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96-583: The RT-2 was the first solid-propellant ICBM in Soviet service, and was a development of the earlier RT-1 series. It was a three-stage inertially-guided missile comparable to the American Minuteman missile . It was armed with a single 600 kiloton warhead and was silo-launched, although a rail-based version was contemplated by Soviet planners. It was deployed in the Yoshkar-Ola missile field. The Soviets used

192-603: A second strike and countervalue counterattack if the U.S. was attacked. However, the development of the United States Navy (USN) UGM-27 Polaris , which addressed the same role, allowed the Air Force to modify the Minuteman, boosting its accuracy enough to attack hardened military targets, including Soviet missile silos. The Minuteman II entered service in 1965 with a host of upgrades to improve its accuracy and survivability in

288-509: A solid-fuel rocket motor could stand ready to launch for long periods of time, in contrast to liquid-fueled rockets that required fueling before launch and so might be destroyed in a surprise attack. The missile was named for the colonial minutemen of the American Revolutionary War , who could be ready to fight on short notice. The Minuteman entered service in 1962 as a deterrence weapon that could hit Soviet cities with

384-608: A $ 13.3 billion sole-source contract for development of the LGM-35 after Boeing withdrew its proposal. Northrop Grumman's subcontractors on the LGM-35 include Lockheed Martin , General Dynamics , Bechtel , Honeywell , Aerojet Rocketdyne , Parsons , Textron , and others. On January 19, 2024, the USAF announced that the program’s costs had risen to over $ 125 billion—37% above the initial $ 95.3 billion budget—and its deployment would be delayed by two years. A revised cost estimate released by

480-428: A D-17 disk revolution was 10 ms. The D-17 also used a number of short loops for faster access to intermediate results storage. The D-17 computational minor cycle was three disk revolutions or 30 ms. During that time all recurring computations were performed. For ground operations, the inertial platform was aligned and gyro correction rates updated. During a flight, filtered command outputs were sent by each minor cycle to

576-507: A Washington, DC think tank in November 2023, explained that the program had encountered "unknown unknowns" and was due for a "re-baseline." He noted, "As we get more into the program, as we understand more deeply what we're actually going to have to do, we're finding some things that are going to cost money. There's no question about that." In March 2019, the W87 Mod 1 (W87-1) thermonuclear warhead

672-530: A ball which could rotate in two directions. Conventional solutions used a shaft with ball bearings at either end that allowed it to rotate around a single axis only. Autonetics' design meant that only two gyros would be needed for the inertial platform, instead of the typical three. The last major advance was to use a general-purpose digital computer in place of the analog or custom designed digital computers. Previous missile designs normally used two single-purpose and very simple electromechanical computers; one ran

768-480: A continuous low rate cycle. Systems in a missile would detect failures, at which point it would be removed and recycled, while a newly built missile would take its place. The missile design was based purely on lowest possible cost, reducing its size and complexity because "the basis of the weapon's merit was its low cost per completed mission; all other factors – accuracy, vulnerability, and reliability – were secondary." Hall's plan did not go unopposed, especially by

864-423: A decade from the late 2020s, are estimated over a fifty-year life cycle to cost around $ 264 billion. Boeing and Northrop Grumman competed for the contract. In August 2017, the Air Force awarded three-year development contracts to Boeing and Northrop Grumman for $ 349 million and $ 329 million, respectively. One of these companies was to be selected to produce a ground-based nuclear ICBM in 2020. The GBSD program

960-498: A length of 55 ft 11 in (17.04 m). The Minuteman I weighed roughly 65,000 lb (29,000 kg), had an operational range of 5,500 nmi (6,300 mi; 10,200 km) with an accuracy of about 1.5 mi (2.4 km). The Minuteman I Autonetics D-17 flight computer used a rotating air bearing magnetic disk holding 2,560 "cold-stored" words in 20 tracks (write heads disabled after program fill) of 24 bits each and one alterable track of 128 words. The time for

1056-805: A modern ICBM system rose to 65 percent, compared to only 15 percent in favor of refurbishing. The ICBM Coalition in Congress, which lobbies for the GBSD, was able to limit the reduction of deployed land-based missiles to 50 in the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) . As of May 2021, membership in the coalition included senators from states that will either house or develop the proposed GBSD missiles: Co-Chair, Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND); Co-Chair, Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT); Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY); Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT); Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT); Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD). Tester serves as Chair of

