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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 1117.PDF
f LIGHT, 22 July 1960 115 ySS "George Washington" fires a vater "slug" to check out one of her launch tubes By the Technical Editor Part 1 THE recent reshaping ofBritain's nuclear deterrentis officially ascribed to a single fact: that any weapon,such as our now-defunct Blue Streak, which can operate onlyfrom a fixed land base—especially one with brief warning-time—iseconomically unsound. Once an enemy has had time to zero-in hisown weapons on the co-ordinates of that base no economic amountof hardening can make it safe. Thus we cancelled Blue Streak as aweapon, and the Minister of Defence announced his intentionof buying an air-launched ballistic missile in its stead. But there islittle doubt that, had he more money, he would have given theRoyal Navy Polaris; and, in fact, a somewhat indefinite feasibilitystudy for Polaris has now been authorized. There are many whoconsider the submarine-launched ballistic missile the least vulner-able deterrent in the world, and it is timely to outline how this re-markable weapon system became an accomplished fact. Flying vehicles have been launched from submarines since theGreat War. But a submarine-based ballistic missile, and especially one which can be launched from the depth of the ocean, is amuch more remarkable concept. Its fulfilment has demanded the solution of a range of wholly new problems which, in aggregate,have perhaps been greater than those posed by any single previous undertaking. Their solution, to an amazingly compressed time-scale, is eloquent testimony to the technological ability of the United States. In view of the immensity of the task involved in mating astrategic ballistic missile with a submarine, it is worth noting that the US Navy only began to think about such a concept fiveyears ago. In the summer of 1955 the Army Ballistic Missile Agency at Redstone Arsenal were well advanced with the basicdevelopment of the first American intermediate-range ballistic missile, the 1,500 n.m. Jupiter. The Secretary of Defense,Charles Wilson, decided that this missile would meet the Navy's requirement, and preliminary discussions were held to determineto what extent the same IRBM system could be utilized by both services. A missile based closely upon Jupiter was finally acceptedby the Navy in December, although few people closely concerned with the project felt much enthusiasm for it. Although relativelysquat, Jupiter was too unwieldy to be an ideal shipmate, and its liquid propellants were widely held to pose unacceptable handlingproblems. In November a Special Projects Office was created by the USNavy in order to manage the fleet ballistic missile (FBM) system. To this office came men from the Bureau of Aeronautics, for whomseveral firms had prepared studies for a submarine-launched solid- propellant ballistic missile. Early in 1956 the Navy started lookingat such a concept in detail, since the liquid propellants of Jupiter appeared increasingly undesirable. During the winter the Navytalked with many possible contractors, and twelve of their pro- posals were screened. One of the firms which had studied theproblem for BuAer had been the young and enthusiastic Missile Systems Division (now Missile & Space Division) of LockheedAircraft. In March 1956 a joint team from LMSD and Aerojet- General started contractual discussions with the Special ProjectsOffice, with a view to the choice of solid propulsion, with jet deflection, while adhering to the Jupiter guidance and warhead.Nevertheless, although by now several firms had been awarded solid-propellant study contracts, the Army Ballistic Missile Agencycontinued to develop a seagoing Jupiter until December 1956. During the summer LMSD and Aerojet-General completed'tie basic design of their missile, which was intended for deploy- POLARIS The Destroyer from the Deep ment aboard large surface vessels. It was a 6+1 cluster, with alaunch weight of 160,0001b (some 50,0001b heavier than Jupiter). A number of scale models were fired to prove the basic configura-tion. LMSD proposed a computer control system to be matched with the basic ABM A guidance; and General Electric, who hadan Army contract for the Jupiter fire-control, were named subcontractors to LMSD to develop this control system. Altogether, the whole FBM project did not look inspiring, andeven its most ardent sponsor must have felt that operational deployment was a long way down the road. But by Septemberthe whole picture had changed drastically as a number of break- throughs reacted upon each other, until it was clear that the missilecould be made very much smaller and better. Aerojet-General demonstrated a specific impulse appreciably higher than had beenanticipated, with the promise of eventually surpassing that of liquid engines using hydrocarbon fuels. At the same time the AtomicEnergy Commission achieved a dramatic reduction in warhead weight for a given yield, while the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology estimated weights for the airborne guidance at but a fraction of that for any previous comparable system. Roughcalculations were staggering; launch weight could be brought down from 160,0001b to approximately 30,000, size could be reduced inproportion, and submarine launching became feasible. On December 8, 1956, the Secretary of Defense authorized theNavy to terminate participation in the Jupiter programme, and to proceed with the development of the entirely new and uncom-promised weapon under the name of Polaris. The joint Army/ Navy committee was dissolved, and the Secretary of the Navyformed a ballistic missile committee to direct the programme at the highest priority. The Special Projects Office, previouslycharged with the development of the seagoing application of Jupiter, was given the responsibility of the reshaped submarineFBM system. The following month the Chief of Naval Operations issued the operational requirement establishing the interim andultimate goals, and a special steering group was created to check that the system chosen was the optimum one. During the early months of 1957 the major industrial subcon-tractors went ahead on the integrated system. LMSD presented a series of missile configurations, all squat two-stage vehicles havingmultiple nozzles with jet deflection and slender re-entry bodies. One of these configurations was adopted, and by the end of March—although the question of submerged launching was left open, pending the demonstration of its feasibility—the basic specifica-tion for the FBM system had been written. It called for state- of-the-art advances in almost every field: lightweight structure,
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