For decades the world hung on the brink of
nuclear annihilation, and despite the certain total destruction promised by nuclear war,
military planners in both the United States and the Soviet Union sought ways to come out
ahead in a potential exchange. Some of these plans were based on completely
unrealistic assumptions, others might have had a chance of success in a real nuclear
exchange. What was overwhelmingly certain however was
that in nuclear war, losses on either side would be staggering. But just how did the US military plan on fighting
a nuclear war? When you hear the term “nuclear war”,
you probably think of an all-out exchange and the end of civilization, and this is certainly
a likely outcome. Yet nuclear war isn't as cut and dry as a
single, full-exchange scenario, and both the Soviet Union and the United States knew this. Nuclear weapons were extremely useful for
both sides- for the United States it offered a way to neutralize the Soviet Union's massive
numbers advantage against it. For the Soviet Union it was a way to neutralize
the United State's technological edge. Both sides had plans for nuclear weapons in
even a conventional war, and some local commanders on both sides even chafed at the need to seek
higher authority than themselves to use nuclear weapons. President Eisenhower initially believed that
nuclear weapons were no different than any other bomb or bullet the military used, and
saw no reason why they couldn't be used against dedicated military targets. However as nuclear weapons grew in destructive
potential and their use proliferated to the Soviet Union and other nations, he very quickly
changed his mind. However, what did not change was the possibility
of using them against strictly military targets. In Europe, the US military planned on using
small tactical nuclear weapons against Soviet armor and infantry forces. While technologically superior and better
trained, US and NATO forces were vastly outnumbered by the forces of the Soviet Union and its
Soviet bloc allies. Both sides knew that tactical nuclear weapons
were the only chance at stopping the Soviets from washing across Europe like a giant tide. For this purpose, battlefield commanders would
be briefly authorized to launch limited nuclear attacks using small and low-yield weapons,
but only against dedicated military targets. Attacks on military targets close to population
or industrial centers were strictly forbidden, as it was hoped that attacking only military
targets deployed in the field would limit the possibility for escalation. If US nuclear attacks did not hit civilian
or industrial centers, then the Soviets may respond with tactical nuclear strikes of their
own but not initiate a full-response targeting American civilian and industrial sectors. It was a dangerous gamble, but it was the
only way to secure victory against the Soviet Union. Today nuclear war planning takes a similar
and flexible approach, seeking to limit the possibility of unchecked escalation. While the United States currently has the
conventional military power to defeat Russia or China without the need of nuclear weapons,
should that balance of power change we can envision how the US would respond to a nuclear
war. Today the US maintains a very small inventory
of tactical nuclear weapons, and these weapons can only be delivered via military aircraft-
a far cry from systems such as the man-portable Davy Crockett tactical weapon which could
be fired by a group of three men at columns of Soviet tanks. In a fictional scenario where Russia or China
achieved numerological and technological parity with the US, and war broke out, these low-yield
tactical nuclear weapons would make up the first salvo of a nuclear war. With approximately 500 B61 gravity bombs,
the United States would quickly begin arming F-16s and F-35s with these variable yield
weapons. Initially they would be launched against enemy
positions, hitting large concentrations of troops and much like in the Cold War, avoiding
striking at civilian or industrial centers. One major problem with Cold War era war planning
was that despite Soviet military targets being the initial focus in a nuclear exchange, launching
an attack against these targets without complete and total surprise would take so long that
most of the equipment and personnel at these sites would have been evacuated. Some mission-critical hardware and structures
that could not be physically moved would be destroyed, and the site rendered inoperable
for several weeks, but most of the actual military targets the US was looking to destroy
would avoid the attack by simply dispersing. Today dispersion is less of a concern thanks
to greatly improved surveillance and attack capabilities that the Cold War US could only
have dreamt of. Advanced reconnaissance satellites can easily
pinpoint the movement of enemy troops and hardware, and global communications afforded
by satellite links can easily connect pilots on strike missions with the intelligence needed
to hit the right targets. Thus in a modern scenario, American F-16s
and F-35s would immediately be launched in attacks against enemy troop formations. It would be expected that the enemy would
retaliate in kind, and it's even hoped so. After all if enemy forces retaliated with
similar tactical nuclear strikes, they might feel satisfied and not need to escalate the
exchange. To limit their own losses, American units
