Word: 9s
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...scientific adviser to President Kennedy; George Rathjens, recently of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency; and Steven Weinberg, a physicist. In a critique released last week, the trio argued "In order to launch a first strike of the sort envisioned by Secretary Laird, the Soviets would need SS-9s with extraordinary accuracy and high reliability; they would need to solve the problem of coordinating an attack on our bombers and Minutemen; they would need to deal with our nuclear-armed tactical aircraft; they would need an effective antisubmarine-warfare system; and they would need a widespread ABM system...
Wohlstetter's own calculations agree with those of John Foster, the Pentagon's Director of Research and Engineering. Foster says that the Russians would need only 420 SS-9s to attack 1,000 U.S. silos-assuming that the SS-9s would each carry three separate five-megaton warheads. Foster concludes: "About 95% of the silos could be destroyed. This would mean 50 of the 1,000 Minuteman missiles would survive...
...rock" silo locations that would make ICBMs more resistant even to multimegaton near misses. Wiesner, Rathjens and Weinberg suggest that the number of ICBMs could be doubled for the price of Safeguard, which would mean that more than 1,000 missiles would survive an attack by the 420 SS-9s that the Pentagon's Foster hypothesized. Wohlstetter answers: "There are safer and cheaper ways of getting [an assured] force of a given size than to buy a much larger one, most of which is susceptible to annihilation...
...knock out substantial numbers of U.S. ICBMs. Last December, however, a top Pentagon official said that the S59 was merely a retaliatory weapon, and was not designed for a first strike against the U.S. There has been no new intelligence since then. The Soviets had installed nearly 200 SS-9s by last summer; and they have now added roughly...
Trying to Be Selective. Under Storer, Northeast shows signs of getting off the ground. The new owners have paid off debts of $38 million, provided operating capital and set up a leasing company that will eventually enable Northeast to obtain a fleet of 727s and DC-9s-28 in all-to give it competitive frequency. Using a $22 million bond issue raised in its own name, Northeast is also acquiring seven Fairchild 227s to replace the creaky DC-3s on short flights. Most important of all, Storer lured away American Airlines' Operations Vice President Forwood C. (and inevitably...