Chevaline
Encyclopedia
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
defences around Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, the system was intended to increase the probability that at least one warhead would penetrate the city's anti-ballistic missile
Anti-ballistic missile
An anti-ballistic missile is a missile designed to counter ballistic missiles .A ballistic missile is used to deliver nuclear, chemical, biological or conventional warheads in a ballistic flight trajectory. The term "anti-ballistic missile" describes any antimissile system designed to counter...
(ABM) defences, something which the Royal Navy's earlier Polaris re-entry vehicle
Atmospheric reentry
Atmospheric entry is the movement of human-made or natural objects as they enter the atmosphere of a celestial body from outer space—in the case of Earth from an altitude above the Kármán Line,...
s (RV)s were thought to be unlikely to do.
Chevaline used a variety of penetration aid
Penetration aid
A penetration aid is a device or tactic used to increase an intercontinental ballistic missile warhead's chances of penetrating a target's defenses...
s and decoy
Decoy
A decoy is usually a person, device or event meant as a distraction, to conceal what an individual or a group might be looking for. Decoys have been used for centuries most notably in game hunting, but also in wartime and in the committing or resolving of crimes.-Duck decoy:The term duck decoy may...
s to offer so many indistinguishable targets that an opposing ABM system would be overwhelmed attempting to deal with them all, ensuring that enough warheads would get through an ABM defence to be a reasonable deterrent
Deterrence theory
Deterrence theory gained increased prominence as a military strategy during the Cold War with regard to the use of nuclear weapons, and features prominently in current United States foreign policy regarding the development of nuclear technology in North Korea and Iran. Deterrence theory however was...
to a first strike. The project was highly secret, and survived in secrecy through four different governments before finally being revealed in 1980.
Military and political requirements
The origins of that Chevaline requirement grew from the conclusion of several British governments that in the event of a SovietSoviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
nuclear attack on the UK alone, as had been threatened in late 1950s by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
and Prime Minister Nikolai Bulganin
Nikolai Bulganin
Nikolai Alexandrovich Bulganin was a prominent Soviet politician, who served as Minister of Defense and Premier of the Soviet Union . The Bulganin beard is named after him.-Early career:...
it was unrealistic to expect that the US would retaliate against the Soviet Union and risk the destruction of most major American cities. That conclusion by successive British governments was the basis of their justification given to the British people for an independent nuclear retaliatory capability.
For some time this deterrent force had been based on the Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
's V-bomber force. This looked increasingly vulnerable in the face of ever-increasing Soviet Air Defence Forces, and by the late 1950s the RAF was pursuing the Blue Steel II
Blue Steel missile
The Avro Blue Steel was a British air-launched, rocket-propelled nuclear stand-off missile, built to arm the V bomber force. It was the primary British nuclear deterrent weapon until the Royal Navy started operating Polaris missile armed nuclear submarines....
stand-off missile to allow its bombers to fire their weapons while still (hopefully) outside the range of the defensive fighters.
Another solution was the Blue Streak missile
Blue Streak missile
The Blue Streak missile was a British medium range ballistic missile . The Operational Requirement for the missile was issued in 1955 and the design was complete by 1957...
project, although this was running into continued delays. Blue Streak also had the serious problem of basing; the UK was small enough that it seemed possible for the USSR to spot the launch sites without much trouble and attack them directly.
A better solution came along in the form of the US's AGM-48 Skybolt
AGM-48 Skybolt
The Douglas GAM-87 Skybolt was an air-launched ballistic missile , equipped with a nuclear warhead, developed by the United States during the late 1950s. The UK joined the program in 1960, intending to use it on their V bomber force...
missile. The US's bomber force was facing the same sorts of problems as the British V-bombers, and were attempting to solve it in a similar fashion, with a long-range standoff missile. In this case, however, the missile in question had a truly long range of just under 2,000 km. Considering the distance from London to Moscow is about 2,500 km, Skybolt would allow the V-Bomber force to attack Russia from sites not far off the English coast, with complete immunity. Skybolt seemed like such a good solution that work on both Blue Steel II and Blue Streak were cancelled.
