SLBM Bulava Ready To Enter Service With Russian Navy

“the front porch vs hitting the neighbor’s house - when you are using a 500KT warhead - is moot. It is sheer idiocy to think otherwise.”

The Bulava is only being deployed in a 6x150KT configuration. It is NOT being deployed in any type of 500KT configuration. Bulava is not suited to destroy hardened targets. It does not have the accuracy or the throw weight to carry high enough yield warheads.

The Trident D5 on the other hand has a throw weight of 2800 kg and an accuracy of 90-120 meters using stellar-inertial guidance. It could carry 8x455KT or 12x100KT or even 14x100KT in a lower range maximum payload configuration. There are many different options for the weapons package thanks to the high throw weight of Trident D5.

But the Bulava can make a great second strike weapon for destroying soft targets. Just like the Posiedon C3, Trident C4 and R-39 Rif.

Ok ...let's take out the 500KT (although the material does say that is the most likely warhead of the operating variant - see Jane’s Strategic Weapons Systems, Issue 50, which gives its CEP, the planned move from MIRV designs to single warhead 500KT designs, and that it can be used as a first-strike and counter-strike weapon). I want to focus on why you said it is a lousy missile ...its CEP and throw weight. Let's make it easy ...let's assume a single warhead 50KT instead of 500KT. Even smaller? How about 5KT? Let's make it even smaller ...how about 1KT. Small enough? Ok, the difference in CEP between the Trident D5 and the Bulava is 90-120m for the D5 and 350m for the Bulava (my numbers say 200-250m, but let us use yours). Using the top accuracy of 90m for the D5 and your 350m for the Bulava, we have a difference in meters of 260m. Using a small nuclear warhead of just 1 kiloton. That, instead of being accurate enough to hit your front porch just had an air-burst over your neighbor's kennel.

For that matter ...let us make the warhead even smaller. Let's say the missile is so lousy that the only throw weight it can manage is to deliver something the size of a Davy Crocket type M388. That only has 0.01KT (yes, I know it may be 0.015 or 0.012, but let's just simply make it 0.01KT). Same scenario ...goes off in your neighbor's yard. No effects on you, right?

In real life we have a weapon that you yourself compare to a Trident C4, which can (the Bulava) travel 8,000-10,000KM and carry 6 warheads each having up to 150KT ...not a single 0.01KT Davy Crocket type), and impact within 200-250m (or let's even use the 350m) with nuclear detonation. And that is pretty lousy because it is only similar to the Trident C4 and not the Trident D5 that can fly over 11,000km (further than the Bulava), and can carry eight 100KT warheads (although due to treaties it would carry the same number as the Bulava anyways) and impact within 90m (more accurate than the Bulava). That's great, but the distance between Moscow and Washington DC is 7,800 KM, which means both missiles are within range. Especially once you consider the missiles are SLBMs, and thus would be launched from submarines that would be in waters much closer. Thus the distance difference is a plus for the D5, but it is not a demerit for the Bulava. Same thing about the warheads ...the D5 can carry more, but it is not allowed by treaty to. However, even if it could carry its maximum, a maximum higher than that of the Bulava, we are talking about nuclear weapons here. The throw-weight of the Bulava is more than sufficient to do necessary damage. And as for the accuracy argument - even if we use 6 warheads per missile, with each warhead having 150KTs, and a CEP of 350m ...let's just say Iran and North Korea would kill to have that capability by 2050!

Saying having something similar to a Trident C4 makes something pretty lousy because the Trident D5 exists, is similar to saying that a 2010 Corvette is pretty lousy because the 2013 Corvette came out. That is silly to say for cars, and is sillier to say for city-killer weapons.

I sincerely hope that the people in actual powers of authority have the wisdom to not apply blanket tags of useless to the actions of potential agitators. Especially when one considers that the functionality of a weapon is not whether or not it is better than what is available elsewhere, but rather whether or not a) it can work and b) can effectively work. The first one means whether or not the weapon can actually function, while the second means whether the weapon can function in the environment of counter-measures that will be operating against it. If it can do both a and b, then it is not a 'pretty lousy' weapon. It may not be the fastest, prettiest, farthest going, nor be able to help with homework for the kids and cook Sunday brunch, but if it can work and can work effectively against the set of countermeasures placed against it then it is pretty dangerous.

Israel and the US are preparing to conduct strikes against Iran's fledgling nuclear program, where their technology of building a functioning nuclear warhead is still open to speculation. The US and Japan threaten to shoot down a North Korean missile test even though the missile was a dud (and had it worked it still would have been a very limited design). Yet, a country makes an SLBM that you yourself compare to the Trident C4, and you call it pretty lousy.

I made a poor choice of words.

I live 13 miles from Minot AFB. Home of the 91st Missile Wing and 5th Bomb Wing.

In the event of a nuclear war, I would be bombarded with dozens of warheads. Accuracy really doesn’t matter. LOL.

According to Aviation Week and Space Technology , "Guidance accuracy for the Trident C4's Mk4 reentry system is...under 1,000 feet circular error probable at 4,000 nautical miles, well below the 1,500 feet goal". At ranges less than 4,000 nautical miles the accuracy is even better. A Pentagon report to congress stated that, "Trident I missile system accuracy is now about the same as Minuteman III operational accuracy". Trident I tests during 1983 consistently achieved CEPs of 750 feet. NRDC

So the Trident C4 had an accuracy of 750-1,000 feet at 4,000 nautical miles using stellar-inertial guidance.

That translates to 230-305 meters.