ARMS-D-Request@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU (Moderator) (03/16/87)
Arms-Discussion Digest Sunday, March 15, 1987 4:39PM
Volume 7, Issue 109
Today's Topics:
Missile protocol
spot checking works for paranoia about booby traps too
US NEWS article on 'Smart' Weapons - questions and concerns
The relative cost of armaments
What if HALF the U.S. nucs were vaporized?
Re: nuclear weapons effects (was: SLBMs in the Great Lakes)
Short summary of Palo Alto CPSR talk by Dr. Tommy Thompson
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Date: Wed, 11 Mar 87 22:14:13 PST
From: tedrick@ernie.Berkeley.EDU (Tom Tedrick)
Subject: Missile protocol
>A serious problem: how do they know that the box does not contain a
>cartridge of nerve gas that can be triggered by remote control? Or even
>a miniature fission bomb? Even remote control is not actually needed,
>just a timer: "detonate at 0400 GMT on 4 July 1999".
There is a way around this problem. For example, present them with
2 boxes which appear identical. Let them open one, use the other.
In that case, assuming cheating would be detected if the box was
opened, the chance of cheating without being detected is <= 1/2.
And there are ways to shrink this probability, of course.
------------------------------
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM%IMSSS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Subject:spot checking works for paranoia about booby traps too
<P> Date: Tue, 10 Mar 87 09:48:01 pst
<P> From: pyramid!utzoo!henry%hplabs@hplabs.HP.COM
<P> Subject: Re: Verification of Mobile Missiles
<P> A serious problem: how do they know that the box does not contain a
<P> cartridge of nerve gas that can be triggered by remote control? Or even
<P> a miniature fission bomb? Even remote control is not actually needed,
<P> just a timer: "detonate at 0400 GMT on 4 July 1999".
That problem is trivial to solve. Amend my message of yestersday
(please read it before reading this). In addition to allowing us to
physically inspect 5% of our boxes (our choice, although our optimal
strategy would be to pick them at random) to verify they haven't
removed them from launchers or tampered with them, allow them to
dismantle 5% of our boxes (their choice) to verify they don't contain
bombs or other booby traps, each year.
<P> Tricky; how do you know that box and mounting have not been cut away from
<P> the platform?
(See my message of yesterday exactly, which I see happens to exactly
follow yours in the digest so presumably you've seen it by now.
Fortuitous juxtaposition, a question and the answer even though the
answer wasn't aware of the question at the time of posting.)
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Date: Thu, 12 Mar 87 15:55:21 PST
From: ihnp4!ihlpm!dcn@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU
Subject: The relative cost of armaments
THE NEED FOR CHOICE
- or -
What you can buy and operate for $180 million/year,
amortized over 10 years (1971 dollars)
Quantity Item
-------- ----
25,000 Infantrymen
1,200 155mm self-propelled howitzers
1,000 MBT-70 tanks
410 Improved Cobra gunships
380 A-4 Skyhawk aircraft
190 Cheyenne helicopters
75 F-15 fighters
1 Nuclear aircraft carrier (with planes)
-------------------------------------------------------
>From "Land Warfare" by Norman R. Augustine.
Dave Newkirk, ihnp4!ihlpm!dcn
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Mar 87 09:55:16 PST
From: jon@june.cs.washington.edu (Jon Jacky)
Subject: US NEWS article on 'Smart' Weapons - questions and concerns
The cover story of the March 16, 1987 issue of US NEWS AND WORLD REPORT
is a long and colorfully-illustrated story on various high-technology
tactical weapons. The story is somewhat informative but isn't real clear
about which weapons already exist and are deployed, which are in development
now, and which are just gleams in someone's eye. In particular, the article
blurs the distinctions between what appear to be three rather distinct
categories of weapons:
1. Precision guided weapons - The soldier selects the target and guides
the weapon all the way to the target. These include the TOW optic fibre
guided rockets and the various laser-guided bombs (which work because someone
focuses light on the target, which the bomb homes in on). These are by now
deployed all over the place and often work well, although they are not
panaceas. A difficulty is that the soldier must often remain exposed during
the whole flight time of the weapon.