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1152-465: A nuclear war. Critics say that the targeting of ICBM silos, which are supposed to act like a sponge drawing nuclear weapons to deplete Russia's nuclear power, could result in the deaths of more than 10 million people. Ellsberg and author Norman Solomon argue that peace groups must oppose not only the GBSD but also the entire land-based leg of the nuclear triad to reduce the threat of an accidental nuclear war. Physicist David Wright, former co-director of

1248-427: A program to improve transistor and component reliability 100 times, leading to the "Minuteman high-rel parts" specifications. The techniques developed during this program were equally useful for improving all transistor construction, and greatly reduced the failure rate of transistor production lines in general. This improved yield, which had the effect of greatly lowering production costs, had enormous spin-off effects in

1344-542: A report entitled Common Ground of the American People , which was a compilation of studies conducted over the previous five years, collecting data from nearly 86,000 individuals who were polled on the GBSD. Sixty-one percent of Americans–including both Democratic and Republican majorities–said they supported phasing out the United States' 400 land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles. Another 2020 poll conducted by

1440-471: A single Soviet missile. In any conceivable scenario where both sides had similar numbers of ICBMs, the US forces would survive a sneak attack in sufficient numbers to ensure the destruction of all major Soviet cities in return. The Soviets would not risk an attack under these conditions. Considering this countervalue attack concept, strategic planners calculated that an attack of "400 equivalent megatons" aimed at

1536-620: A single target, whose precise trajectory information was hard-coded directly in the system's logic. In 1957, a series of intelligence reports suggested the Soviet Union was far ahead in the missile race and would be able to overwhelm the US by the early 1960s. If the Soviets were building missiles in the numbers being predicted by the CIA and others within the defense establishment, by as early as 1961 they would have enough to attack all SAC and ICBM bases in

1632-482: A sneak attack. This had initially been proposed as a way to defend the SAC bomber fleet. The Army argued that upgraded Soviet missiles might be able to attack US missiles in their silos, and Zeus would be able to blunt such an attack. Zeus was expensive and the Air Force said it was more cost-effective to build another Minuteman missile. Given the large size and complexity of the Soviet liquid-fueled missiles, an ICBM building race

1728-548: A way to improve launch times or survivability, but part of a radical plan to greatly reduce the cost of ICBMs so that thousands could be built. He envisioned a future where ICBMs were the primary weapon of the US, not in the supporting role of "last ditch backup" as the Air Force saw them at the time. This would require huge deployments, which would not be possible with existing weapons due to their high cost and operational manpower requirements. A solid fuel design would be simpler to build, and easier to maintain. Hall's ultimate plan

1824-611: A wider range of targets. Some missiles also carried penetration aids, allowing the higher probability of kill against Moscow's anti-ballistic missile system . The payload consisted of a single Mk-11C reentry vehicle containing a W56 nuclear warhead with a yield of 1.2 megatons of TNT (5 PJ ). The Minuteman II had a length of 57 ft 7 in (17.55 m), weighed roughly 73,000 lb (33,000 kg), had an operational range of 6,300 mi (10,200 km) with an accuracy of about 1 mi (1.6 km). The major new features provided by Minuteman II were: System modernization

1920-607: A written statement, President Obama agreed to "modernize or replace" all three legs of the triad. A request for proposal for development and maintenance of a next-generation nuclear ICBM was made by the US Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center in July 2016. The GBSD would replace the Minuteman III , which was first deployed in 1970, in the land-based portion of the US nuclear triad. The new missiles, to be phased in over

2016-625: Is dangerous and could trigger a nuclear war. According to William Hartung, author of Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex , a president would have only minutes to decide whether to launch ICBMs in a crisis so that the missiles would not be destroyed in a first strike. In 2020, the Program for Public Consultation at the University of Maryland, issued

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2112-595: The Air Force Global Strike Command . As of 2024 , the LGM-30G (Version 3) is the only land-based ICBM in service in the United States and represents the land leg of the U.S. nuclear triad , along with the Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) and nuclear weapons carried by long-range strategic bombers . Development of the Minuteman began in the mid-1950s when basic research indicated that

2208-583: The Department of the Air Force awarded Northrop Grumman a $ 13.3 billion contract to develop the GBSD intercontinental ballistic missile. Work on the GBSD missiles will be done in Roy and Promontory , Utah; Huntsville and Montgomery, Alabama ; Colorado Springs, Colorado ; Bellevue, Nebraska ; San Diego and Woodland Hills, California ; Vandenberg Space Force Base , California; Chandler, Arizona ; Annapolis Junction, Maryland ; and other locations. In April 2022,

