he envisaged these as carrying chemical rather than nuclear warheads, he grasped the far reaching strategic implications. "The smallest of these raiders carried enough of such stuff to 'prepare' about eight hundred square miles of territory; it could have turned London or New York into a cityful of distorted corpses. These vessels made London vulnerable to Japan, Tokyo vulnerable to Dublin; they abolished the last corners of safety in the world."[citation needed]
The first successful tests of a submarine-based launch platform were by German submarines in World War II using a submarine towed launch platform. These and other early SLBM systems required vessels to be surfaced when they fired missiles, but after World War II, launch systems were quickly adapted to allow underwater launching, with the United States making the first underwater launch of a Polaris.
Ballistic missile submarines have been of great strategic importance for the USA and Russia and other nuclear powers since the start of the Cold War, as they can hide from reconnaissance satellites and fire their nuclear weapons with virtual impunity. This makes them immune to a First Strike directed against nuclear forces, allowing each side to maintain the capability to launch a devastating retaliatory strike, even if all land-based missiles have been destroyed. This relieves each side of the necessity to adopt a launch on warning posture, with its grave attendant risk of accidental nuclear war. Additionally, the deployment of highly accurate missiles on ultra-quiet submarines allows an attacker to sneak up close to the enemy coast and launch a missile on a depressed trajectory - a very close range attack which will hit its target in a matter of minutes, thus opening the possibility of a decapitation strike.
Types of SLBMs
Specific types of SLBMs (current, past and under development) include:
United States
- Polaris missile and Chevaline
- Poseidon missile
- Trident missile - current
Soviet Union / Russia
- R-13 SS-N-4
- R-21
- RSM-25 [1]R-27
- RSM-40 [2]R-29 "Vysota", also known as SS-N-8 or "Sawfly"
- RSM-45 R-31[3] also known as SS-N-17 "Snipe"
- R-16 also known as SS-N-17 "Snipe" [reference to R-16 is erroneous)[4]
- RSM-50 [5]R-29RL "Vysota", also known as SS-N-18, NATO name "Stingray"
- RSM-52 [6]R-39 "Rif", also known as SS-N-20
- RSM-54 [7]R-29RM "Shtil" - current, also known as SS-N-23 "Skiff"
- RSM-54 "Sineva" - currently in production
- RSM-56 "Bulava", also known as Bulava-30 - expected in service in 2009
United Kingdom (U.S. supplied)
- Polaris missile and Chevaline
- Trident missile - current
Types of SSBNs
Specific types of ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs) include:
- United States
- James Madison class - former
- Benjamin Franklin class - former
- Ohio class - current
- Russia
- List of NATO reporting names for ballistic missile submarines - current and former
- United Kingdom
- Resolution class - former
- Vanguard class - current
France
- Redoutable class - former
- Triomphant class - current
People's Republic of China
- Type 092 (Xia class) submarine - current
- Type 094 (Jin class) submarine - To be deployed by 2010[12]
India
- Arihant class submarine - Projected to be operational in 2012, India .[13]
See also
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Submarine-launched ballistic missiles |
- ICBM
- nuclear navy
- nuclear warfare
- nuclear strategy
- submarine
- submarine-launched missile
- vertical launching system
Notes
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ Korabli VMF SSSR, Vol. 1, Part 1, Yu. Apalkov, Sankt Peterburg, 2003, ISBN 5-8172-0069-4
- ^ [1]
- ^ http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/27/stories/2008022757940100.htm
- ^ http://ibnlive.in.com/news/india-gets-submarinebased-nuclear-missile/44268-3.html
- ^ DRDO working on 5,500 Km Agni
- ^ [2]
- ^ http://www.in.com/news/readnews-current-affairs-india-joins-elite-club-with-nuclear-submarine-launch-10138511-93408-hp.html
References
External links
- Video showing the launch of a Trident SLBM.
- Estimated Strategic Nuclear Weapons Inventories (September 2004)
- R-11 SLBM
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