US Navy No Likee Nukie?

“I am not an atomic playboy”.  Admiral William Blandy, joint commander of the Crossroads nuclear test, perhaps demonstrating post-test the Navy’s preferred mode of encounter with nuclear weapons.
Thanks to @jkbloodtreasure for the definitive tweet on this image:  'we made a dessert and we called it peace'

I have an article up exclusively on Asia Times, The Case of the Missing Nukes…and a Disappearing US Mission in Asia, concerning an interesting and, I fear, transitory lack of tactical nuclear weapons in theater in Asia.

I see tactical nukes making a comeback in Asia, probably courtesy of the Long Range Stand Off weapon a.k.a. nuclear-tipped cruise missile that the Pentagon probably sees as the real game-changer in countering the PRC’s military buildup.  I'm addressing that issue in depth in a separate piece. (Update: here: US Pivot to Asia Poised to Enter Nuclear Phase)

I suspect the US Navy itself is happy to be out of the tactical nuclear business and, in fact, fears their return.

For one thing, surface ships do not do well in nuclear exchanges, tactical or otherwise, something that might appear obvious in retrospect but needed to be demonstrated to the overly-optimistic Navy brass by detonating a nuclear warhead amid a flotilla of derelict ships at Bikini Atoll for the benefit of Admiral Blandy.  

Operation Crossroads in its non-cakelike, supremely and irrevocably radioactive original form.  If you look closely, you can see the flotilla.

I have a detailed write-up on the far-reaching significance of the Crossroads test (and the background of the legendary cake picture) here.

Second, judging by an appalling litany of Navy-related nuclear accidents compiled by the Federation of American Scientists, a pitchy platform on a slobbery ocean filled with enemy ships and other manmade and natural hazards is perhaps not the best place to store a nuclear arsenal.

Dozens of nuclear weapons were lost at sea over the decades because they were on ships, submarines, or aircraft that were lost. On December 5, 1965, for example, while underway from operations off Vietnam to Yokosuka in Japan, an A-4E aircraft loaded with one B43 nuclear weapon rolled overboard from the Number 2 Elevator. The aircraft sank with the pilot and the bomb in 2,700 fathoms (4,940 meters) of water. The bomb has never been recovered.

Here’s a picture from the FAS piece showing the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise on fire in 1969 after a conventional warhead exploded, ignited some jet fuel & caused a chain reaction of munitions and fuel explosions.

According to a subsequent account:

In all, there were 18 munition explosions or detonations. Eight holes were blown through the flight deck and deep into the ship. It took in a little over three hours to extinguish all of the fires. This incident resulted in 28 deaths and 344 injuries. There were 17 aircraft damaged and 15 destroyed. The cost of repairing the structural damage to the ship and replacing the aircraft and other equipment was over 126 million dollars.

According to the captain, losing the ship was a distinct possibility.  In addition to its 8 nuclear reactors, the Enterprise carried about 100 nuclear bombs. 

Six years later, the aircraft carrier USS Kennedy, also with about 100 nuclear bombs, struck and almost sank the USS Belknap.  The Belknap’s aluminum superstructure burned to the deckline in the resulting fire (helping convince the US Navy to move to all-steel construction), killing 6, and the fires were stopped within a few feet of the bunker containing the Belknap’s nuclear munitions (warheads for its Terrier SAM battery).

…and the collision of the nuclear-armed attack sub USS Pintado with a Soviet sub

…and the loss of the USS Scorpion.

Even strategic subs, which I understand are supposed to stay aloof from the fray and lurk in safe, remote waters, have apparently had several accidents.

1968: USS Von Steuben (48 warheads on 16 Polaris missiles) collides with Spanish freighter…

1970: Fire on the submarine tender USS Canopus, itself carrying nuclear missiles & warheads, while moored next to two strategic subs in port.  96 nuclear warheads involved…

1974: The USS James Madison dives on top of a Russian attack sub that I guess was rather successfully shadowing it.  160 nuclear warheads on the James Madison.  Number on Russian sub unknown.

1998: Collision between USS Kentucky & a US attack sub off Long Island; 192 warheads on Kentucky alone.

