Aerospace Daily September 2, 2003
Navy eyes submarine-launched intermediate range ballistic missile
By Rich Tuttle
The idea of a submarine-launched intermediate range ballistic missile is being studied by the Navy's Strategic Systems Programs (SSP) unit.
SSP wants industry input on such a weapon by Sept. 16, according to an Aug. 26 FedBizOpps notice. Conventional and nuclear payloads should be considered, the notice says.
Lt. Amy Morrison, a Navy spokeswoman, said the purpose of the notice is to request data "to support preliminary conceptual work on missiles that support the Unified Command Plan, which assigns responsibility for global strike to STRATCOM, [U.S. Strategic Command]."
The request for information, she said, "is not a requirement - it's not even at that stage yet ... It's basically an avenue to explore possibilities from industry, to see what kind of technology's out there."
The SLIRBM would have a maximum diameter of 32.5 inches, according to the notice. This is less than half the diameter of a long-range Trident intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), according to John Pike of GlobalSecurity.org, an independent defense-oriented operation based in Alexandria. Va.
"It definitely sounds like they're looking at this as being a backfit missile," he said in an Aug. 29 telephone interview. Its relatively small size - the original Polaris A1 sub-launched IRBM of the 1960s was 54 inches in diameter - would allow installation in a Virginia-class attack sub, with a small fairing, Pike said.
With the end of the Cold War, he said, the Navy must "think about what else one might put in the existing Ohio tubes. And, if you were going to design a new class, would it really be [like] the Ohio?" Pike said a sub-launched IRBM would be a departure from the thrust of fleet ballistic missile program, which has been toward longer ranges. Polaris had a range of about 1,000 nautical miles, and today's Trident can fly more than 4,000 nautical miles.
But with the disappearance of the Soviet Union and its robust anti-submarine warfare capability, the need for such long ranges has diminished, and subs with shorter-range, and therefore smaller, missiles can now get closer to their targets, Pike said. This, he said, "means you can carry more [missiles] per boat, and ... you can start thinking about the possibility of delivering non-nuclear munitions" from ballistic missile subs.
SSP says it will use industry inputs at a classified SLIRBM "technical exchange" planned for Sept. 22, at which it "will present detailed Navy requirements, current and future technology plans, and ongoing programs."
"This is just really at the conceptual stage, and as we go further and they have these kinds of technical exchanges the ideas are going to somewhat solidify," Morrison said.
SSP also wants input on launching an IRBM from surface ships.
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