Implications for Good

If polywell fusion is developed, in what ways will the world change for better or worse? Discuss.

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Betruger
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Post by Betruger »

Roger wrote: Just like the bodega is too small for the Gatling gun, the Planet Earth is too small to be playing with beam weapons.
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MSimon
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Post by MSimon »

Who the hell would come to a beam weapon party with nukes on missiles? Think it thru MS..... consider the scale of the implications, please.
It will start that way Roger. It will not end there though. I was merely considering the next step.
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MSimon
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Post by MSimon »

But yet the carrier mentality is still very strong here in the US,
There is a good reason for the fleet carrier. If you have them you don't need airbases in order to apply air power to a conflict.

The fleet carrier will go away when you have military aircraft with a combat radius very much greater than 300 miles. A combat radius of 12,000 miles or more would do the trick.

The death of the fleet carrier has been predicted for a very long time. I do believe its life is at least another half century.
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choff
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Post by choff »

My hope is that if the global economy takes off with polywell, education becomes affordable throughout the world with it, poor people become educated faster than they can overbreed. Educated people have fewer children, population growth comes under control, global poverty is elimanated. Rich people send the poor people to do their fighting, no more poor people, fewer wars.

Educated women don't like alpha males deciding their lives for them. When the alpha male comes up against the alpha female, he's met his match, in ways he didn't plan on.

I read an article a way back the F14's got scrapped for the F18's on carriers. Some avaitor types were complaining about the range and speed of the 18's being inferior, makine the carriers less effective.

Around the end of the Vietnam era, I saw a tv program about cost overruns and poor performance in the F18 development program. The interviewer was telling the guy in charge of the program that critics of the F18 called it 'a turkey that won't fly!' I'll never forget his response, he said, 'we'll keep working on it until we've got a turkey that will fly!'
CHoff

Roger
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Post by Roger »

Roger wrote:But the time when you could win a fleet level action with carriers is 60 years gone by.
M Simon do you contend the above statement is wrong?
MSimon wrote: I do believe its life is at least another half century.
Ah crap, thats how we loose a carrier, because they will get put someplace they do not belong and sunk.

Airpower? Your'e serious? 50 yrs? Well we do have some steam engine museums, so I guess its possible. WE have a steam engine museum here in NJ.... Whippany I think it is.

I dissagree, the ICBM made the carrier obsolete, the Sunburn makes the carrier a target. Combat radius of a carrier plane is moot, when I can sink every US carrier on the planet with 10 Sunburns or S-300/400.


Sorry in the age of supersonic cruise missiles, the Fleet carrier is a museum.
I like the p-B11 resonance peak at 50 KV acceleration. In2 years we'll know.

D Tibbets
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Post by D Tibbets »

I might as well chime in again in this drifting thread. Beam weapens are sexy, but limited to line of sight, and they do not like the atmosphere, so they are primarily a short range weapon unless shooting steeply up or down so that the minimum of atmosphere gets in the way. The 747 airborn laser project has the hull of the aircraft stuffed with equipment to produce the chemical laser beam that can burn through thin aluminum plate in only a few seconds (if the enemy doesn't paint the missle with reflective high temperature coatings). Weaker lasers can burn through nearby thick steel plate in fractions of a second. The modest preformance of the airborn laser system reveals how difficult it is to maintain aim and focus when propigating through many miles of turbulent atmosphere.
My vote for trends that are most significant in changing the battlefield is improvements in sensers and communication- you have to find the target and direct weapons at it to be effective. Second place would be robots as both senser platforms and kill machines. Third place would be precision weapons that allow "surgical strikes". These would be a considerable deterrent for potential adversaries that cannot match these capabilities. Unfortionatly, it can also make conflicts more likely due to a perception that you can fight a more clean war. And, despite all this, it continues to be demonstrated that if you want to impose your will and control on an adversary you need boots on the ground (or a bunch of robots).

If you just want to kill alot of people, nothing compares to a nuclear bomb in an ICBM or stealthy cruse missle.


Dan Tibbets
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Roger
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Post by Roger »

choff wrote:

I read an article a way back the F14's got scrapped for the F18's on carriers. '
Front landing gear mounts on the F-14 corroded, all were grounded, shame the Super TOmcat was a real good plane.

BTW, Aegis point defense systems in carrier groups are being demounted, as ineffective against anything moving over mach one or so. Going terminal the Sunburn hits mach 4.5. The Aegis would have maybe 2-3 seconds when the Sunburn is in its engagement envelope.Thusly its being replaced. The brass had no choice. They dont want to loose a carrier and they know carriers are big targets.
I like the p-B11 resonance peak at 50 KV acceleration. In2 years we'll know.

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Post by Roger »

D Tibbets wrote: Third place would be precision weapons that allow "surgical strikes".
Right, super or hyper sonic missiles, properly placed are trouble for targets and defensive systems.

AS to boots on the ground, right on. and carriers can provide ground support, if the other side has no supersonic mach 3-4 criuse missiles, you;ll be just fine.
I like the p-B11 resonance peak at 50 KV acceleration. In2 years we'll know.

choff
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Post by choff »

Particle beam weapons as offensive strategic weapons are a long way off. My point is that when you get there, and the other guy gets there, warning time doesn't exist. The situation is dictated by the technological capability, not politics. The decision to shoot first is unavoidable, and things quickly get out of hand.
The way to avoid this problem is to make world peace before you get there. The great game has kept us safe, employed millions in industry and the military, pushed scientific development, but if we don't end it we're doomed.
CHoff

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Post by MSimon »

Roger wrote:
Roger wrote:But the time when you could win a fleet level action with carriers is 60 years gone by.
M Simon do you contend the above statement is wrong?
MSimon wrote: I do believe its life is at least another half century.
Ah crap, thats how we loose a carrier, because they will get put someplace they do not belong and sunk.

