Stuart Slade
Prince of Darkness
Posts: 686
(1/21/01 6:05:55 pm )
Balance of Power - 1953
There have been many debates about what would have happened if the US and China hadn't negotiated an end to the Korean War in 1953. Lets look at the balance of strategic power at that time to put the situation in context.
United States - Offensive
6 Heavy Bomb Wings with 185 B-36
4 Heavy Strategic Wings with 137 RB-36
7 Medium Bomb Wings with 329 B-47
4 Medium Strategic Wings with 99 RB-47
3 Medium Bomb Wings with 138 B-50
5 Medium Bomb Wings with 110 B-29
1 Medium Strategic wing with 38 RB-50 and 8 RB-29
5 Strategic Fighter Wings with 235 F-84G
20 Medium Air Refuelling Squadrons with 359 KC-97
8 Medium Air Refuelling Squadrons with 143 KB-29
Total stock of nuclear weapons - approximately 1,200 all fission devices
Its often assumed that the "strategic fighters" were intended to escort the B-36s. This isn't quite true. They were intended to "escort" them but in the sense of using nuclear weapons to blast a hole in the outer shell of the Soviet defenses. It was assumed that once the bombers were through the outer crust they could go more or less where they wanted.
United States - Defensive
600 F-86D, 37 F-89B, 31 F-89C, 109 F-94A, 356 F-94B. Large numbers of old piston engined fighters including F-47N and F-51D and H in the Air National Guard. Five Nike-Ajax battalions were formed but would not be operational until mid-1954.
Soviet Union - Offensive
1 Long Range Aviation Corps with 100 Tu-4A
18 Long Range Aviation Regiments with 1,100 Tu-4
The Tu-4A designation indicated that these aircraft were the only ones that were atomic-weapons capable. At least some of these aircraft were configured to act as tankers. The Soviet Union had a stockpile of around 30 nuclear weapons in 1953, all fission devices.
Soviet Union - Defensive
Details are very unclear and contradictory but it appears that there were a mixture of around 1,000 fighters including MiG-15s and MiG-17s, Yak-23s and La-15s as jetfighters and La-11 piston-engined fighters.
A few things pop out of the page on this. One is that the war is still largely a conventional one - the US has a ferocious atomic arsenal for its first blow but therafter bombing would be largely conventional. The Soviet Union has virtually no nuclear strike capability in terms of reaching the US.
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Hoahao
Old Friend
Posts: 165
(1/21/01 7:29:35 pm )
Re: Balance of Power - 1953
Mmmmmmm.... is it just my ego, or is this aimed at me?? [8) ] My idea was that 1953 has a certain flavor similar to 1985-6. The US buildup is going on both conventionally as well as "strategically". Taking conventional US ground fire power in Europe in '53 would show at least a balance. 6 divisions rated at 50% more firepower then the Soviet divisions; the Soviet divisions not a full strength. Considering the logistic "tail" for US divisions, plus it's European allies, why would a Reagan strategy not work. It would appear that the west had both conventional as well as nuclear dominance.......and knew it. Europe is safe. To continue the war in Korea, and put the Chinese through a meat grinder, possibly expanding it with air strikes on China proper, and at least raids along the coast would have blackened their eyes some. "Unleash Chang Kai-shek!!"
"The shovel is brother to the gun." C. Sandburg
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Tim Hanna
Me
Posts: 1818
(1/21/01 11:36:31 pm )
Re: Balance of Power - 1953
So the Soviets really have no way to intercept inbound B-36's.
What was their radar net like? The Soviets had to deal with the single largest national boarder of any nation in the world. I am betting that they had between two and three times as many miles of boarder to watch than the USA did.
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former"
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Guilherme Loureiro
New Guy
Posts: 6
(1/22/01 1:30:43 am )
Re: Balance of Power - 1953
Just one question: you didn't mention any B-45 or RB-45 units. Were they already retired by 1953, even the RB-45s?
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Larry
Old Friend
Posts: 69
(1/22/01 9:40:46 am )
B-45
According to Joe Baugher's Encyclopedia of American Military Aircraft, a total of 141 B-45A's and B-45C's were produced by 1950, when production ceased. Another 33 RB-45C's were also produced. These aircraft could carry up to 22000 lbs of bombs, including the Grand Slam of WWII vintage. With a 10,000 lb bomb load, they had a combat radius of 1100 miles. They wing of B-45C's stationed in England should probably included in Stuart's list, although they could only reach the extreme western portions of the Soviet Union with thier range/payload capability.
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Stuart Slade
Prince of Darkness
Posts: 689
(1/22/01 5:05:38 pm )
Its your ego Eric......
I must admit I didn't have a specific agenda in mind when I started these balance of power postings other than to give people an accurate picture of what the strategic situation really was in those days. I'll probably do one for 1967 and 1973 in due course.
