On 11/1/2012 3:30 PM, Saintly Oswald wrote:
> And your timeline about who almost sparked WW3, while not wrong, is different than mine. I was talking about the Cuban Missile Crisis, not the assassination. The CMC was a result of Cold War hawkish policies which predated the Kennedy administration. It was the "drug-addled security risk" JFK's changing of those policies which brought us back from the brink. As for the post-assassination Castro rumors, those may have been genuine attempts to make trouble, but I think they were probably intended as inducement to Earl Warren and others to cover up the removal process. LBJ in a phone call to Richard Russell bragged about how he had Warren in tears saying he's do whatever LBJ wanted after waving the Oswald-In-Mexico evidence in his face. Very handy, those rumors.
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Not handy. A planned hoax to short circuit the investigation.
You also left out another factor. Polaris. We didn't need those obsolete
missiles in Turkey. Kennedy had already ordered them to be removed.
History and development
The Polaris missile replaced an earlier plan to create a submarine-based
missile force based on a huge surfaced submarine carrying four "Jupiter"
missiles, which would be carried and launched horizontally. This Navy
"Jupiter" missile is not to be confused with the U.S. Army Jupiter
Intermediate-range ballistic missile. At Edward Teller's prompting,[1]
the Navy's "Jupiter" missile plans were abandoned in favor of the much
smaller, solid-fuel-propelled Polaris.
Originally, the Navy favored cruise missile systems in a strategic role
as deployed on the earlier USS Grayback, but a major drawback of these
early cruise missile launch systems (and the Jupiter proposals) was the
need to surface, and remain surfaced for some time, to launch.
Submarines were very vulnerable to attack during launch, and a fully or
partially fueled missile on deck was a serious hazard. Rough weather was
another major drawback for these designs, but rough sea conditions did
not unduly affect Polaris launches.
It quickly became apparent solid-fueled ballistic missiles had
advantages over cruise missiles in range and accuracy, and unlike both
Jupiter and cruise, were able to be launched from a submerged submarine,
improving submarine survivability.
The prime contractor for all three versions of Polaris was Lockheed, now
Lockheed Martin.
The Polaris program started development in 1956. The USS George
Washington, the first US missile submarine, successfully launched the
first Polaris missile from a submerged submarine on July 20, 1960. The
A-2 version of the Polaris missile was essentially an upgraded A-1, and
it entered service in late 1961. It was fitted on a total of 13
submarines and served until June 1974.(1). Ongoing problems with the
W-47 warhead, especially with its mechanical arming and safing
equipment, led to large numbers of the missiles being recalled for
modifications, and the U.S. Navy sought a replacement with either a
larger yield or equivalent destructive power. The result was the W-58
warhead used in a "cluster" of three warheads for the Polaris A-3, the
final model of the Polaris missile.
Polaris A-3
This missile replaced the earlier A-1 and A-2 models in the US Navy, and
also equipped the British Polaris force. The A-3 had a range extended to
2,500 nautical miles (4,630 km) and a new weapon bay housing three Mk 2
re-entry vehicles (ReB or Re-Entry Body in US Navy and British usage);
and the new W-58 warhead of 200 kt yield. This arrangement was
originally described as a "cluster warhead" but was replaced with the
term Multiple Re-Entry Vehicle (MRV). The three warheads were spread
about a common target and were not independently targeted (such as a
MIRV missile is). The three warheads were stated to be equivalent in
destructive power to a single one-megaton warhead. Later the Polaris A-3
missiles (but not the ReBs) were also given limited hardening to protect
the missile electronics against electromagnetic pulse effects while in
the boost phase. This was known as the A-3T ("Topsy") and was the final
production model.
Polaris A-1
Polaris A-1 on launch pad in Cape Canaveral
The first version, the Polaris A-1, had a range of 1000 nautical miles
(1853 km) and a single Mk 1 re-entry vehicle, carrying a single W-47-Y1
600 kt nuclear warhead, with an inertial guidance system which provided
a Circular error probable (CEP) of 1800 meters (6000 ft). The two-stage
solid propellant missile had a length of 28.5 ft (8.69 m), a body
diameter of 54 in (1.37 m), and a launch weight of 28,800 lbs (13,090 kg).
The USS George Washington was the first fleet ballistic missile
submarine (SSBN in U.S. naval terminology) and she and all of the other
Polaris submarines carried 16 missiles. Forty more SSBNs were launched
in 1960 to 1966.
Work on its W47 nuclear warhead began in 1957 at the facility that is
now called the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory by a team headed
by Edward Teller and Harold Brown.[2] The Navy accepted delivery of the
first 16 warheads in July 1960. On May 6, 1962, a Polaris A-2 missile
with a live W47 warhead was tested in Operation Dominic in the central
Pacific Ocean, the only American test of a live strategic nuclear missile.
The two stages were both steered by thrust vectoring. Inertial
navigation guided the missile to about a 900 m (3,000 foot) CEP,
insufficient for use against hardened targets. They were mostly useful
for attacking dispersed military surface targets (airfields or radar
sites), clearing a pathway for heavy bombers, although in the general
public perception Polaris was a strategic second-strike retaliatory
weapon.[citation needed]