[WeatherOp]

Originally posted by ngtm1r


The GBU-28 was designed for the F-111. (Specifically, the F-111's centerline external stores rack.) The Air Force sent all the F-111s to the Arizona boneyard shortly after the First Gulf War. The GBU-28 might be usable with a B-52, nobody's tried that yet AFAIK, but as these are generally assumed to be defended targets, a B-52 is not the best choice. A B-1B can probably carry it on one of the wing external stores racks, but that destroys the stealth characteristics and might pose nasty trim problems (undesireable when flying low at or above Mach 1). The B-2 can't fit it inside the bomb bay. It's something like 28 feet long.

Acording to that site I posted,  153 inches or 12.5 feet. And the GBU-28 is usable with the F-15E Strike Eagle.

However it will destroy the stealth ablitys of an aircraft if carried on the wing like you said. However, the F-117 can carry it, so whats the worry.

Originally posted by nuclear1


Highlighted for clarity. We've had a non-nuclear Bunker Buster, but this plan that was dropped was one for a nuclear version of the famed Bunker Buster of the Gulf War.

Yeah, but the part that made me think of this as old news is this.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has abandoned research into a nuclear “bunker-buster” warhead,deciding instead to pursue a similar device using conventional weaponry  a key Republican senator said Tuesday.

Ether this senator is very ill-informed or it's old news.

[FireCrack]

Peacekeeper is kinda a good name, because when you think of it...

Ironicly, the most powerfull weapons are weapons of peace

Noone would ever use them, or decalre war on a country that has them...

[pyro-manic]

Wanna bet? That's the whole reason these things were being developed...

[FireCrack]

Sure i'l make a bet on that, i cant lose, because even if i do, you wont be alive to kow it!!!!!


Muahahahahah!!!

[Clave]

If we could blow through the submarine pens in WW2 with non-nuclear weapons, then we sure as hell can crack any bunker built now.  Unless it has Chobham Armour of course (but we don't sell that to anyone) so what's the big fuss?  It's not the force of the explosion anyway, it's the penetration.  And you achieve that by good design and high-speed...

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Deepblue
Surely a nuclear weapon would be an effective way of stopping a biological weapon if said weapon existed?

Well... lemme think of the problems;
1) Fallout;
Radiation......sure, you may not give a **** about other countries civillians, but other people do; that's assuming the storage is not within a major city, which is kind of a sensible hiding place if you want to deter nuclear attack

2) Precedence;
Once you use a nuke 'defensively', you're likely to establish a precedence for anyone else to use it; a bona fide excuse for first strikes.  This is a bit of a biggie; I bet China would love to be able to really threaten Taiwan, for example, or maybe Pakistan and India will decide to have a bit more sabre-rattling.

3) Fallout (2);
Political, this time.  Not only will the world be really, really ****ing narky about nuclear weapons deployment (especially as the countries likely to be hostile and have bio-weapons are all much, much smaller than the US in terms of military capacity), you're also encouraging countries to develop 'defensive' WMD; seeing as the Us would have shown a willingness to first strike, a lot of countries would be a mite nervous and anxious to build up a big CBW arsenal to threaten global/regional devastation if attacked.

4)Defense
Sensible enemy will already, as a matter of course, have hidden and dispersed CBW locations just in case of some form of attack, nuclear or otherwise.  And that would definately be deployed in the event of a nuclear attack, even if in a SCUDs-to-Israel type way rather than a direct attack.

[pyro-manic]

I just had a thought. ( )

I remember a little while back, somebody (aldo?) posted some info about the development of space-based weapons platforms, that would drop high-density projectiles onto targets from orbit. IIRC it talked about depleted uranium or tungsten projectiles, which would provide excellent penetration of pretty much any structure (something that dense travelling at such high speed). Could they be talking about this when they say they're going to pursue a "conventional" solution? Though the orbital weapon would have pretty much the same effect as a nuke, but without the fallout...

And Clave makes an excellent point. We developed the Tallboy and Grand Slam bombs in the early 40s, on a tiny budget. Surely it's not that hard to develop that idea a bit?

[FireCrack]

Rods from God

kinda related
http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/impacteffects/

[Admiral Nelson]

Although Tallboy and Grand Slam were excellent weapons, they were HUGE.  The emphasis now a days is on much smaller weapons.  Bunker technology has come a long way since the 1940s, after all.

The US further developed the Grand Slam into the T-12, to be carried by the B-36.  This weighed 43,000 lbs!!

[WeatherOp]

Yeah, if I remeber right, they droped the "Grand Slam" bomb on the Tirpitz. And completly destoryed it.

[Flipside]

It was the Tall Boy they dropped on the Tirpitz, after it had been crippled by mini-subs.

[Styxx]

Originally posted by pyro-manic
I just had a thought. ( )

I remember a little while back, somebody (aldo?) posted some info about the development of space-based weapons platforms, that would drop high-density projectiles onto targets from orbit. IIRC it talked about depleted uranium or tungsten projectiles, which would provide excellent penetration of pretty much any structure (something that dense travelling at such high speed). Could they be talking about this when they say they're going to pursue a "conventional" solution? Though the orbital weapon would have pretty much the same effect as a nuke, but without the fallout...

If they do that, say goodbye to GPS, sattelite surveillance and sattelite communications in general. It's a lot cheaper to deny orbital space than it is to put ground attack weapons in space. And any country with basic space launch capabilities could do it, you just need orbital launch rockets and lots and lots of BBs. And the US would be the most affected, proportionately, by the denial of orbital space.