2. "Fire and forget" weapons - The soldier selects the target, but the weapon
guides itself to the target. This is significantly harder. The most
effective examples seem to depend on the target making itself very
conspicuous, for example the HARM anti-radiation missiles that home in on
radar beacons. The article also describes AMRAAM, an air-to-air missile of
which it is said "a pilot can fire as soon as he detects an enemy aircraft.
He can immediately steer clear while the missile tracks and kills the enemy
with no further help." The story says AMRAAM is "costly and controversial"
but is "now being tested." Is this for real? I vaguely recall hearing
about AMRAAM off and on for many years, and thought it was in a lot of
trouble, a bit like the Sgt. York.
3. Autonomous weapons - The weapon itself selects the target. I have a lot
of trouble with this one. For one thing, it is obviously a lot more difficult
technically than even "fire and forget;" The article rather blurs this
distinction. The article says,
"Smart bombs that require human control might not be good enough. ... A simple
stick-figure picture of a target, such as a railroad bridge, is put into one
"autonomous guided bomb" under development. Launched at very low level with
a strap-on rocket, the bomb flies a preplanned route until it sees something
to attack that matches its computer's picture."
Does anyone recognize the project refered to here? Is this thought feasible?
Based on my understanding of the state of the art in image understanding, I
would have thought not. Does this possibly represent some reporter's
understanding of some rather speculative document like the 1983 DARPA
Strategic Computing Report?
Another autonomous weapon which is evidently farther along is SADARM:
"The Army's Sense and Destroy Armor (SADARM) smart-weapon system uses
advanced radar, heat sensors, and a miniature onboard computer ... Fired
from artillery, ... the submunitions, each a small, self-contained weapon,
would pop a small parachute and spin slowly down as it scans for telltale
signatures of self-propelled guns. Once it sensed the presence of a target,
it would aim for the center and fire an explosively formed slug of
metal that slams into the lightly armored top of the vehicle, filling the
crew compartment with a hail of deadly shrapnel."
What are these "telltale signatures?" Are they all that discriminatory?
Elsewhere, the article implies that distinguishing tanks from trucks and
jeeps is not much of a problem. Is that true, _in the context of this
kind of weapon_?
The article strives for journalistic balance in the usual way: Proponent
A says these are necessary and would be effective, critic B charges they
may be ineffective and we should not become too dependent. What I find
missing is the notion that perhaps such judgments need not be based on
personal opinion, that it ought to be possible to design tests that determine
these things. That is, maybe A is right and B is wrong (or vice versa).
I assume the people who work on these understand that, but
the concept never really appears in the article. Also, the article implies
that the strategy and doctrine of relying rather heavily on this kind of
stuff is almost dogma by now, rather than still being provisional and
much debated in strategy circles. Is that true?
The article is especially good in in explaining why such weapons are thought
necessary:
Population trends tell the story ... West Germany has the world's lowest
birth rate. ... By 1994 the draftee pool will shrink nearly in half. In
America, political realities impose an equally inflexible obstacle. "How
far do you think a President would get who wanted to reinstate the draft,
expand the standing armies by three or four times, and deploy a major portion
of that force overseas?" asked Joseph Braddock (of the defense think-tank,
BDM). "We don't have much choice," adds former Defense Secretary Harold
Brown. "We've got to choose quality over quantity."
-Jonathan Jacky
University of Washington
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Mar 87 11:23:27 PST
From: "Clifford Johnson" <GA.CJJ@STANFORD.BITNET>
Subject: What if HALF the U.S. nucs were vaporized?