That’s just a sampling of what we know about.  The FAS page has more.   

And that's just vulnerabilities exhibited in normal peacetime operations, without enemies shooting missiles, setting off bombs, firing torpedos, and whatnot.  So maybe the US Navy on balance prefers that somebody else worry about storing and delivering tactical nuclear weapons.

Thirdly, nukes, especially tactical nukes, reduce the need for big, expensive conventional maritime platforms like aircraft carriers, destroyers, and so on, especially in dealing with a nuclear power like the PRC.

Because of the re-nuking of Asia, at least in US "defense" doctrine, that I anticipate, I view current Navy activities in the West Pacific as a dash by the US Navy to create a narrative supporting its relevance and enabling it to bulk up its position in the few years before the return of tactical nuclear weapons and growing local qualms about the wisdom of the pivot combine to sunset the Navy's dominance of the China-containment narrative.   

Make non-nuclear hay while the sun shines, in other words!

The Sweet, Sweet Side of Nuclear Weapons

As I write about the NPT Review Conference and nuclear disarmament, this image deserves--nay demands--its own post.

Readers may click on the picture to enjoy its full-sized magnificence.

It's been making the rounds of the Internet with varying attributions.

Fortunately, its provenance is documented in the on-line archives of Time Magazine from November 18, 1946:

In Washington last week, at the Army War College's sumptuous officers' club, two admirals and their wives gave a little party to commemorate the dissolution of Joint Army-Navy Task Force No. i, which staged Operation Crossroads at Bikini. An East St. Louis group of bakers sent a cake, made out of tiny angel-food puffs, in the shape of an atomic explosion. Vice Admiral W.H.P. ("Spike") Blandy, Crossroads commander, and Mrs. Blandy were photographed gaily cutting the cake, while Rear Admiral F. J. Lowry stood happily by .

The picture made the Washington Post's society page. It also made a lot of people indignant and unhappy...the Rev. Mr. Davies [pastor of a Unitarian church in Washington--ed.] thundered: "An utterly loathsome picture. If I spoke as I feel I would call it obscene.... How would it seem in Hiroshima or Nagasaki to know that Americans make cakes of angel-food puffs in the image of that terrible diabolical thing". . . .

Time concluded mordantly: These were probably the harshest words ever spoken of a dessert.

Operation Crossroads, by the way, represented the first two nuclear tests conducted after World War II, Able and Baker. It was something of a cock-up--and not just for the residents of Bikini Atoll, who saw their home atoll largely obliterated and totally irradiated, and its name applied to risque swimwear.

Wikipedia has a superb article on the Crossroads tests.

The U.S. Navy was apparently quite anxious not to concede any ground to its despised rivals in the Air Force, even though it seemed that strategic doctrine had permanently shifted away from big ships lobbing big shells to big planes dropping really big bombs.

The first Crossroads test was therefore run by the Navy as an experiment--and hopefully a demonstration--of the ability of a surface fleet to survive in a nuclear attack zone and continue to operate.

It was understood from the beginning that humans would not do well, but it was considered important to learn if carbon based life forms would be able to survive, at least for a while, and do their duty.

Patriotic livestock volunteered to stand in for human sailors during the tests.


Ships not in the immediate blast area survived, to the Navy's gratification.


However, the takeaway, especially after the spectacular and spectacularly dirty underwater detonation of the Baker test, was that the Navy's role in nuclear warfare would not involve blithely replacing the dead and dying with a fresh crew and continuing with its military business.




The ships were hopelessly irradiated and could not be made safe even after many dreary months of decontamination. Unless the sailors were to be outfitted in lead suits, the ships were unusable.



Fortunately for the U.S. Navy, submarine-based nuclear-tipped missiles emerged to guarantee the relevance--and budget--of the salty service into the 21st century.

The four photos of the Crossroads tests are from the Wikipedia article cited above. The goats were exposed during the Able (airburst) test. The second and third photos show stages in the Baker (underwater) test. The test flotilla is clearly visible in both pictures and gives an idea of the size of the blast. The final photo shows Navy crews during their unsuccessful attempts to decontaminate the Prinz Eugen, one of the ships in the flotilla.