2304-629: The Ground Based Strategic Deterrent ( GBSD ), is a future American land-based intercontinental ballistic missile system (ICBM) currently in the early stages of development. It is slated to replace all 450 Minuteman III missiles from 2029 through 2075. The Minuteman missiles are currently stationed in North Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, and Nebraska. In 2020 the Department of the Air Force awarded defense contractor Northrop Grumman

2400-641: The National Nuclear Security Administration , after a 35-year-long hiatus. The Air Force intends to deploy a single warhead on each missile. The Congressional Research Service notes that the high throw-weight of the missile could provide options for it to carry several MIRVs or penetration aids at a future time, if prospective enemies develop credible anti-ballistic missile defenses. GBSD testing would occur mainly at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, and at Vandenberg Space Force Base (VSFB), California, with missile launches from VSFB over

2496-703: The Strategic Air Command 's arsenal in 1962. After the first batch of Minuteman I's were fully developed and ready for stationing, the United States Air Force (USAF) had originally decided to put the missiles at Vandenberg AFB in California, but before the missiles were set to officially be moved there it was discovered that this first set of Minuteman missiles had defective boosters which limited their range from their initial 6,300 miles (10,100 km) to 4,300 miles (6,900 km). This defect would cause

2592-641: The United States Air Force website, the L in LGM is the Department of Defense designation for silo-launched ; G means surface attack ; and "M" stands for guided missile . In 2010, the ICBM Coalition, legislators from states that house nuclear missiles, told President Obama they would not support ratification of the New START treaty with Russia unless Obama agreed to revamp the US nuclear triad : nuclear weapons that could be launched from land, sea, and air. In

2688-414: The autopilot that kept the missile flying along a programmed course, and the second compared the information from the inertial platform to the target coordinates and sent any needed corrections to the autopilot. To reduce the total number of parts used in Minuteman, a single faster computer was used, running separate subroutines for these functions. Since the guidance program would not be running while

2784-510: The 1960s, became increasingly vulnerable to surface-to-air missiles . The B-1 of the early 1970s eventually emerged with a price tag around $ 200 million (equivalent to $ 600 million in 2023) while the Minuteman IIIs built during the 1970s cost only $ 7 million ($ 30 million in 2023). The Air Force countered that having a variety of platforms complicated the defense; if the Soviets built an effective anti-ballistic missile system of some sort,

2880-494: The 1970s, 1,000 Minuteman missiles were deployed. This force has shrunk to 400 Minuteman III missiles as of September 2017 , deployed in missile silos around Malmstrom AFB , Montana ; Minot AFB , North Dakota ; and Francis E. Warren AFB , Wyoming . The Minuteman III will be progressively replaced by the new LGM-35 Sentinel ICBM, to be built by Northrop Grumman , beginning in 2030. Minuteman owes its existence largely to Air Force Colonel Edward N. Hall , who in 1956

2976-604: The 1990s. It's not clear exactly why the W59 was replaced by the W56 after deployment but issues with "... one-point safety" and "performance under aged conditions" were cited in a 1987 congressional report regarding the warhead. Chuck Hansen alleged that all weapons sharing the "Tsetse" nuclear primary design including the W59 suffered from a critical one-point safety issue and suffered premature tritium aging issues that needed to be corrected after entry into service. The LGM-30F Minuteman II

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3072-449: The Atlas and Titan at 120 inches (3.0 m), which meant smaller and cheaper silos. Hall's goal of dramatic cost reduction was a success, although many of the other concepts of his missile farm were abandoned. Previous long-range missiles used liquid fuels that could be loaded only just prior to firing. The loading process took from 30 to 60 minutes in typical designs. Although lengthy, this

3168-509: The Boeing project, leaving Northrop Grumman as the sole bidder for the contract by October 2019. In December 2019, it was announced that Northrop Grumman won the competition to build the future ICBM. Northrop won by default, as their bid was the only one left to be considered for the GBSD program. The Air Force said that they would "proceed with an aggressive and effective sole-source negotiation" in reference to Northrop's bid. On 8 September 2020,

3264-511: The Department of Defense on July 8, 2024, put total program acquisition costs for the Sentinel program at $ 140.9 billion. The United States Air Force plans to procure 634 Sentinel missiles, plus an additional 25 missiles to support development and testing, to enable the deployment of 400 missiles. According to the Air Force, the program also includes modernizing "450 silos and more than 600 facilities across almost 40,000 square miles". According to

3360-573: The Federation of American Scientists and ReThink Media found a majority of both Republicans and Democrats favored alternative solutions to the GBSD, including extending the life of the Minuteman III ICBM. Over 800 registered voters were surveyed, with an oversampling of 200 registered voters in ICBM states: Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, Nebraska and Wyoming. When respondents were asked, "What do you think