Skybolt development was itself cancelled in early 1962, leading to a major political row. In the end a compromise was reached later that year; the Nassau agreement
Nassau agreement
The Nassau Agreement, concluded on 22 December 1962, was a treaty negotiated between President John F. Kennedy for the United States and Prime Minister Harold Macmillan for the United Kingdom...
had the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
taking over the deterrent role with newly-acquired Polaris missiles, an arrangement that was formally outlined in the Polaris Sales Agreement
Polaris Sales Agreement
The Polaris Sales Agreement was an agreement between the United States and the United Kingdom which formally arranged for the Polaris missile system to be provided to the UK to maintain its independent nuclear deterrent. The arrangement had been set up in principle as a result of the Nassau Agreement...
.
One key part of the agreement was that the UK would develop their own warhead
Warhead
The term warhead refers to the explosive material and detonator that is delivered by a missile, rocket, or torpedo.- Etymology :During the early development of naval torpedoes, they could be equipped with an inert payload that was intended for use during training, test firing and exercises. This...
s for the missiles, as the UK military and political establishments were rather worried about losing their own nuclear production and design capability. Having already put some effort into the Skybolt warhead, it was decided to adapt this design, based on the US W59
W59
The W59 was an American thermonuclear warhead used on some Minuteman I ICBM missiles from 1962-1969.The W59 was 16.3 inches in diameter and 47.8 inches long, and it weighed 550 pounds...
, for Polaris instead of the original W58
W58
The W58 was an American thermonuclear warhead used on the Polaris A-3 submarine launched ballistic missile. Three W58 warheads were fitted as multiple warheads on each Polaris A-3 missile....
.
The ABM problem
Anti-ballistic missile
An anti-ballistic missile is a missile designed to counter ballistic missiles .A ballistic missile is used to deliver nuclear, chemical, biological or conventional warheads in a ballistic flight trajectory. The term "anti-ballistic missile" describes any antimissile system designed to counter...
systems. Developing an ABM system was largely an engineering issue, requiring radars with high resolution and targeting computers that could adjust trajectories fast enough given an approach speed in thousands of miles an hour. Even though these items would be expensive, the ABM interceptor itself was likely to cost about the same as an ICBM (or less), so any increase in the enemy's stockpile could be countered for an additional expenditure of about the same amount. This was a game the US was clearly willing to play, although it would seem the USSR was considerably less capable of doing so given the size of the two countries' respective economies.
The Soviets were confirmed as working on an ABM system in 1961 when they made their first successful exo-atmospheric interception of an ICBM. An American response was to develop "Antelope", a system designed to overwhelm an ABM defence with decoys, or penaids (penetration aids). In the end the US abandoned Antelope because they could achieve the same ends simply by throwing additional warheads, which was becoming increasingly inexpensive with the introduction of MIRV
Multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle
A multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle warhead is a collection of nuclear weapons carried on a single intercontinental ballistic missile or a submarine-launched ballistic missile . Using a MIRV warhead, a single launched missile can strike several targets, or fewer targets redundantly...
s.
This development left the British in a particularly bad position. Although the Polaris was fairly immune to direct attack in the submarines, this meant little if the warheads could not make it through the Soviet defenses – especially if the Soviets were convinced of this. Further, the Polaris did not have the physical size or throw-weight needed to enlarge its current three-warhead payload, making the US's "overwhelm" solution difficult to implement even if they were willing to invest in producing additional warheads. A single Resolution class submarine
Resolution class submarine
The Resolution-class submarine armed with the Polaris missile was the United Kingdom's primary nuclear deterrent from the late 1960s to 1994, when they were replaced by the Vanguard-class submarine carrying the Trident II.-Background:...
with 16 Polaris missiles would throw a total of 48 warheads, and with ABMs the USSR would be fairly confident that they could safely afford to shrug off such an attack. It was potentially even worse than this, as the three Polaris warheads remained fairly close together during reentry, and could theoretically all be attacked by a single ABM with a large warhead.
Something had to be done in order to maintain the relevance of the UK's nuclear deterrent. Although developments in the ABM field had been watched throughout the 1960s, exactly what to do about the problem apparently remained a fairly low priority. In 1967 the US offered a newer version of the Polaris, the A3T design, which featured a "hardened" missile airframe intended to better protect it against ABMs. As the UK had not yet received their missiles, they agreed to use the A3T version as it required relatively few other changes.
