On this day in engineering history,
the U.S. Navy began studying the development of a solid-fueled, ship-based,
fleet ballistic missile (FBM). Four years later, the first Polaris A-1 rocket was
test-launched from the USS George
Washington, the Navy's first fleet ballistic missile submarine. The success
of the Polaris gave the Navy a nuclear-armed submarine launched ballistic missile
(SLBM) - and the United States an important second-strike capability in its Cold
War confrontation with the Soviet Union.
The Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA)
On March 20, 1956, the
Ballistic Missile Committee of the Office of the Secretary of Defense approved
the Navy's request to research the use of solid propellant rockets with
intercontinental capabilities. Although critics decried the Committee's
decision as a nod to interservice rivalries, the Navy's request was more than a
response to the creation of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA) a month
earlier. Staffed by leading rocket scientists such as Wernher von Braun, the
ABMA gave the Army greater control over weapons such as the Jupiter intermediate
range ballistic missile (IRMB), then a joint Army-Navy venture.
By Land and By Sea
During the early 1950s, the
Army and Navy had worked together to develop the Jupiter IRBM for land and sea
deployment. Each military service had conflicting requirements, however, and
the Navy's interest in a solid-fueled ballistic missile was grounded in both
practical and technological considerations. The liquid-propellant rockets that
the Army wanted required complex launch support equipment, but space aboard
ship remained at a premium. There was also the matter of storing and handling
liquid rocket fuel while at sea, a matter of special concern during undersea
missions.
Replacing the Regulus
The fleet ballistic missile
(FBM) that the U.S. Navy now sought would complement and eventually replace the
SSM-N-8 Regulus, a nuclear-armed cruise missile that was first launched from a
submarine in 1953. In order to replace its cruise missiles with ballistic ones,
however, the Navy would have to overcome several more obstacles, including the
heavy weight of nuclear warheads and the sheer size of rockets such as the
Jupiter. There was also the matter of ballistic missile technology itself,
which historian David Baker described as "still cluttered with unknowns" in his
1978 book, "The Rocket: The History and Development of Rocket and Missile
Technology".
Resources:
http://www.aiaa.org/aerospace/images/articleimages/pdf/AA_Mar06_OOP.pdf
http://knowledgerush.com/kr/encyclopedia/Polaris_missile/
http://web.mit.edu/ssp/people/sapolsky/TARGETING%20POLARIS.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulus_missile
The
Rocket, by David Baker
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