3456-476: The GBSD because I believe there's still an important deterrent." Jennifer Granholm , Secretary of Energy in the Biden administration, told the press on April 9, 2021, "We have to keep and maintain the stockpile to make sure that it is safe and effective, and we will continue to do that to ensure that we can deter nuclear aggression from other countries." GBSD critics include former Secretary of Defense William Perry ;

3552-515: The GBSD include the Heritage Foundation , Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin , former Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and members of Congress in the "ICBM Coalition." They argue that the current ICBMs, first introduced in the 1970s, have had their life extended long enough and need to be replaced with a modular system in which components are easier to replace or update. In defending the importance of land-based missiles, supporters say they are

3648-600: The GBSD's official designation was announced: The LGM-35A Sentinel. In April 2023, the USAF formally began seeking vendor information preliminary to issuing a request for proposal (RFP) for the Next-generation reentry vehicle (NGRV). On January 19, 2024, the USAF announced that the LGM-35A Sentinel program will exceed its original budget estimate of $ 95.3 billion by at least 37%, pushing the total cost to over $ 125 billion, and

3744-412: The ICBM and SLBM fleet might be rendered useless, while the bombers would remain. This became the nuclear triad concept, which survives into the present. Although this argument was successful, the number of manned bombers has been repeatedly cut and the deterrent role increasingly passed to missiles. The LGM-30A Minuteman I was first test-fired on 1 February 1961 at Cape Canaveral , entering into

3840-455: The Minuteman II had a CEP of 0.26 nautical miles (0.48 km; 0.30 mi). Additionally, the computers were upgraded with more memory, allowing them to store information for eight targets, which the missile crews could select among almost instantly, greatly increasing their flexibility. From that point, Minuteman became the US's primary deterrent weapon, until its performance was matched by

3936-501: The Minuteman project, sending him to the UK to oversee deployment of the Thor IRBM . On his return to the US in 1959, Hall retired from the Air Force. He received his second Legion of Merit in 1960 for his work on solid fuels. Although he was removed from the Minuteman project, Hall's work on cost reduction had already produced a new design of 71 inches (1.8 m) diameter, much smaller than

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4032-516: The Navy's Trident missile of the 1980s. Questions about the need for the manned bomber were quickly raised. The Air Force began to offer a number of reasons why the bomber offered value, in spite of costing more money to buy and being much more expensive to operate and maintain. Newer bombers with better survivability, like the B-70 , cost many times more than the Minuteman, and, in spite of great efforts through

4128-682: The Pacific Ocean. Additional testing would be conducted at U.S. Army Dugway Proving Ground, Utah, U.S. Army Garrison–Kwajalein Atoll and within the territorial waters of the Republic of the Marshall Islands. On 7 July 2022, a Minotaur II+ rocket launched from Vandenberg TP-01 for a suborbital reentry vehicle (Mk21A reentry vehicle belonging to AFNWC) demonstration mission for the future LGM-35A Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile. Supporters of

4224-814: The Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee. During a spring 2021 event hosted by the Washington, D.C.–based Advanced Nuclear Weapons Alliance, Tester said he was committed to keeping the GBSD "on track" though added there will be debate about the proposed new missiles during the 2022 defense appropriations process. According to the Arms Control Association, Caucus Senators received the following contributions from military contractors from 2012-2020: Romney ($ 645,000); Tester ($ 102,360); Barasso ($ 89,000); Daines ($ 85,948); Enzi ($ 68,500); Cramer ($ 49,593). In total, military contractors have donated $ 1.2 million to

4320-478: The Soviet Union, and thus impossible to attack by either ICBM, because they were moving, or long-range interceptor aircraft , because they were too far away. In the shorter term, looking to rapidly increase the number of missiles in its force, Minuteman was given crash development status starting in September 1958. Advanced surveying of the potential silo sites had already begun in late 1957. Adding to their concerns

4416-560: The UCS Global Security Program, in his report Rethinking Land-Based Nuclear Missiles , writes that submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) are as accurate, if not more, than land-based missiles, and are "virtually undetectable," making the ICBMs not only obsolete but also sitting ducks in the five states that house ICBMs. Wright concludes that the vulnerability of ICBMs has prompted the Air Force to keep them on high alert, which

4512-489: The US in a single first strike . It was later demonstrated that this " missile gap " was just as fictional as the " bomber gap " of a few years earlier, but through the late 1950s, it was a serious concern. The Air Force responded by beginning research into survivable strategic missiles, starting the WS-199 program. Initially, this focused on air-launched ballistic missiles , which would be carried aboard aircraft flying far from