However it was not until 1970 that serious efforts to explore the ABM problem started in earnest. By this point the US and USSR had agreed in the ABM Treaty to deploy up to 100 ABMs at only two sites. MIRVs had so seriously upset the balance between ABM and ICBM that both parties agreed to limit ABM deployment largely as a way of avoiding a massive buildup of new ICBMs. The only good news for the UK in this development was that it clearly defined the problem they were facing; their attacks had to be able to credibly defeat a 100-interceptor ABM defense around Moscow. Thus started project KH.793, a one-year project to identify potential solutions.
One option would be to build additional Polaris platforms and keep more of them at sea. Two Resolutions would throw 96 warheads and almost guarantee penetration, while three would make it a certainty. However, this would require a fleet of at least five submarines to keep two on station at all times, as well as larger crew complements, training and logistics support. This appeared to be the most expensive option.
Several "low cost" options were also explored. Among these were "Topsy", the A3T missile the UK had already agreed to use. Another option was Antelope, which used hardened warheads along with penaids, although it reduced the payload to two warheads in order to save weight for the penaids. They also explored a "superhardened" version known as Super Antelope, a further improvement on the warhead that also used a manoeuvrable warhead "bus" to deploy the penaids further apart in space.
The Royal Navy preferred to upgrade to the Poseidon missile
UGM-73 Poseidon
The Poseidon missile was the second US Navy ballistic missile system, powered by a two-stage solid fuel rocket. It succeeded the Polaris missile beginning in 1972, bringing major advances in warheads and accuracy...
, increasing the number of warheads from three per missile to between ten and thirteen of a newer and lighter design. In this case a single Resolution could launch up to 208 warheads, guaranteeing that some would get through. This option also had the advantage of maintaining commonality with the US Navy, as well as offering greater range, and thus increasing the safety of the launch submarines.
The US also favored the Poseidon, although for more technical reasons. They felt that while the decoy approach was useful against near-term ABMs deployed by the USSR, that it was considerably less useful against "point defence" type interceptors. This is because the decoys are so much lighter than actual warheads; when they started to hit the upper atmosphere the decoys would slow more than the warheads and thus "declutter", allowing the warheads to be attacked. This would require a much faster-reacting system than a long-range interceptor, one that could safely wait until only a few moments before detonation, but this was by no means impossible and was part of the US's own ABM systems.
However, as the UK had decided to produce its own warheads and bus, this option would require considerable development effort in order to produce a new MIRV bus of their own. Although in theory the UK might be able to use the US-designed bus, these options were being explored in the midst of the ABM Treaty, and it was not clear whether or not the treaty might forbid this technology being transferred. A number of related options were thus explored, including "Option M" which used a simple "de-MIRVed" bus, "Hybrid" (or "Stag") which put the newer Poseidon warheads on the existing Polaris A3T missiles, and "Mini Poseidon", a similar adaptation with a smaller six-Poseidon-warhead payload on the A3T.
In the end the higher levels of the British political system decided against the urgings of their own Chiefs of Staff and went with the penaid approach on the existing A3T missile. This decision was made official late in 1973 by the Edward Heath
Edward Heath
Sir Edward Richard George "Ted" Heath, KG, MBE, PC was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and as Leader of the Conservative Party ....
administration, who changed the name from Super Antelope to Chevaline. The name 'Chevaline' was the result of a telephone call to London Zoo from an official at the Ministry of Defence. Prompted by a request for a name-change from his boss, the Secretary of State for Defence, Lord Carrington, the official asked the zoo to 'imagine an animal like a large antelope' and inquired whether there was such a beast. The zoo told him there was a South African creature called a Chevaline, and the official 'thought that sounded rather good'. (The creature to which the zoo was probably referring was the Roan Antelope, Hippotragus equinus which is known in French as 'Antilope chevaline'.)
Initially it was planned to make the project public, but a change of government in the 1974 elections ended these plans. A new review again concluded that the project should continue, even though the naval staff continued to be opposed. Full development started in January 1975.
Development
The project was carried out in extreme secrecy by a team consisting of the Atomic Weapons EstablishmentAtomic Weapons Establishment
The Atomic Weapons Establishment is responsible for the design, manufacture and support of warheads for the United Kingdom's nuclear deterrent. AWE plc is responsible for the day-to-day operations of AWE...
