Message from @Mad Hatter
Discord ID: 573621237813739550
well it only goes mach 3 now but they are planning to upgrade it to 5
Mach 22 for an ICBM is just wasting money
not a choice
that's just how the trajectory is
Also that, but theoretically if they could, what's the point?
too hard to intercept
Fair enough, but would it be cost effective in the long run to even fire one
NASA rockets already aren't cost effective
That entire organization is an expense, it never really turns profit, monetarily at least
ICBMs are very cost effective if you put nukes on them
far more effective than bombers or cruise missiles
Not if the enemy has multi kill vehicles
kinetic interceptors are just propaganda
a full scale attack is impossible to stop
and you only need 1 warhead to get through
the best an ABM system can hope for is to stop one or two ICBMs
They throw a bunch of these up
like north korea's arsenal
insufficient
and need to be able to distinguish decoys from warheads
which is very non-trivial
so its not important for missles to go fast thats ur theory ?
they go mach 3 they are gonna upgrade it to mach 5 why isnt mach 3 fast enough ?
why dont they just go mach 22 like nasa does
why would they upgrade it from mach 3 to mach 5 when they could just make it go mach 22 im not a military expert but i think the faster ur missle goes the better no ?
ballistic missiles will go mach ~20 no matter what
because they are ballistic missiles
if you want to throw something at a target halfway around the world you need to throw it at mach 20
if you have a cruise missile that's a different matter
because it's affected by the atmosphere
so it can fly with wings
but it also needs constant power to keep flying long
unless it's a hypersonic glide vehicle
the fastest missle is mach 5
what missile are you talking about?
ICBMs go far faster than mach 5
missles in general no outerspace fantasy stuff
ICBMs go mach 5