4608-495: The US's primary weapon of nuclear war. Chief among these qualities was its digital computer, the D-17B. This could be updated in the field with new targets and better information about the flight paths with relative ease, gaining accuracy for little cost. One of the unavoidable effects on the warhead's trajectory was the mass of the Earth, which contains many mass concentrations that pull on

4704-519: The bases had 150 missiles emplaced; F.E. Warren had 200 of the Minuteman IB missiles. Malmstrom had 150 of the Minuteman I, and about five years later added 50 of the Minuteman II similar to those installed at Grand Forks AFB , ND. The Minuteman I's length varied based on which variation one was to look at. The Minuteman I/A had a length of 53 ft 8 in (16.36 m) and the Minuteman I/B had

4800-402: The burn, which made them questionable for the sort of accuracy required to hit a target at intercontinental range. While this initially appeared to be an insurmountable problem, it ended up being solved in an almost trivial fashion. A series of ports were added inside the rocket nozzle that were opened when the guidance systems called for engine cut-off. The reduction in pressure was so abrupt that

4896-553: The computer, the D-17B , was built in the form of a drum machine but used a hard disk in place of the drum. Building a computer with the required performance, size and weight demanded the use of transistors , which were at that time very expensive and not very reliable. Earlier efforts to use computers for guidance, BINAC and the system on the SM-64 Navaho , had failed and were abandoned. The Air Force and Autonetics spent millions on

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4992-432: The current Minuteman III ICBM system is over 50 years old, the majority of respondents said the ICBMs should be replaced by a modern system, compared to 23 percent who said the ICBMs should be refurbished to extend their current life. Just five percent indicated an opinion that they should be eliminated entirely. When informed that Russia and China have modernized their nuclear arsenals, support for replacing Minuteman III with

5088-556: The current members of the Senate ICBM Coalition and more than $ 15 million to the 64 members of the influential committees, the Senate and House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittees and the Senate and House Appropriations defense subcommittees, that can decide the fate of ICBM legislation. ICBM contractors are also engaged in lobbying representatives in Congress, with corporate backers of GBSD employing 380 lobbyists, according to

5184-411: The electronics industry. Using a general-purpose computer also had long-lasting effects on the Minuteman program and the US's nuclear stance in general. With Minuteman, the targeting could be easily changed by loading new trajectory information into the computer's hard drive, a task that could be completed in a few hours. Earlier ICBMs' custom wired computers, on the other hand, could have attacked only

5280-696: The engine nozzles. Unlike modern computers, which use descendants of that technology for secondary storage on hard disk , the disk was the active computer memory . The disk storage was considered hardened to radiation from nearby nuclear explosions, making it an ideal storage medium. To improve computational speed, the D-17 borrowed an instruction look-ahead feature from the Autonetics-built Field Artillery Data Computer ( M18 FADAC ) that permitted simple instruction execution every word time. At its introduction into service in 1962, Minuteman I

5376-502: The face of an anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system the Soviets were known to be developing. In 1970, the Minuteman III became the first deployed ICBM with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV): three smaller warheads that improved the missile's ability to strike targets defended by ABMs. They were initially armed with the W62 warhead with a yield of 170 kilotons . By

5472-402: The fuel into large cylinders with a star-shaped hole running along the inner axis. This allowed the fuel to burn along the entire length of the cylinder, rather than just the end as in earlier designs. The increased burn rate meant increased thrust. This also meant the heat was spread across the entire motor, instead of the end, and because it burned from the inside out it did not reach the wall of

5568-408: The future, as it allowed the missile to be extended and carry more fuel and payload. During Minuteman's early development, the Air Force maintained the policy that the manned strategic bomber was the primary weapon of nuclear war. Blind bombing accuracy on the order of 1,500 feet (0.46 km) was expected, and the weapons were sized to ensure even the hardest targets would be destroyed as long as

5664-535: The government should do about ICBMs?", 30 percent favored updating existing ICBMs rather than replacing them, 26 percent supported the GBSD, 20 percent preferred eliminating the ICBMs and 10 percent supported abolishing all nuclear weapons. According to a 2021 survey commissioned by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, an organization funded by the top weapons manufacturers, the majority of voters believe that nuclear deterrence capability should be one of

5760-408: The guidance system would have to be kept running and aligned at all times. This was a serious problem for the mechanical systems, especially the gyroscopes which used ball bearings . Autonetics had an experimental design using air bearings that they claimed had been running continually from 1952 to 1957. Autonetics further advanced the state of the art by building the platform in the form of

