Over the last few days, I have heard a couple of pundits/commentators make comments about being uncertain on the reliability of the Russian nuclear weapons. However, poking around in Google, I don’t see much in the way of news on the subject.
What’s the straight dope? Is there a reason to believe that the Russian weapons are suspect? And, does a 20% (or whatever) failure rate matter when we’re talking about so many of them?
It is worthwhile to note that the “weapon system” consists of several different components; the booster and launch system (silo (ICBM), submarine (SLBM), or transporter/erector/launcher (mobile ICBM)), the early warning radar and satellite warning network, the command, control, and integration (C[SUP]2[/SUP]I), the operators, and the actual nuclear weapons and reentry vehicles carrying them. We only have very limited information all aspects of these but we can observe periodic verification and new system development flight tests, and get some limited information on maintenance from START treaty inspections. Anyone making definitive statements about the readiness and reliability of the Russian nuclear deterrent is almost certainly speaking through their hat.
That being said, we can make a few observations from what is publicly known. After the end of the Cold War and the first international inspections, there were stories circulated about the massive degree of neglect to former Soviet silo facilities, often relating tales of silos having several meters of water in them. As far as I have been able to discern, there are only two documented instances of this specific condition, both found in silos for weapons which were already being retired. The Russian (formerly Soviet) ICBM fleet has been substantially retired with only the newest and purportedly most accurate legacy systems still in service. The Russian ICBM arsenal is undergoing modernization, essentially replacing all storable liquid propellant missiles like the R-36M (SS-18 ‘Satan’) and RS-18 (SS-19 ‘Stiletto’) being retired in favor of solid propellant missiles such as the RS-12M2 (SS-27 ‘Topol-M’) and RS-24 (SS-29 ‘Yars’), both of which can be road mobile, which theoretically increases survivability for counterstrike capability. On the SLBM front, Russia mostly fields the R-29M (SS-N-23 ‘Skiff’) in the Delta IV ballistic missile submarine (7 operational), and is just starting to deploy the RSM-56 (SS-N-32 ‘Bulava’) in the Borey-class submarine (2 operational). Both of these have had teething problems and an arguably incomplete testing regime before deployment.
By comparison, the United States has only maintained a single ICBM system (the LGM-30G ‘Minuteman III’ or MMIII), which is a silo-based system that was designed in the early 'Seventies and has seen a couple of propulsion system remanufacturing and guidance system upgrade programs since. Russia has approximately 350 ICBMs–a mixture of single RV and small MIRV–whereas the US has around 450 MMIII missiles, largely in single RV configuration. For SLBMs, the US Navy deploys the UGM-133 ‘D5 Trident II’ missile in the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine.
However, it should be noted that the United States Air Force has a regular flight test program (Force Development Evaluation) in which 3-5 operational Minuteman missiles (actually pulled straight out of a silo) are flown every year. There have been a small handful of failures (3 out of over 200 flights, none of the propulsion system) which is a demonstration of high confidence. There is a similar program for the Trident system. By comparison, the Russians only have a very irregular number of flight tests, and their new system development tests for the Skiff/Topol-M and the Bulava have had a number of failures.
As far as the reliability of the ‘physics package’ itself, neither nation has conducted underground nuclear tests since the mid-'Eighties, and the aging surveillance programs are necessarily based upon subscale and materials testing combined with simulation, which is only as good as the assumptions that go into it. The Russians probably put less money into it, and if there performance in other technical areas such as space launch are any indication, are suffering from a dramatic loss of expertise.
In the end, what is important in a strategic weapon system is the perception of the reliability and efficacy of the system, and realistically, even if the Russian system were only 10% effective, it would still be sufficient in a full out exchange to essentially destroy the industrial and transportation infrastructure of the United States, and vice versa. These weapons are never intended to be used (at least, not by rational actors) and if one is ever launched it is by definition a failure of the deterrence value of the weapons. They could be made of papier-mâché as long as the opponent believes that they are a threat, and there is no plausible argument that the Russian arsenal, even in a less-than-ideal state of maintenance, isn’t a credible threat.
Stranger
Thanks, Stranger. That was extremely interesting and informative
I agree - thanks for taking the time to research and post!
Media reports the Russians are developing a new SS-18 style liquid fueled ICBM. Called the “Sarmat”
There’s only one way to find out.