(AWE) at Aldermaston
Aldermaston
Aldermaston is a rural village, civil parish and electoral ward in Berkshire, South-East England. In the 2001 United Kingdom Census, the parish had a population of 927. The village is on the southern edge of the River Kennet flood plain, near the Hampshire county boundary...
, the Royal Aircraft Establishment
Royal Aircraft Establishment
The Royal Aircraft Establishment , was a British research establishment, known by several different names during its history, that eventually came under the aegis of the UK Ministry of Defence , before finally losing its identity in mergers with other institutions.The first site was at Farnborough...
(RAE) at Farnborough
Farnborough, Hampshire
-History:Name changes: Ferneberga ; Farnburghe, Farenberg ; Farnborowe, Fremborough, Fameborough .Tower Hill, Cove: There is substantial evidence...
, and Hunting Engineering at Ampthill
Ampthill
Ampthill is a small town and civil parish in Bedfordshire, England, between Bedford and Luton, with a population of about 6,000. It is administered by Central Bedfordshire Council. A regular market has taken place on Thursdays for centuries.-History:...
, Sperry Gyroscope
Sperry Corporation
Sperry Corporation was a major American equipment and electronics company whose existence spanned more than seven decades of the twentieth century...
at Bracknell
Bracknell
Bracknell is a town and civil parish in the Borough of Bracknell Forest in Berkshire, England. It lies to the south-east of Reading, southwest of Windsor and west of central London...
, Lockheed Aerospace
Lockheed Corporation
The Lockheed Corporation was an American aerospace company. Lockheed was founded in 1912 and later merged with Martin Marietta to form Lockheed Martin in 1995.-Origins:...
in the United States, and others too numerous to mention, both in the U.S. and the UK. The system was tested at the US Eastern Test Range, Cape Canaveral
Cape Canaveral
Cape Canaveral, from the Spanish Cabo Cañaveral, is a headland in Brevard County, Florida, United States, near the center of the state's Atlantic coast. Known as Cape Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, it lies east of Merritt Island, separated from it by the Banana River.It is part of a region known as the...
, and the warheads were tested with two full scale underground nuclear tests (Fallon UGT in 1974 and Banon UGT in 1976) at the Nevada Test Site
Nevada Test Site
The Nevada National Security Site , previously the Nevada Test Site , is a United States Department of Energy reservation located in southeastern Nye County, Nevada, about northwest of the city of Las Vegas...
. There were also numerous weapon effects tests to prove the RV/warhead resistance to the radiation-effects of the Galosh warhead; and there were numerous missile tests at the Woomera Missile Range, Australia, to develop various aspects of the RVs, the PAC and decoys. Recent declassifications of official files show that more than half the total project costs were spent in the United States, with industry and government agencies.
Range of the "Improved" Chevaline system was 22% less than the "Unimproved" Polaris A3T, reduced from 2500 nautical miles (4,630 km) to 1950 nmi (3,611.4 km). This was the source of continuing pressure on the development team from the Naval Staff, who had set the minimum requirement at 2000 nmi (3,704 km), and who were deeply concerned at intelligence reports of improving Soviet anti-submarine warfare
Anti-submarine warfare
Anti-submarine warfare is a branch of naval warfare that uses surface warships, aircraft, or other submarines to find, track and deter, damage or destroy enemy submarines....
capabilities. Reduced missile range had the effect of reducing the sea-room in which the British submarines could hide. With Chevaline, the patrol area was limited to the north of and just around the GIUK gap
GIUK gap
The GIUK gap is an area in the northern Atlantic Ocean that forms a naval warfare chokepoint. Its name is an acronym for Greenland, Iceland, and the United Kingdom, the gap being the open ocean between these three landmasses...
, whereas previously they could operate within an area to the south of the Gap as well. This was a serious problem, because much of NATOs anti-submarine strategy was based on closing the Gap, with the implicit assumption that areas north of it would be fairly easy for Soviet submarines to operate within. If the Polaris fleet were forced to operate to the north of the line, or even within a limited distance of it, they would be lacking the protection of the bulk of the NATO forces, and potentially in the midst of a high concentration of enemy hunter-killer subs. Needless to say, this was "upsetting".