5856-414: The high atmosphere, and could be fitted to existing missiles like Minuteman. The shape of these reentry vehicles required more room on the front of the missile than a traditional reentry vehicle design. To allow for this future expansion, the Minuteman silos were revised to be built 13 feet (4.0 m) deeper. Although Minuteman would not deploy a boost-glide warhead, the extra space proved invaluable in

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5952-402: The highest priorities for the Department of Defense, with a majority also supporting modernization efforts. The survey asked more than 2,000 voters for their views on national security and nuclear arms. Eighty-one percent of survey respondents preferred the security benefits of the United States' ground-based nuclear capabilities more than the cost savings of removing these capabilities. When told

6048-418: The largest Soviet cities would promptly kill 30% of their population and destroy 50% of their industry. Larger attacks raised these numbers only slightly, as all of the larger targets would already have been hit. This suggested that there was a " finite deterrent " level around 400 megatons that would be enough to prevent a Soviet attack no matter how many missiles they had of their own. All that had to be ensured

6144-584: The late Daniel Ellsberg , Pentagon Papers whistleblower and author of The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner ; the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL); the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS); the Federation of American Scientists (FAS); and Peace Action . They argue that the new missiles would be not only costly, but also dangerous, increasing the risk of accidentally launching

6240-488: The least expensive leg of the nuclear triad because they do not necessitate large maintenance crews or incur expensive refueling costs, like nuclear-powered submarines. Additionally, they argue land-based missiles are visible reminders that the US can strike back in the event of a nuclear attack, thus making them essential to nuclear deterrence. In its annual 2021 Threat Assessment, the US Intelligence community said China

6336-573: The missile fuselage until the fuel was finished burning. In comparison, older designs burned primarily from one end to the other, meaning that at any instant one small section of the fuselage was being subjected to extreme loads and temperatures. Guidance of an ICBM is based not only on the direction the missile is traveling but the precise instant that thrust is cut off. Too much thrust and the warhead will overshoot its target, too little and it will fall short. Solids are normally very hard to predict in terms of burn time and their instantaneous thrust during

6432-456: The missile sat in the silo, the same computer was also used to run a program that monitored the various sensors and test equipment. With older designs this had been handled by external systems, requiring miles of extra wiring and many connectors to locations where test instruments could be connected during servicing. Now these could all be accomplished by communicating with the computer through a single connection. In order to store multiple programs,

6528-683: The missiles to fall short of their targets if launched over the North Pole as planned. The decision was made to station the missiles at Malmstrom AFB in Montana instead. These changes would allow the missiles, even with their defective boosters, to reach their intended targets in the case of a launch. The "improved" LGM-30B Minuteman I became operational at Ellsworth AFB , South Dakota , Minot AFB , North Dakota , F.E. Warren AFB , Wyoming , and Whiteman AFB , Missouri , in 1963 and 1964. All 800 Minuteman I missiles were delivered by June 1965. Each of

6624-430: The more established names in the ICBM field. Ramo-Wooldridge pressed for a system with higher accuracy, but Hall countered that the missile's role was to attack Soviet cities, and that "a force which provides numerical superiority over the enemy will provide a much stronger deterrent than a numerically inferior force of greater accuracy." Hall was known for his "friction with others" and in 1958 Schriever removed him from

6720-496: The open. Since there was no system to detect the ICBMs being launched, the possibility was raised that the Soviets could launch a sneak attack with a few dozen missiles that would take out a significant portion of SAC's bomber fleet. In this environment, the Air Force saw their own ICBMs not as a primary weapon of war, but as a way to ensure that the Soviets would not risk a sneak attack. ICBMs, especially newer models that were housed in silos, could be expected to survive an attack by

6816-506: The remaining fuel broke up and blew out the nozzle without contributing to the thrust. The first to use these developments was the US Navy. It had been involved in a joint program with the US Army to develop the liquid-fueled PGM-19 Jupiter , but had always been skeptical of the system. The Navy felt that liquid fuels were too dangerous to use onboard ships, especially submarines. Rapid success in

6912-427: The role of the missile was to present an unassailable threat to the Soviet population, Polaris was a far better solution than Minuteman. The document had long-lasting effects on the future of the Minuteman program, which, by 1961, was firmly evolving towards a counterforce capability. Minuteman's final tests coincided with the start of John F. Kennedy 's presidency. His new Secretary of Defense , Robert McNamara ,

