![]() |
![]() |
|
![]() |
|
Thread Tools | Search this Thread | Display Modes |
|
#1
|
||||
|
||||
![]()
SRBMs and MRBMs are a different game. They have different launch signatures and trajectories than ICBMs. They wouldn't necessarily elicit the same sort of nuclear response.
In your scenario, would NATO take Putin's warning at face value and just wait around to see what happens? I doubt it. Why wouldn't Russia use SRBMs for the sort of strike you're describing? It's been done before, many times, my a few nations, in anger. Using an ICBM would provoke a nuclear response- it's doctrine. The potential risk is too great and the potential response likely devastating.
__________________
Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module |
#2
|
|||
|
|||
![]() Quote:
The Russians still have 200 active OTR-21 Tochka (SS-21) and an unknown number of the newer 9K720 Iskander-M (SS-26) mobile SRBM with conventional HE and fragmentation payloads (and nuclear). Their designed for tactical precision strike against hostile artillery and air defence launchers, air fields, command and communications centers and troops concentrations and critical civilian infrastructure facilities, and the SS-26 was specifically designed to neutralize NATO missile defence systems. The SS-26 can be launched within 4 minutes to an altitude of 50km at a speed of Mach 6-7. But it only has a range of 500 km which means if it is launched from western regions of Russia it will barely reach the German-Polish border. They could easily use them on NATO bases and military installations in the Ukraine, Poland, the Baltic states and maybe parts of Turkey to the south, but to hit Western Europe they would need bombers and ICBM's with conventional warheads. The Soviets/Russians developed a series of conventional fragmentation HE and submunition warheads for the FROG, Scud, SS-21, SS-23 and SS-26 SRBM's, and I think it could be quite easy for them to retrofit an ICBM and maybe even a naval SLBM with a conventional warhead. Russian SLBM's with conventional warheads would really complicate things for NATO. SRBMs and MRBMs have a different launch signatures and trajectories to an ICBM as an ICBM enters low Earth orbit, but the flight path and trajectory of an ICBM launched from Russia towards Western Europe would be different to one launched at North America. Also didn't the Soviets develop the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System (FOBS) to confuse American detection systems. It was phased out in 1983 as part of SALT II, but with all the effort that America and NATO has put into ABM systems over the past 15 years wouldn't it occur to Russia to secretly reactivate it for non-nuclear use if it was surrounded by anti-ballistic missile systems? |
#3
|
||||
|
||||
![]() Quote:
Quote:
As soon as U.S./NATO member spy satellites detect the launch signature of a Russian ICBM, it's game over. We know where nearly all of their fixed launch sites are and we're still watching. We'll be compelled to launch a nuclear counterstrike. It would take an incredible- some would say, suicidal- degree of self restraint not to. "There may or may not be a nuclear weapon or three on the way towards us and/or our allies but let's wait and see before responding." AFAIK, that would go against Cold War nuclear warfare protocols. Yes, conventional-armed ICBMs are an asset that Putin has at his disposal, but he'd have to be daft to use it in the capacity that you are describing, especially, as you just pointed out, since he has alternative platforms which can serve the same purpose (i.e. deliver conventional warheads on targets in East & Central Europe.) Also, can an ICBM designed and built to hit targets a continent away even be reconfigured to hit much closer targets? I would think not- that's why SRBMs and MRBMs exist, right?
__________________
Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
![]()
hell if he really wanted to cause chaos with conventional explosives just use good old fashioned truck bombs using intellgence and Special Forces operatives - and leave a conveniently dead Muslim driver to be found - so that no one suspects Putin did it while maximum disruptions occur
|
#5
|
||||
|
||||
![]() Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
And what about targets in North America? |
#6
|
||||
|
||||
![]() Quote:
Quote:
As for hitting targets in the U.S., don't the Russians still have some submarine-launched cruise missiles that can carry conventional explosive payloads? That would be a safer option because it likely wouldn't set off the same kind of alarms that an SLBM would. As far as NATO vs. Russia war in Eastern Europe, I think that with all of the Cold War baggage that both the U.S. and Russia still have, neither side is going to want to start slinging ballistic missiles. Now, if the war escalated to a full-blown WWIII-type scenario with fighting spreading across the globe, perhaps that reluctance would diminish. But for a war in Eastern Europe, I don't think so.
__________________
Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module Last edited by Raellus; 03-08-2014 at 06:11 PM. |
#7
|
|||
|
|||
![]() Quote:
![]() Quote:
|
#8
|
||||
|
||||
![]()
On that, we are in agreement. It'll be interesting to see what happens over the next few years as the U.S. downsizes its military while Russia continues to modernize and expand its own. I've read that Putin misses the Cold War and would like to see something similar- he's certainly doing his darnedest to bring it back to life!
__________________
Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module |
![]() |
Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests) | |
|
|