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Factoids:

1) About 80% of the US nuclear warhead inventory are on submarines. It’s about 40% for the Russians.

2) The US has about 44 interceptors mission tasked to kill incoming ballistic missions. Assessed effectiveness... 50%. So at most you can hit 22 incoming warheads.

3) Russian boomer submarines number 11. Each sub has 16 missiles aboard and each missile MIRVs to 6 warheads. Total missiles in the fleet — 176. X6 for warheads 1056.

Of which 44 might be intercepted.

So talk of the US having nothing to stop a newly revealed hypersonic IRBM is a bit silly. We also can’t stop more than 5% of current, non hypersonic missiles.

And that’s just the first wave from submarines. Their ICBMs and air-launched weapons, that likely will be hypersonic, come later.

Our coastal proximity to our ICBM fields, though as far as we could get them, is a fundamental geographical Russian advantage. Their weapons are on subs, like ours, but their ICBMs are not only very far from any coasts, they are also mobile.

And they have so much surface area their oil will run out long after ours.

Wrong enemy to have. We will be begging for that oil someday.

Thanks. Perfect answer.

I was going to ask if anyone thought the US had a missile defense system for regular ICBMs. The answer is, not hardly!

The basic article seems written as some sort of scare tactic for people who believe we do have some kind of missile defense.

That first factoid isn’t true.

https://www.defense.gov/Multimedia/Experience/Americas-Nuclear-Triad/

There are 400 active LGM-30G Minuteman IIIs, each with three MIRVs. Total nuclear weapons = 1,200 warheads.

There are 14 American Ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs), each with 20 Trident missiles with 3 warheads each. That’s 14 X 20 = 280 missiles with 840 warheads.

By air (most of the nuclear arsenal of the USA is air carried):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B61_nuclear_bomb#Deployment

There are 72 active B-52H bombers with 20 nuclear cruise missiles in its inventory and 20 B-2s. For the B-2s, Each bay carries eight bomb racks, and in the nuclear role the bomber can carry an assortment of up to sixteen B61-7 bombs (10–360 kilotons), B61-11 bombs (400 kilotons) or B-83-1 thermonuclear bombs (1.2 megatons). Not all carry nuclear weapons but which do is kept classified.

The B61 has been deployed by a variety of US military aircraft. US aircraft cleared for its use have included the B-1 Lancer, B-2 Spirit, B-52 Stratofortress, F/A-18 Hornet, A-6 Intruder, A-4 Skyhawk, F-111, F-15E Strike Eagle and F-16 Fighting Falcon and the F-35A. The B61 can fit inside the F-22 Raptor’s weapons bays and is also carried by the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II. How many are deployed currently is classified. Missions can be set up in a matter of minutes to hours, if necessary.

There are 600 B61 Gen 7s, 215 Gen 10s, 50 Gen 11s and 300 Gen 12s. The Gen 13s are being tested, but only a handful have been built.

The US has about 44 interceptors mission tasked to kill incoming ballistic missions. Assessed effectiveness... 50%. So at most you can hit 22 incoming warheads.

What are you talking about here? A single Patriot launcher carries 12 to 16 interceptors, each. A given battery normally has five to eight trailers connected to the control computer. A THAAD battery typically has six launchers, eight missiles each. Aegis-capable ships, as well as Aegis Ashore systems have quite a few SM-2 and -3 missiles, and are currently adding patriot missile support.

Not to mention, air-launched interceptors are potential options, they've been used against cruise missiles and slower targets just fine.