would widely disperse, while other US assets sought to interfere with or destroy the complex
communications and intelligence chains of assets required for accurate targeting. The next level of nuclear escalation would
come if the US believed that a greater expansion was inevitable, or if enemy forces began the
escalation themselves. The United States would next move to attack
more strategic, rather than tactical, targets, striking out at enemy military installations
and communications hubs. These attacks may still be carried out with
airborne assets, but other than the B-2 stealth bomber, it's not likely any American aircraft
would survive long enough to deliver their bombs to assigned targets deeper in enemy-held
territory. Instead, the United States would need to use
either submarine launched ballistic missiles, or SLBMs, or traditional ICBMs. Modern American weapons feature the ability
to produce variable yields, scaling up or down their destructive potential. Future American nuclear weapons will even
be able to scale their yields down as low as 2% of the bomb used on Hiroshima. This gives the US options that would hopefully
limit the expansion of a nuclear war. By using low yield weapons against non-civilian
or industrial targets, it's hoped that if any response was forthcoming, then that response
would similarly target American military and communication targets with low-yield weapons
and avoid industry and population centers. One certain target would be Russian or Chinese
nuclear weapons, and this presents a problem for US war planners. It is not believed that SLBMs have the penetration
power to permanently shut down an enemy ICBM field, requiring the use of ICBMs for the
job. American ICBMs however would be themselves
immediately targeted by enemy ICBMs, unless again the American attack was a bolt-out-of-the-blue
which achieved complete surprise. With submarine-based weapons lacking the penetration
power of ICBMs, and American ICBM fields in the US being immediately counter-attacked
by enemy nuclear strikes, this means that the US faces a conundrum: while it wishes
to limit the scope of the war, not using all of its available ICBM inventory at the start
of a war means that it will never get a chance to do so, as any unlaunched ICBMs will be
destroyed by enemy counter-attacks. It is the traditional use-it-or-lose-it scenario,
and one that many fear means that a limited escalation is all but impossible. If the US chose to use ICBMs only to strike
at military targets and enemy missile fields, and left those targeting major population
and industrial centers for deterrence unlaunched, then they would be destroyed in the ensuing
counterattack and the US would forever lose the ability to launch its most high yield
weapons. In this scenario the United States would have
given up nuclear parity and deterrence from escalation by holding cities under threat,
for the sake of striking a few military targets, losing nearly half of all its nuclear capabilities
while using only a small fraction of them in return. Should any enemy nuclear missile fields remain
operational after the attack, the US would be at a severe disadvantage going forward. It's likely then that striking at only military
targets is impossible, and the US would simply opt for escalating one more rung up the ladder. This would involve adding enemy industrial
and economic hubs to the list of approved targets for nuclear strike, with the aim being
of preventing attacks against population centers but still destroying the enemy's ability to
continue fighting. At this point in a nuclear war, targeting
would have the dual purpose of not just stopping the enemy's ability to fight today, but ensuring
that the enemy is far too damaged economically or politically to rebuild faster than the
United States in the post-war period. For US nuclear war planning, considerations
on the US achieving superiority in the post-war period are given highest priority. The next step in the nuclear war ladder is
an all-out exchange, with the targeting of major population centers. This is in fact not an active war plan of
the United States, meaning that a massive attack against enemy cities is not actually
planned for as part of any war planning. Rather, a massive all-out exchange would be
the causality of an increasingly escalating nuclear war. The ability to target and destroy cities is
held only as a deterrent, hopefully convincing the enemy that escalating past the previous
rung on the nuclear ladder is simply not worth it. If however an initial attack was detected,
or even just feared, the US may simply opt to attack first. As part of its commitment to safeguard allies
under its nuclear umbrella, the United States retains a nuclear first strike policy to this
day. As nuclear war escalates, a select portion
of American military and nuclear assets would immediately go into reserve in sheltered locations. US war planning dictates that a strategic
reserve of both nuclear weapons and conventional forces be established during a nuclear conflict,
so that in the post-war period the United States still has access to some level of conventional
military power as well as nuclear weapons for defense. Even in a post-nuclear war involving an all-out
exchange and the destruction of most major cities around the world, the same nuclear
weapons that brought about the end of the world would remain ready to launch a new apocalyptic
war for whoever survives.