7008-463: The service entry will be delayed by two years. This estimate was raised to $ 140.9 billion in July 2024 following a Nunn-McCurdy review. The Program Acquisition Unit Cost (PAUC) has risen from an estimated $ 118 million per missile in 2020 to approximately $ 162 million as of December 2023 . This increase is primarily due to rising costs in command and control systems and missile silo infrastructure. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall , speaking at

7104-530: The solid-propellant motors. Headquarters RVSN exercised normal control of the RT-2 missile force, through an intermediate RVSN Army and launch complex headquarters (HCC). A launch complex consisted of an HCC and several LCCs, monitoring numerous underground launchers. Minuteman missile Minuteman II: 6,300 nmi (7,200 mi; 11,700 km) The LGM-30 Minuteman is an American land-based intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in service with

7200-534: The solids development program, combined with Edward Teller 's promise of much lighter nuclear warheads during Project Nobska , led the Navy to abandon Jupiter and begin development of their own solid-fuel missile. Aerojet's work with Hall was adapted for their UGM-27 Polaris starting in December 1956. The US Air Force saw no pressing need for a solid fuel ICBM. Development of the SM-65 Atlas and SM-68 Titan ICBMs

7296-654: The two upper stages of the RT-2 to develop the RT-15 mobile IRBM system. The RT-2PM Topol is supposedly a modernized version of the RT-2 The RT-2 was capable of delivering a 540 kg (1,200 lb) class payload to a maximum operational range of approximately 10,000 km (5,500 nautical miles) A single launch control center (LCC) monitored numbers of launchers. The hardened and dispersed silo concept increased system survivability and provided steady environmental controls from

7392-523: The warhead as it passes over them. Through the 1960s, the Defense Mapping Agency (now part of National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency ) mapped these with increasing accuracy, feeding that information back into the Minuteman fleet. The Minuteman was initially deployed with a circular error probable (CEP) of about 1.1 nautical miles (2.0 km; 1.3 mi), but this had improved to about 0.6 nautical miles (1.1 km; 0.69 mi) by 1965. This

7488-552: The weapon fell within this range. The USAF had enough bombers to attack every military and industrial target in the USSR and was confident that its bombers would survive in sufficient numbers that such a strike would utterly destroy the country. Soviet ICBMs upset this equation to a degree. Their accuracy was known to be low, on the order of 4 nautical miles (7.4 km; 4.6 mi), but they carried large warheads that would be useful against Strategic Air Command 's bombers, which parked in

7584-472: Was a Soviet anti-ballistic missile system which was known to be under development at Sary Shagan . WS-199 was expanded to develop a maneuvering reentry vehicle (MARV), which greatly complicated the problem of shooting down a warhead. Two designs were tested in 1957, Alpha Draco and the Boost Glide Reentry Vehicle. These used long and skinny arrow-like shapes that provided aerodynamic lift in

7680-451: Was accomplished without any mechanical changes to the missile or its navigation system. At those levels, the ICBM begins to approach the manned bomber in terms of accuracy; a small upgrade, roughly doubling the accuracy of the INS, would give it the same 1,500 feet (460 m) CEP as the manned bomber. Autonetics began such development even before the original Minuteman entered fleet service, and

7776-457: Was an advantage for weapons that might be attacked by Soviet aircraft. But Hall was convinced that they could be used for a true ICBM with a 5,500-nautical-mile (10,200 km; 6,300 mi) range. To achieve the required energy, that year Hall began funding research at Boeing and Thiokol into the use of ammonium perchlorate composite propellant . Adapting a concept developed in the UK , they cast

7872-518: Was an improved version of the Minuteman I missile. Its first test launch took place on September 24, 1964. Development on the Minuteman II began in 1962 as the Minuteman I entered the Strategic Air Command's nuclear force. Minuteman II production and deployment began in 1965 and completed in 1967. It had an increased range, greater throw weight and guidance system with better azimuthal coverage, providing military planners with better accuracy and

7968-420: Was concentrated on launch facilities and command and control facilities. This provided decreased reaction time and increased survivability when under nuclear attack. Final changes to the system were performed to increase compatibility with the expected LGM-118A Peacekeeper . These newer missiles were later deployed into modified Minuteman silos. LGM-35 Sentinel The LGM-35 Sentinel , also known as

8064-422: Was effectively invulnerable and had enough accuracy to attack Soviet cities. If the Soviets improved the accuracy of their missiles this would present a serious threat to the Air Force's bombers and missiles, but none at all to the Navy's submarines. Based on the same 400 equivalent megatons calculation, they set about building a fleet of 41 submarines carrying 16 missiles each, giving the Navy a finite deterrent that

