this post was submitted on 29 Oct 2023
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This feels so out of date to me. We have guided ballistic missiles, drones, etc. Why are we still thinking about dropping an unguided bomb like this from an aircraft with a human in it? It's >1 megaton ffs - close should be "good enough"?
Because they can glide a long way and are stealthier without propellant. It’s still a standoff weapon. The B21 is a stone cold killer. It can get in fairly close undetected and drop from high altitude in still relatively safe airspace. The bombs are away without anyone ever knowing it was there. Then you’ve got a stealthy bomb gliding in silently. It probably shows up on radar like a raindrop.
Randrops are falling on my head
Soon we will all be dead
What happens when someone takes control of the guidance? A bomb dropped from the sky is going to obey the laws of physics and that's it.
Laws of physics? What are you, a narc?
https://i.imgur.com/z3EEL82.mp4
I'm so glad someone made it into a movie.
You dont just "take over" an inertial guidance system.
No, but the possibility exists.
In the same way the atoms that make up you and the atoms that make up a car wont hit eachother if you get hit. Unless there is some massive amount of fuckery theres no stopping a bomb once its dropped.
Dispersal of liability if something goes wrong?
It's not the ground-based targeting system so that company can't be sued. It's not the onboard nav so that company can't be sued. It's not the software so that company can't be sued. It's not communication latency or interference so we can't blame it on a bad command decision to push forward without more reliable data points.
The only thing that will ultimately result in a nuclear weapon being dropped is if the guy with human eyes is looking at the target, makes a judgement call, and pushes the button.
All that being said, we should not be building more nukes regardless. This is dumb.
You can probably fit more bomb in the same package if you odnt have to worry about propellant
I would lean to reliability and speed. Ballistic missiles don’t get a lot of testing while the bombers are flown regularly and takeoff/land pretty much anywhere .