Word: warhead
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...into the negotiations as an effort to divide the alliance. Said U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle: "All the Soviet proposals have had one common characteristic-they would leave the U.S. with zero nuclear forces in Europe, and they would leave the Soviet Union with thousands of nuclear warheads on Soviet missiles." In the NATO view, a failure by the U.S. to counter the 243 triple-warhead SS-20s now aimed at Western Europe would "decouple" the U.S. and its West European allies by indicating that the U.S. would no longer risk its own cities for the defense...
...fact, when they are lined up nuke for nuke beside the vast arsenals held by both the U.S. and the Soviet Union, the British and French missiles do not seem worth counting. France's force de frappe consists of five nuclear-powered submarines, each equipped with 16 single-warhead missiles, and 18 land-based missiles. Their range: no more than 1,800 miles, barely enough to reach Moscow. Britain relies on four nuclear submarines, each armed with 16 Polaris missiles. Says former French Ambassador to NATO François de Rose: "The number we have now is immaterial compared...
...last-ditch attempt to find a home for the orphan MX missile, recommended the prompt deployment of 100 MX missiles in existing Minuteman silos and research on silo "hardening." For the long term, the panel proposed the development of an unspecified number of smaller (15-ton) single-warhead missiles with a range, like the MX's, of 8,000 miles...
...report argued that the highly accurate, nearly 100-ton MX, with ten warheads, is needed immediately to "remove the Soviet advantage in ICBM [intercontinental ballistic missile] capability" and goad Russia into serious arms-reduction negotiations. For the 1990s, however, the so-called Midgetman missile must be developed because, with one warhead to the MX's ten, it would make a less tempting target to the Soviets...
...enhance the two-phase plan on Capitol Hill and limit warhead totals, the commission wedded missile deployment to arms control. "The land-based ICBM cannot be preserved without arms control," said Commission Member John Deutch of M.I.T. "This was our truly unanimous view." However, the shift back to single-warhead missiles scrambles the prevailing mathematics of arms control. With this in mind, the commission recommended a different method of calculating strategic threats: counting the number of warheads and their size rather than the number of missiles possessed by each side. While the new math won prepublication plaudits from Pentagon officials...