8160-616: Was fitted with the W59 warhead with a yield of 1 Mt. Production for the W56 warhead with a 1.2 Mt yield began in March 1963 and W59 production was ended in July 1963 with a production run of only 150 warheads before being retired in June 1969. The W56 would continue production until May 1969 with a production run of 1000 warheads. Mods 0 to 3 were retired by September 1966 and the Mod 4 version would remain in service until

8256-453: Was given charge of the solid-fuel-propulsion division of General Bernard Schriever's Western Development Division , created to lead development of the SM-65 Atlas and HGM-25A Titan I ICBMs. Solid fuels were already commonly used in short-range rockets. Hall's superiors were interested in short- and medium -range missiles with solids, especially for use in Europe where the fast reaction time

8352-438: Was initially expected to enter service in 2029 and remain active until 2075. On 25 July 2019, Boeing announced it would not place a bid for the program, citing Northrop's recent acquisition of Orbital ATK (now Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems), Boeing's supplier of solid rocket motors. Northrop signed an agreement to firewall Boeing's proprietary data after acquiring Orbital ATK. The Air Force subsequently halted funding for

8448-415: Was not considered to be a problem at the time, because it took about the same amount of time to spin up the inertial guidance system , set the initial position, and program in the target coordinates. Minuteman was designed from the outset to be launched in minutes. While solid fuel eliminated the fueling delays, the delays in starting and aligning the guidance system remained. For the desired quick launch,

8544-405: Was one the Soviets could not afford. Zeus was canceled in 1963. Minuteman's selection as the primary Air Force ICBM was initially based on the same " second strike " logic as their earlier missiles: that the weapon was primarily one designed to survive any potential Soviet attack and ensure they would be hit in return. But Minuteman had a combination of features that led to its rapid evolution into

8640-539: Was planning to double its arsenal of nuclear weapons over the next ten years in "the most rapid expansion in its history." It also warned that Russia may expand and modernize its nuclear arsenal. One of the main supporters of the GBSD is Senator Jon Tester (D-MT), Chair of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense. In a March 21, 2021, interview with Defense News , Tester said, "As of right now, I think it's important that we move forward with

8736-478: Was progressing, and "storable" ( hypergolic ) liquid propellants were being developed that would allow missiles to be left in a ready-to-shoot form for extended periods. These could be placed in missile silos for added protection, and launch in minutes. This met their need for a weapon that would be safe from sneak attacks; hitting all of the silos within a limited time window before they could launch simply did not seem possible. But Hall saw solid fuels not only as

8832-557: Was selected for GBSD, replacing the W78 warhead currently used on the Minuteman III. It was planned for GBSD to deploy in 2028, with W87-0 warheads initially being fitted to the system and W87-1 warheads being fitted from 2030 onward. This affords the Air Force a small amount of flexibility if the W87-1 is delayed. The completion of the first plutonium pit for the W87-1 was announced in October 2024 by

8928-629: Was tasked with continuing the expansion and modernisation of the US nuclear deterrent while limiting spending. McNamara began to apply cost/benefit analysis , and Minuteman's low production cost ensured its selection. Atlas and Titan were soon scrapped, and the storable liquid fueled Titan II deployment was severely curtailed. McNamara also cancelled the XB-70 bomber project. Minuteman's low cost had spin-off effects on non-ICBM programs. The Army's LIM-49 Nike Zeus , an interceptor missile capable of shooting down Soviet warheads, provided another way to prevent

9024-485: Was that the US missiles survived, which seemed likely given the low accuracy of the Soviet weapons. Reversing the problem, the addition of ICBMs to the US Air Force's arsenal did not eliminate the need, or desire, to attack Soviet military targets, and the Air Force maintained that bombers were the only suitable platform in that role. Into this argument came the Navy's UGM-27 Polaris . Launched from submarines, Polaris

9120-435: Was to build a number of integrated missile "farms" that included factories, missile silos , transport and recycling. He was aware that new computerized assembly lines would allow continual production, and that similar equipment would allow a small team to oversee operations for dozens or hundreds of missiles, radically reducing the manpower requirements. Each farm would support between 1,000 and 1,500 missiles being produced in

9216-510: Was unassailable. This presented a serious problem for the Air Force. They were still pressing for the development of newer bombers, like the supersonic B-70 , for attacks against military targets, but this role seemed increasingly unlikely in a nuclear war scenario. A February 1960 memo by RAND , entitled "The Puzzle of Polaris", was passed around among high-ranking Air Force officials. It suggested that Polaris negated any need for Air Force ICBMs if they were also being aimed at Soviet cities. If

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