The consensus seems to be that the Soviets would not invade/wipe-out
the U.S., but would encroach on "vital interests" elsewhere, were
the U.S. nuclear arsenal to be eliminated. We wouldn't want that,
also seems the consensus. But perhaps it is more important to note
that were just ONE HALF of the U.S. arsenal to be eliminated (across
the board), nothing would change. I think it's imbecilic to suppose
that the U.S. deterrent would be significantly less dreadful. After
all, it was about 1960 that Eisenhower was deeply shocked by
overkill levels, and that was before 1000 Minuteman (obtained
through the missile-gap hoax), Cruises, Tridents, etc. Does anyone
disagree? Does anyone think the Soviets would attempt to translate
pointless numerical superiority into third-world coercion?
On the one hand, no-nukers naively? want to go too far too soon. On
the other hand, military (and some influential arms control)
strategists childishly? found nuclear posture on the PRESUMPTION
that unless the U.S. has at least the same number of nucs as the
U.S.S.R., it can be bullied into third-world concessions. This is
the theory of "escalation dominance:" in a game of chicken, the
smaller car will swerve first. Not only is this transparently
illogical, but savings in eliminating half of our nucs could
strengthen credible forces. Here's how the section "Nuclear Forces"
is summarized by the Joint Chiefs (FY 1988 Military Posture):
"The overall military balance is critical to US and allied security.
Adverse trends in either nuclear or conventional capabilities lessen
assurance that aggression against US and allied interests can be
deterred and increase the risks of coercion. Although significant
progress has been made towards redressing trends unfavorable to the
West, this progress has not compensated fully for decades of high
Soviet investment."
Re the risks of nuclear coercion, the record indicates that the U.S.
has concretely threatened to use nucs on 19 separate occasions,
versus zero threats from the U.S.S.R.
To: ARMS-D@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
------------------------------
Subject: Re: nuclear weapons effects (was: SLBMs in the Great Lakes)
Date: Fri, 13 Mar 87 13:52:23 PST
From: Vern Paxson <vern@lbl-csam.arpa>
"The Effects of Nuclear Weapons", compiled and edited by Samuel Glasstone
and Philip J. Dolan, and listed as "For sale by the Superintendent of
Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 20402",
seems to me to be a good reference for the nitty-gritty on nuclear
blasts. In sections 6.41-6.52 they discuss Characteristics of Underwater
Bursts. They give one set of hard numbers:
For example, the peak overpressure at 3,000 feet from a
100-kiloton burst in deep water is about 2,700 pounds
per square inch, compared with a few pounds per square
inch for an air burst.
A 5 PSI overpressure is enough to completely destroy a building. The
authors state that the duration of the shock wave in water is a few
hundredths of that in air, so that will lessen the damage. While subs
are built to withstand high pressures (though not 2,700 PSI, I'd
think), the *very* sudden pressure increase from a blast may still be
enough to destroy a sub some distance (> 1 mile) away.
Vern Paxson vern@lbl-csam.arpa
Real Time Systems ucbvax!lbl-csam.arpa!vern
Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (415) 486-6411
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Mar 87 13:58:07 pst
From: Eugene Miya N. <eugene@ames-pioneer.arpa>
Subject: Short summary of Palo Alto CPSR talk by Dr. Tommy Thompson
Preface:
Several years ago, I worked with a friend (Caltech grad, PhD in CS U
Wisc.) at JPL at a time of great unrest. Many people left the Lab for
a variety of reasons, but this one friend and I maintained contact
when he went to work at LLNL while I went to Ames. In time, I met
other people (some weapons designers or "weapons physicists" from
the Lab and the friend pointed out that people at his Livermore church
thought about inviting some of the protestors to speak
(Livermore Action Committee); this never happened.
But in time, I did suggest members from Computer Professionals for
Social Responsibility (CPSR) and Labbies could meet. This did happen
and CPSR members spoke to a small audience at the Lab (unfortunately the
person who arranged this had a terminally ill wife at the time).