[aldo_14]

Unless they got there first and threatened any ground threat with SBW.  Which is possible; bugger knows what they actually have up there already, after all........

[Deepblue]

Originally posted by aldo_14


Well... lemme think of the problems;
1) Fallout;
Radiation......sure, you may not give a **** about other countries civillians, but other people do; that's assuming the storage is not within a major city, which is kind of a sensible hiding place if you want to deter nuclear attack

2) Precedence;
Once you use a nuke 'defensively', you're likely to establish a precedence for anyone else to use it; a bona fide excuse for first strikes.  This is a bit of a biggie; I bet China would love to be able to really threaten Taiwan, for example, or maybe Pakistan and India will decide to have a bit more sabre-rattling.

3) Fallout (2);
Political, this time.  Not only will the world be really, really ****ing narky about nuclear weapons deployment (especially as the countries likely to be hostile and have bio-weapons are all much, much smaller than the US in terms of military capacity), you're also encouraging countries to develop 'defensive' WMD; seeing as the Us would have shown a willingness to first strike, a lot of countries would be a mite nervous and anxious to build up a big CBW arsenal to threaten global/regional devastation if attacked.

4)Defense
Sensible enemy will already, as a matter of course, have hidden and dispersed CBW locations just in case of some form of attack, nuclear or otherwise.  And that would definately be deployed in the event of a nuclear attack, even if in a SCUDs-to-Israel type way rather than a direct attack.

One of the primary reasons for the development of a bunker buster nuke was to minimize fallout by trapping it underground.

[Corsair]

Originally posted by pyro-manic
I just had a thought. ( )

I remember a little while back, somebody (aldo?) posted some info about the development of space-based weapons platforms, that would drop high-density projectiles onto targets from orbit. IIRC it talked about depleted uranium or tungsten projectiles, which would provide excellent penetration of pretty much any structure (something that dense travelling at such high speed). Could they be talking about this when they say they're going to pursue a "conventional" solution? Though the orbital weapon would have pretty much the same effect as a nuke, but without the fallout...

Like FireCrack said, Rods from God, which were made of tungsten. About a year ago, Popular Science ran an article on that and a few other technologies that the US military is looking at... including some sort of some sort of UberKillerDeath Minigun that would be capable of something like 300,000 rounds a second, using electromagnetism or something like that.

[WeatherOp]

Originally posted by Corsair



Like FireCrack said, Rods from God, which were made of tungsten. About a year ago, Popular Science ran an article on that and a few other technologies that the US military is looking at... including some sort of some sort of UberKillerDeath Minigun that would be capable of something like 300,000 rounds a second, using electromagnetism or something like that.

Nah, that laser that shot true several inches of Titanium was cooler. Allthough it was a bit large.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Deepblue


One of the primary reasons for the development of a bunker buster nuke was to minimize fallout by trapping it underground.

Which it wouldn't be able to do (see top story).

Anyways, I though you were referring (given proximity) to the articles I linked, which allowed nuclear - without restriction - attacks to be requested upon WMD stores (although it mentioned storage bunkers, it doesn't restrict to them).

[pyro-manic]

The electronic gun thingie has been around for years ('twas on Tomorrow's World on the Beeb back in the 90s, before it went crap and got cancelled) - rate of fire of a million RPM was demonstrated back then, so it's entirely possible that's been upped now. IIRC it was to be used as a point defence weapon for ships and large vehicles, to destroy incoming missiles etc. It wasn't like a conventional gun at all - rather than having the bullets fed into the barrel(s) one at a time, the barrels were actually filled with bullets stacked end-to-end, and fired by means of an electronic pulse that fired the charges. Looks more like a little rocket pod than a gun, though it was much smaller. Bit heavy on the ammo, though...

[achtung]

Bombing a Bunker in Four Steps (From Pop-Sci)

1.  A B-2 bomber flying at an altitude of 40,000 feet drops a modified B83 nuclear weapon carrying a 1.2-megaton warhead.  It travels 2,000 feet per second towards it's ground target.

2.  Assuming the soil is composed of granite, the nuke will penetrate to a depth of 20 feet within 100 milliseconds.  Radar sensors on the warhead detonate the nuke once it has plowed to it's target depth, releasing the engergy of more than a million tons of TNT.

3.  The balst creates a 1,200 foot wide crater and sends a shockwave travelling 1,116 feet per second through the ground.  The wave will destroy everything down to 1,000 feet.  Any bunkers deeper than that could survive the blast.

4.  The National Academy of Sciences estimates that the explosion will shoot some 300,000 tons of radioactive debris up to 15 miles into the air.  The total number of casualties will vary but could exceed one million, depending on weather, wind velocity, and the blast's proximity to towns and cities.

Sorry if there are any typos I had to type it from the magazine.

[Descenterace]

Originally posted by pyro-manic
It wasn't like a conventional gun at all - rather than having the bullets fed into the barrel(s) one at a time, the barrels were actually filled with bullets stacked end-to-end, and fired by means of an electronic pulse that fired the charges. Looks more like a little rocket pod than a gun, though it was much smaller. Bit heavy on the ammo, though...

Google for MetalStorm.

It could fire grenades in a similar manner at a similar rate, too. It was designed as an area-denial defensive weapon rather than an offensive weapon.

As for electromagnetic rail-weapons, the fire rate of a railgun is in theory limited only by the time taken for the projectile to leave the barrel, meaning that faster, more powerful projectiles could be fired more rapidly...
Of course, that assumes we find a way to prevent erosion of the rails and can actually pump the weapon with a continuous stream of pulses of the required power.