Efforts were made to reduce warhead weight by substituting a new, smaller, high-yielding thermonuclear primary tested at Fondutta UGT and Quargel UGT, and although these tests were deemed successful, the delays involved in preparing them for Chevaline were thought to risk further unacceptable delays to the in-service date planned, and they were not used. This thermonuclear primary was by then being referred to in official documents as a "trigger device" and some suspect that this new description was a sleight-of-hand to circumvent the pledge given by Prime Minister Wilson of "no new generation of nuclear weapons". The thermonuclear (or fusion) secondary for Chevaline and known to AWRE by the codename Reggie, is known from these declassified documents to be recycled from the "Unimproved" Polaris A3T warhead.
Further political developments
As stated above, the Chevaline project was kept secret by a succession of UK governments, both Labour and Conservative. This included the governments of Harold WilsonHarold Wilson
James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, KG, OBE, FRS, FSS, PC was a British Labour Member of Parliament, Leader of the Labour Party. He was twice Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s, winning four general elections, including a minority government after the...
, Edward Heath
Edward Heath
Sir Edward Richard George "Ted" Heath, KG, MBE, PC was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and as Leader of the Conservative Party ....
, Harold Wilson
Harold Wilson
James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, KG, OBE, FRS, FSS, PC was a British Labour Member of Parliament, Leader of the Labour Party. He was twice Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s, winning four general elections, including a minority government after the...
's second term and James Callaghan
James Callaghan
Leonard James Callaghan, Baron Callaghan of Cardiff, KG, PC , was a British Labour politician, who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1976 to 1980...
. The project was finally revealed by Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
's then defence minister Francis Pym
Francis Pym
-Bibliography:****- External links :...
. The reasons for revelation were both political and practical. The cost over-runs of the project were now so enormous (approx £1billion in 1979) that the secret inner cabinet spending approvals could not continue. The key decision to proceed had been taken in 1975, four years previously, and cancellation would be unlikely to save money at that point. Even if it were to be cancelled, a replacement would have to be ordered in any case. Shortly afterwards the Thatcher government decided that the successor system should be the Trident
Trident missile
The Trident missile is a submarine-launched ballistic missile equipped with multiple independently-targetable reentry vehicles . The Fleet Ballistic Missile is armed with nuclear warheads and is launched from nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines . Trident missiles are carried by fourteen...
system and ordered the C4 variant.
The Naval Staff angst that had been a feature of the Chevaline project surfaced here too. For several reasons the Navy had not wanted Chevaline and had actively lobbied against it. Their preference for Poseidon was in large part based on commonality of equipment. Polaris was being phased out of use by the US Navy and supplies of spares and repair facilities were becoming unavailable. To keep the Polaris missile in use in the UK meant that some production lines had to be re-opened at great cost to supply a very small force. A missile common to both navies was desirable, and the Naval Staff strongly argued against Chevaline. Although the papers will not be declassified for some time yet, it seems likely that the Naval Staff made the same case with Trident with some success when their influence was at its height after the Falklands War
Falklands War
The Falklands War , also called the Falklands Conflict or Falklands Crisis, was fought in 1982 between Argentina and the United Kingdom over the disputed Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands...
.
The US later decided to move primary development from the C4 to the larger Trident D5, a much more capable missile, but one that would not fit into the latest Ohio-class submarines, let alone the older Benjamin Franklin class
Benjamin Franklin class submarine
The Benjamin Franklin class of submarine was an evolutionary development from the of fleet ballistic missile submarine. Having quieter machinery and other improvements, they are considered a separate class. A subset of this class is the re-engineered 640 class starting with...
. Their solution to this problem was to simply change the design of the Ohio class to allow for the larger D5. Thatcher, who was fully committed to Trident, decided to follow the same route and authorized the design of the Vanguard class submarine
Vanguard class submarine
The Vanguard class are the Royal Navy's current nuclear ballistic missile submarines , each armed with up to 16 Trident II Submarine-launched ballistic missiles...
to carry them. They agreed to a deal whereby the US and British combined missile stock is serviced at a single location at the US Navy facility at King's Bay, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
, and from there missiles are issued to both US and British submarines. Only the warheads (added later to British missiles) are different.