Actually, a very interesting book along these lines is “The Russia House” by Le Carre. What if you think you know something, but don’t know if it’s correct?
Thanks for your, as usual, informative and clear post, Stranger. I always look forward to you dropping into a thread about nuclear weapons, rockets, and suchlike.
As an aside, can I say that “physics package” is one of the awesomest euphemisms ever? It’s not a bomb! It’s a… thing…that uses physics!
Generally Russian made products have problems. Search for soviet made buses, airplanes, cars, etc. and maintenance/operational problems with those.
For example the Mig-15 would go into a spin if it flew too slow. To recover, the pilot had to apply full left rudder, and push the stick full forward. If this was not done, then CRASH!
I am curious about the Russian modernization efforts. Are they building new warheads? Or are they building new RVs and reusing old warheads? Is there any publicly available information on this?
Actually, the physics package is only part of the bomb- specifically the pit, boosting materials, explosive lenses, tampers, reflecting materials, hohlraum, sparkplug, etc… (for a Teller-Ulam fusion bomb).
The rest of the bomb is more mundane- fins, fuses, altimeters, etc…
IIRC, the dichotomy came about because at one point there were different “physics packages” that could work in the same bomb shell.
My favorite nuclear euphamism (nuphamisim? nuclamisim?) is, after it initiates a reaction, it doesn’t “explode”, it “disassembles”
There are some exceptions to this, notably Soviet-era small arms. Those things just keep going and going and going and going.
Yeah, I didn’t mention the Sarmat because it is largely regarded as more innuendo than operational threat. Given the problems that the Soviets and Russians had with storable liquid rockets (similar to the US experience with the LGM-25C ‘Titan II’), it would be highly surprising that they would want to deploy a storable liquid across their entire ICBM inventory. However, a vehicle with the same or better performance of the SS-18 could be used for a number of other roles including conventional global ballistic strike, a fractional orbital bombardment system (FOBS), or anti-satellite weapon deployment. Given the more transient nature of these kinds of weapons (that could be fueled and brought online with some notice prior to use) it is plausible that the Russians might want to field a higher performance storable liquid vehicle for these purposes. But Russia has publicly stated that the Sarmat will not be deployed starting before 2020, and I think a lot of missile wonks think the program is just entirely a sham.
The details of exactly what the Russians have in their nuclear arsenal are somewhat sketchy, and there is a bit of "Trust me, why would I lie?’ in inspection requirements as it comes to the actual weapons versus direct verifications on launchers and launch sites, but it is likely that the Russians are fabricating some modest number of new nuclear weapons that meet more modern surity and safety standards, while ridding their arsenal of older and more unsafe weapons. The United States had intended to do the same, retiring older weapons like the W-76 (carried by C4 Trident) and W-78 (carried by Minuteman II/III) with W-87 and W-88, and building a new family of replacement weapons under the Reliable Replacement Warhead program. The RRW was ultimately cancelled for cost and political reasons and W-88 production curtailed. The W-87, originally carried in the Mark 21 RV on the LGM-118A ‘Peacekeeper’ missile (and intended to be carried in single RV configuration for the cancelled road mobile LGM-134A ‘Midgetman’) underwent a life extension effort and was installed on Minuteman III missiles in a single RV under the Safety Enhanced Reentry Vehicle program.
Both Russia and US have foregone new [SUP]239[/SUP]Pu fabrication (which has become a significant problem for long duration space missions using RTGs), but Russia retains and has even increased their production of highly enriched (e.g. weapons grade) uranium, ostensibly for high performance power reactors but also usable in boosted fission and fusion weapons. ([SUP]239[/SUP]Pu is still valued for making very compact weapons suitable for tactical use, but is costly to manufacture and difficult to handle.) The US largely remanufactures pits and shells out of material recovered from disposed weapons, but it is likely that the Russians are able to produce new weapons at modest rates. In either case, there are more than enough remaining weapons to satisfy strategic deterrence requirements as they are currently deployed, and the reliable lifespan of the physics package has been demonstrated to be many decades. The overall system reliability, on the other hand, is questionable as it depends on many factors, and I don’t know that I have much faith in even the original system design estimates much less the guesswork that goes into estimating the functional reliability of a system that has never been (and effectively cannot be) tested in a fully operational fashion.
Stranger
Yeah. Are’nt a lot of the facilities and infrastructure for designing and fabricating SS-9 and SS-18 style ICBM in The Ukraine? Could the Russians make it even if they wanted to?