Airpower? Your'e serious? 50 yrs? Well we do have some steam engine museums, so I guess its possible. WE have a steam engine museum here in NJ.... Whippany I think it is.

I dissagree, the ICBM made the carrier obsolete, the Sunburn makes the carrier a target. Combat radius of a carrier plane is moot, when I can sink every US carrier on the planet with 10 Sunburns or S-300/400.

Sorry in the age of supersonic cruise missiles, the Fleet carrier is a museum.
Nope. There are countermeasures.

As to fleet vs. fleet. There is no fleet out there to challenge the US fleet.

You might like to read this:

http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index ... e=Page+One

and then assume the countermeasures have been updated by 20 years.

ICBMs have one minor problem. The kill radius is about 5 miles max (and that is for multi-megaton warheads). The time to target 10 minutes add 2 minutes for targeting. At flank speed (30+ knots) The fleet has already moved out of the kill zone.

OK you plan to get tricky and just use an EMP blast. All military eqpt is hardened against EMP. I was designing such eqpt in 1978.

My ship in 1967 (launched in '64 probably designed in the late 50s) already was tight for ABC warfare including massive air filters. (nice place to hang out on a hot day - always a very brisk breeze).

You might want to look up the Bikini tests where the US Navy learned how to armor its ships against nukes.

And then you launch your ICBM and it hits or misses the task force. What do you suppose you will receive in return? A smile and a kiss? ICBMs always leave a return address.

Don't forget that targeting and shooting is now good enough to kill a mortar or even large gun shell in flight. The Sunburn will get shredded in flight. Or it will get spoofed and hit a towed spoofer.

What do you think the Aegis radar is all about?

Say Iran fired off a few Sunburns? What do you think are the odds their refining capacity would last six hours past launch?

Or study the Falklands War. The Argentines got hits on a few ships. Then they lost the Belgrano. The Argies were lucky the Brits didn't care to engage the Argentine mainland.

The aircraft carrier's day will come. But not any time soon.

===

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Post by MSimon »

choff wrote:Particle beam weapons as offensive strategic weapons are a long way off. My point is that when you get there, and the other guy gets there, warning time doesn't exist. The situation is dictated by the technological capability, not politics. The decision to shoot first is unavoidable, and things quickly get out of hand.
The way to avoid this problem is to make world peace before you get there. The great game has kept us safe, employed millions in industry and the military, pushed scientific development, but if we don't end it we're doomed.
There is the horizon problem. You have to get close enough or high enough for a line of sight shot.

Space is the high ground.

Cue up the Star Wars theme music.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oma9uPz9YYk
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MSimon
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Post by MSimon »

OK. So the Aegis radar and associated defense systems are inadequate and being replaced. That says that countermeasures are available.

How do you counter that? Higher speed? Well you need a bigger missile capable of taking a LOT of heat in the final seconds.

Mach 10 at sea level is hard to do. If you want to survive the final run in from self generated heat.
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kunkmiester
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Post by kunkmiester »

The Navy also has SM-3, which makes anything not sea-skimming irrelevant. And despite the Sunburn's long range, you still have to be able to see what you're aiming at. That means getting a ship or plane past the Aegis cruisers, which aren't obsolete yet, just Phalanx.
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pfrit
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Post by pfrit »

MSimon wrote:Say Iran fired off a few Sunburns? What do you think are the odds their refining capacity would last six hours past launch?
If you are suggesting that a nation fires a lethal attack at an US carrier force and has to wait 6 hours for a response (or even 15 minutes) I think you are nuts. The commander of a carrier force is authorized to use any and all means at his disposal to ensure the survival of his command. A serious attack on his command would mean an immediate, maximal response from his command. He would not need any political approval for it. I doubt he would use his nuclear options if he is not attacked with nuclear weapons, but they would be at his disposal. The rules of engagement when under enemy fire is more than a little frightening. There may be as many as five countries in the world with more firepower than a modern US carrier force. As far as I am concerned, that is the biggest defensive system of a carrier force.
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Post by MSimon »

pfrit wrote:
MSimon wrote:Say Iran fired off a few Sunburns? What do you think are the odds their refining capacity would last six hours past launch?
If you are suggesting that a nation fires a lethal attack at an US carrier force and has to wait 6 hours for a response (or even 15 minutes) I think you are nuts. The commander of a carrier force is authorized to use any and all means at his disposal to ensure the survival of his command. A serious attack on his command would mean an immediate, maximal response from his command. He would not need any political approval for it. I doubt he would use his nuclear options if he is not attacked with nuclear weapons, but they would be at his disposal. The rules of engagement when under enemy fire is more than a little frightening. There may be as many as five countries in the world with more firepower than a modern US carrier force. As far as I am concerned, that is the biggest defensive system of a carrier force.
It takes time to mount an attack. And the attack might need to be repeated for effect. I was figuring six hours was enough time.
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