Wednesday, we had the reverse situation, a member of the weapons design
staff at the Lab spoke to a CPSR audience. I did not know Tommy before
hand, but other weaponeer friends and their associates (including Lowell
Wood) have attend Palo Alto Chapter meetings.
Background:
Tommy Thompson is a weapons physicist who has worked on problems of ABM.
His area right now is non-nuclear SDI.
Introduction:
Tommy's talk began as an analysis of the causes of and measures to prevent war.
This section was perceived as somewhat dull to the audience (nods), but
it was important as this was lunchtime physicist talk as another
weaponeer friend pointed out.
He covered treatries (basically said they don't work or that you would
want assurance). He covered various aspects of deterence. Causes are
the typically presented sociological causes.
His basic position was that he was in favor of research to develop
terminal defense and that boost phase defense was basically the
requirement of defending cities and he was not in favor of city defense.
Numerous people asked him about internal Lab beliefs to which he
responded that 70% of the people in the know at LLNL were only
interested in terminal defense and only Reagan was for "obsoleting
nuclear weapons." To which people asked, if your expert technicals
views are not understood by the higher-ups, We'll help your 70%.
Tommy's basic reason for research was to break the business as usual
offensive weapons development in favor of a more defense weapons
approach. Tommy did acknowledge the use of X-ray and particle beam
weapons (including nuclear device fueled systems), but that he was in
favor of the non-nuclear terminal defense for reasons of simplitcity
(re: decoys), treaty verification as opposed to ICBM launch vehicles,
There was no name calling, and there is little of the moralizing
"How can you work on etc...." but one person pointed out that he was
passing some of this negative nuclear responsibility (problems) on to
his children rather than try to resolve the solution now. The classic
response of "If you can show me a better way, please do."
He tried to illustrate how you have strategic weapons back up tactical
weapons, which back up conventional forces which backup foreign policy.
This pyramid was quite detailed and I won't over it further since you
can guess how it goes and what criticism arose.
Interesting Q&A:
I asked if he did not like the Triad concept (noted in his talk as
against Fleet Ballistic Missile subs). Tommy said yes. He did
not like FBM subs. Turned out we had a former FBM sub officer in the
audience who strongly disagreed with Tommy's position and felt it was
the best and safest part of the triad. Tommy had questioned the
human-factors verification decision to which this ex-officer pointed out
that no sub commander would ever rise that far is he had doubts about
firing missiles. The questioner also pointed out that subs drop less
than 10 feet, the Pacific is vast and not likely to easily find subs,
and that most subs are aware that they could be blown out of the water
quickly. Forward launching velocity must be less than 1 1/2 knots
preferably 1/2 knot.
Tommy has designed nuclear weapons in the past, and one of my questions
was one I asked another friend "Have you ever designed a dud?" Tommy's
answer was, "Since I'm not telling you the when or the why (long pauses
between words), I can say yes (smile)."
The other programs Tommy worked on were Safeguard and Sentinel. Tommy
mentioned that these other ABM programs failed because tracking and
acquisition consideratons. Tommy was in favor of hardening, of course,
for CEPs of 1,000 meters.
Dave Redell did mention the proposal to use nuclear weapons throwing
dirty tup into the paths of incoming warheads. If there are questions,
I could try to answer some from memory, I really didn't take notes.
This contrasted to my next day's meeting where the topic of weapons
effects and shock waves passing thru "objects" were part of the
conversations. Hum.
Unfortunately, Cliff Johnson did not come (wish you had Cliff), and many
of the typical National CPSR officers were not there (Severo, Laura,
Gary, Lucy).
From the Rock of Ages Home for Retired Hackers:
--eugene miya
NASA Ames Research Center
eugene@ames-aurora.ARPA
"You trust the `reply' command with all those different mailers out there?"
"Send mail, avoid follow-ups. If enough, I'll summarize."
{hplabs,hao,ihnp4,decwrl,allegra,tektronix,menlo70}!ames!aurora!eugene
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End of Arms-Discussion Digest
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