AFAIK, all nuclear devices ever deployed were tested as some time. The US RRW was supposed to be the first device developed using only computer modeling. And it was cancelled, in part, due to high cost and doubts about its reliability. I haven’t heard about Russia putting billions into supercomputers. So I am guessing that they are not building anything brand new. At most, they are following old designs but with modern electronics and insensitive explosives.
If you think Russian aircraft are unreliable or prone to problems, you haven’t followed their successes with the Mig 29 through the Su35s. There’s lots of footage of these aircraft flying at international airshows and they are awesome, fully capable aircraft.
The US has always underestimated our enemies capabilities, from the Japanese 0 to the Mig 15.
Bad technology? Whose rockets does the US use to send astronauts to the ISS? I think that may be changing soon if not already though.
Will their bombs go boom if need be. I’d bet money on it. Even NK can make a nuke go boom, Russia is leagues ahead of them.
The Mig-15 did not flat spin when flying too slow.
Curt Earl spent some time in China buying the plane and he talked with the Chinese about the MiGs. AT one time, conversation turned to the combat experiences in Korea. The Chinese laughed about the stories in American writings about the MiGs falling into flat spins. They said that, while the American pilots flew in a g-suit, the MiG pilots in Korea did not. As a result, they sometimes passed out due to GLOC in a hard break. Unconscious pilot in a jet means a smoking hole in the ground.
Pilot error, not aircraft design.
Never, ever underestimate your enemy. That’s a major mistake.
What is this Russian propaganda?
Here are a few of MANY links which say otherwise…
https://forum.warthunder.com/index.php?/topic/23570-stall-characteristics-of-mig-15/
"Lowery said he’d been in mission debriefings and heard other F-86 pilots say they’d been following a flight of four MiG-15s when one of them would suddenly stall and start spinning . “Once they get into a spin, a MiG-15 won’t recover. It has a flat spin mode, too.”…
http://www.talkingproud.us/Military/MiGAlley/MiGAlley/F86PilotStories.html
“Additionally, the MiG-15 tended to spin after it stalled, and often the pilot could not recover.”…
You mistake is assuming that US aircraft of the era didn’t also have noxious flying qualities near the corners of the envelope.
Fully stalling an F-86 was not a great idea either. If for no other reason that it takes a lot of altitude to recover an out-of-control jet and very often you’re not all that far above the ground. Either way the aircraft is lost. Whether you get out alive then depends on 1950s ejection seat tech. Which also sucked badly on both sides. Albeit more badly on the USSR side.
It is true that all US weapons (and presumably all Soviet-developed weapons) were tested to an extent, for most later design weapons that testing consisted of limited yield or testing of the pit with an inert or downgraded tamper. No attempt at positive reliability testing has ever been performed on a particular design in toto because of the extreme cost and difficulty, although there is certainly reliability testing on the explosive lenses and other initiation components. But if Russia is building new nuclear weapons they are almost certainly based on existing designs with limited modifications to obtain a specific yield profile or package size. Although the computing power needed to simulate the detonation of a nuclear weapon to a high degree of fidelity is no longer very extraordinary–a medium sized beowulf cluster costing a few hundred thousand dollars would be more than adequate to simulate the most complex weapons with a run time of a few weeks or less–for a design using new materials or a novel configuration there is a lot of practical data that is necessary to validate the model.
Or the B-58 Hustler, an aircraft so difficult to fly that nearly a quarter of the production was lost in operational accidents, and an ejection system that was likely as not to take your arm off.
The Soviet approach to aircraft and rocket design was very different, often shooting for robustness and raw power over refinement and overall performance, which led to weapon systems that were often maintenance intensive but capable of being operated and serviced with limited support and training. I recall looking at a certain Soviet-designed 'Fifteies era missile with one of my co-workers who laughed that they had mounted the guidance unit on a composite-wood shelf as an example of how crude the design was. I then noted that plywood had both excellent strength-to-weight and damping properties, was a relatively stable material that is electrically isolating and doesn’t corrode, and could be easily worked with simple tools. In contrast to the often complex bulkheads and isolation systems used in most rocket vehicles it was a very simple and effective solution (albeit one that wouldn’t be suitable for modern electronics due to the potential for FOD and outgassing of the resin binder).
Stranger