Finally, recently published recollections from senior members of the development team are explicit in stating that Chevaline was not the best, or with hindsight, the cheapest choice the British could have made from the many options available. But the choices were never simple but overlaid with what was politically possible, what was in the best interests of UK industry and its scientific base. In the end, the alternatives were "between Chevaline or nothing at all; a decision which could easily have meant withdrawal of the UK from the military political nuclear scene" and that option was unthinkable to the military staffs and government alike.
Description
ABM-1 Galosh
ABM-1 Galosh was a Soviet, nuclear tipped surface-to-air anti-ballistic missile . The Galosh is based on the A-35 ABM System using Grushin model A-350 missile. The primary mission was to destroy U.S...
missiles was to deploy an upgraded or Improved Front End (IFE) to Polaris A3T using the Antelope/Super Antelope/Chevaline technology. The Chevaline solution was to decrease the number of warheads carried by the Polaris system from three to two, using the space and weight to carry numerous decoys, and increase the likelihood of warhead survival by substituting a new super-hardened thermonuclear primary for the warhead contained in a new super-hardened RV.
The IFE was built in two primary parts. One warhead was mounted directly to the front of the second stage, as had been the case for all three warheads in the original Polaris. The second part was the "penetration aid carrier", or PAC, which carried the second warhead along with the various penetration aids. The PAC dispensed one RV but the principal purpose of its manoeuvring capability was to dispense the 27 decoys into a 'threat tube' surrounding the RVs, which also had a 'disguise' to match their radar appearance to the decoys. The system was not a MIRVing system because the target of both warheads was one location, about which the two warheads were spread, as in the earlier MRV system of Polaris A3T.
In the case of an attack on the USSR, even a single Resolution could have ensured the destruction of a significant portion of the Soviet command structure. Given all sixteen missiles launching successfully, an ABM system would be presented with 551 credible-looking targets to deal with. Given that the ABM treaty limited the USSR to 100 ABM interceptors, a "hit" was virtually guaranteed.
The 'unimproved' British Polaris A3T carried three 200 kt warheads designated ET.317
ET.317
The ET.317 was a nuclear weapon of the British Armed Forces, developed for the British version of the UGM-27 Polaris missile....
in U.S. Mk-2 RVs, composed of a primary known as Jennie and a thermonuclear secondary known as Reggie. The integrated upgraded Polaris system was known as A3TK and carried two warheads in upgraded British-designed RVs. These warheads used the new Harriet primary with Reggie re-used from the ET.317 warhead, and their nuclear yield increased to 225 kt. This system was in service from 1982 to 1996, when it was replaced by Trident D5
Trident missile
The Trident missile is a submarine-launched ballistic missile equipped with multiple independently-targetable reentry vehicles . The Fleet Ballistic Missile is armed with nuclear warheads and is launched from nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines . Trident missiles are carried by fourteen...
.
See also
- Chevaline Re-entry BodyChevaline Re-entry BodyThe Chevaline Re-entry Body was the Re-entry vehicle , of the British Chevaline warhead development of the Royal Navy's UGM-27 Polaris missile system...
- 3-Dimensional Quartz Phenolic3-Dimensional Quartz Phenolic3-Dimensional Quartz Phenolic is a phenolic-based material composed of a quartz cloth material woven into a seamless sock shape cloth impregnated with a phenolic resin and hot-pressed. When cured, 3DQP can be machined in the same way as metals and is tough and fire-resistant...
- Nuclear weapons and the United KingdomNuclear weapons and the United KingdomThe United Kingdom was the third country to test an independently developed nuclear weapon, in October 1952. It is one of the five "Nuclear Weapons States" under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which the UK ratified in 1968...
- UGM-27 PolarisUGM-27 PolarisThe Polaris missile was a two-stage solid-fuel nuclear-armed submarine-launched ballistic missile built during the Cold War by Lockheed Corporation of California for the United States Navy....
- Resolution class submarineResolution class submarineThe Resolution-class submarine armed with the Polaris missile was the United Kingdom's primary nuclear deterrent from the late 1960s to 1994, when they were replaced by the Vanguard-class submarine carrying the Trident II.-Background:...