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Air Force tests ICBM after delay over tensions with China
the hill vis msn ^ | 8/16/2022 | Ellen Mitchell

Posted on 08/16/2022 3:19:13 PM PDT by RomanSoldier19

he Air Force on Tuesday said it had successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) nearly two weeks after postponing the launch amid increased tensions with China over Taiwan.

The unarmed Minuteman III, which is capable of holding a nuclear payload, was launched at 12:49 a.m. Pacific Time from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., with its reentry vehicle landing roughly 4,200 miles away near the Marshall Islands, according to a statement from Air Force Global Strike Command.

The statement said the test demonstrated U.S. readiness and reliability, as well as the “expertise of our strategic weapons maintenance personnel and of our missile crews who maintain an unwavering vigilance to defend the homeland.”

(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: ccp; icbm
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To: RomanSoldier19

Vandenberg Air Force Base

No such place.

Now it’s Vandenberg Space Force Base.


21 posted on 08/16/2022 6:06:25 PM PDT by null and void (they promise the jetsons but deliver the flintstones)
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To: Travis McGee
They are for first strikes only, or they are dead.

I served at Cheyenne Mt NORAD, PAVE Paws Cape Cod (6MWS) and Woomera, Australia (5DCSC). They're all missile warning/strategic sensor locations. We see Russian and Chinese launches at first light up. We fire our ICBMs at that time--before the enemy can make them dead.

What, seriously, is the point of follow-up strikes when we launch everything at first notice? It still takes time for even a rocket to get from Asia to North America. The best the Russians will do is hit EMPTY silos. The main destructors will just fly past each other on the way to certain destruction.

Anyway, that's what MAD is. MUTUALLY assured destruction.

We also know where the Russian/Iranian/Chinese leadership goes to hide. They're our first targets.

Years ago, we decided that the only thing our enemies really care about is themselves surviving a nuclear war--not their cities or people. We don't NEED to have mobile launchers for those. Also, the mobility of our nuclear strike force is in aircraft, not big trucks.

I don't know why you seem to think, just because we don't have mobile, ground crawling launchers, we're deficient in strategic mobility. We decided to use our air platforms instead. It's not the old fashioned ghost dance! We just have different options and made different choices.

If you have strategic ideas for winning a nuclear war, let's hear it. But I don't think anyone does, because, in my opinion, you can't win a nuclear war. Everyone loses.

22 posted on 08/16/2022 6:08:43 PM PDT by Alas Babylon! (Rush, we're missing your take on all of this!)
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To: Travis McGee

I do agree ship killer missiles are the future and the carriers would be vulnerable. I don’t have the answers regarding them, but I think they would do well to station themselves far from mainland China like the Indian Ocean, straits of Malacca, etc., which are vital to China but beyond the range of their weapons.

Nor do I think they will use heavy missiles like the D-20. Since these can carry a nuke, the enemy/us would have to treat them as such, and then the whole world goes to a nuclear conflict which nobody wins, especially China. The Chinese aren’t that stupid, are they?

By the way, don’t be so insulting! I’m well versed on WWII Pacific history. When I was in Australia, I was lucky enough to catch the C-141 milk run back to Hickam AFB, and then the next week return flight via other islands. At the time I was reading John Tolland’s Rising Sun and William Manchester’s American Ceasar.

I was delighted to go to many of the South Pacific islands that were so prominently part of the War.

Do not confuse me with some civilian a hole from the 1930s. I much admire the Japanese and I was born in the 50s anyway.

I also believe the Japanese forces were perhaps the most fearsome enemy, man for man, we ever faced.

Chill man, I’m not your enemy!


23 posted on 08/16/2022 6:20:28 PM PDT by Alas Babylon! (Rush, we're missing your take on all of this!)
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To: SaveFerris

Only used in the B-2 now.

I don’t know if the new B-21s will have them.

They could refit B-52s or B-one’s with them, but elected to take the nuke role from the B-one.

IMHO, the B83 is just too big. We’ve come so far in our ability to put a round precisely on target nowadays, I think a big explosion is just overkill. But that’s my opinion only.


24 posted on 08/16/2022 6:34:47 PM PDT by Alas Babylon! (Rush, we're missing your take on all of this!)
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To: RomanSoldier19

25 posted on 08/16/2022 7:04:34 PM PDT by jonrick46 (Leftnicks chase illusions of motherships at the end of the pier.)
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To: Alas Babylon!

Always thought an F-15 could carry B83 but may have been looking at a 61.


26 posted on 08/16/2022 8:50:45 PM PDT by SaveFerris (Luke 17:28 ... as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold ......)
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To: Travis McGee

https://www.defensenews.com/air/2022/04/05/heres-the-new-name-of-the-us-air-forces-next-gen-nuke/

https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/u-s-nuclear-weapons-upgrade-sees-delay-on-leaky-silos-old-tech

https://www.afnwc.af.mil/Weapon-Systems/Sentinel-ICBM-LGM-35A/

I’m in the weeds now buddy ...... but when I left, the new and improved was progressing at warp speed.

Stay Safe !


27 posted on 08/16/2022 9:36:05 PM PDT by Squantos (Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everyone you meet ...)
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To: SaveFerris

They are ......


28 posted on 08/16/2022 9:37:47 PM PDT by Squantos (Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everyone you meet ...)
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To: SaveFerris

And trump has nuclear secrets we wants to sell


29 posted on 08/17/2022 4:33:33 AM PDT by ronnie raygun
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To: Travis McGee
So, we have been patching up, rebuilding, “boosting,” and re-naming the same rockets in fixed silos since 1963...

Meanwhile, our potential adversaries have all of their many new classes of ICBMs on MOBILE launchers.

Geez a whiz....

What is it they call the Minuteman Missile fields? Ducks on a pond, I think? Their mission is basically to attract the maximum Russian first-strike to the most remote area of the US, so that our Trident D-5's can clean up the smallest possible Russian 2nd strike forces.

30 posted on 08/17/2022 8:25:41 AM PDT by Tallguy
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