The interesting thing about the 1953 balance of power is that the US margin isn't nearly as great as it appears. They have a devastating superiority in terms of number of bombs but the conventional assets of the USSR substantially greater. What we'll see over the next decade is the balance swing massively to the US to the point where a nuclear confrontation is virtually suicide for the USSR.
In fact there is an interesting pattern that emerges here; we see the USA picking up their immense superiority in nuclear firepower during the Eisenhower era at the expense of their conventional capability. The USSR tried to maintain its conventional capability and, as a result, its nuclear power was severely retarded. In the 1960s the reverse happened; the US concentrated on conventional forces and frittered away their immense strategic superiority. Its no wonder Khruschev believed Kennedy was a monumental imbecile.
Its interesting to speculate what would have happened if Nixon had won in 1960. Its likely that all the immense resource spoured into strategic offensive forces in the 1950s would have been directed back into strategic defenses. that means that by the time the Soviet strategic offense gets into gear in the late 1960s, its already obsolete, facing a tight and effective US defense. Faced with maintaining conventional, offensive nuclear and defensive nuclear forces, the USSR collapses under the strain in the early 1970s - a decade or two ahead of schedule..
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David Newton
Old Friend
Posts: 185
(1/22/01 5:20:06 pm )
Re: Its your ego Eric......
Stuart, would it be too much to ask if you could include all of the declared nuclear powers in NATO in the equation, plus China if possible. I would be fascinated for example to follow the progress of Britain's nuclear deterrant from the V bombers through Polaris to Trident. The same would also be interesting for France.
Obviously this doesn't affect 1953, after all Britain had just exploded its first bomb the year before and hadn't exactly got round to getting a strategic deterrant yet.
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Sea Skimmer
Regular
Posts: 12
(1/22/01 7:42:54 pm )
Lets see could Russia stop the bombers ....
Lets see Russia has the 100mm Ks-19 that can reach 45000 feet with a 35 pound shell , the Ks-18 85mm that can reach 30000 feet with a 21 pound shell . I dont know when the SA-1 came in to service but it was some time in the 1950s along with the SA-2 which can reach 60000 feet . So Russian ground based systems cant stop American bombers . Any one know when SSN-3 shaddock came in to service as it can take a nuclear warhead .
Lets see about Fighters . The MiG-9 can reach 42000 feet , the La-11 can reach 33000 feet , Yak-23 can get up to 48000 feet , MiG-15 can hit 51000 feet , MiG-17 can get up to 54000 . All these planes need a good deal of time to reach their max ceiling's . As a note even the Best MiG-21 models can hit 60000 . Heck even in 1964 the Su-15 could only get up to 65000 feet . So Russia had no Defences .
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Stuart Slade
Prince of Darkness
Posts: 693
(1/23/01 5:32:12 pm )
Re: Lets see could Russia stop the bombers ....
The SA-1 entered service about 1955; it was virtually ineffective (the US ECM gear had its measure long before it entered service). The V-750 (SA-2) came in around 1958. The P-5 (Shaddock wasn't deployed operationally until around 1960 - 61 and the chances of a submarine getting to within launching range of the US were minute. The only Soviet SLBMs in the 1950s had explosive warheads, not nuclear.
Guns were pretty well obsolete in the strategic environment by the 1950s. A combination of altitude and speed made their chances of hitting things pretty remote. The US was phasing its guns out in favor of missiles in this period (the last US AA guns were 120 mm weapons) protecting the locks at Sault St Marie. The real problem the Soviets has wasn't the assets for air defense, it was getting them to work together. In the 1950s, the Soviet air defense system was technically comparable with that used by the British in 1940. Certainly throughout the 1950s, if recon aircraft (RB-36s, RB-45s, RB-47s, U-2s etc) could get into the USSR they could go where they wanted in relative safety. We did lose aircraft now and then but the loss rate was low (some RB-47s made it back badly shot up but thats another story).
The problems the Soviet fighters had were legendary; a combination of short range and elusive targets (plus on the B-36, a really nasty defensive firepower) gave them little chance of making an intercept. The experience of the US B-29s over Korea probably gives us an idea of what was waiting for the Soviet bombers over the US.
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Sea Skimmer
Regular
Posts: 15
(1/23/01 7:32:13 pm )
OK thanks ..
I was thinking more along the lines of a cruiser with P-5 missiles steaming along the American coast . the Russians did ahve Cruiser missiles befor the P-5 but form what I have read they where worthless .
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zsecretwishmaker
New Guy
Posts: 1
(4/5/01 3:33:34 am )
Re: OK thanks ..
p-5 missiles what are they?
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Sea Skimmer
Old Friend
Posts: 231
(4/7/01 7:09:00 pm )
Re: OK thanks ..
P-5 is the russian "code" for the SS-N-3:
Russians know it as P-5
NATO calls it SS-N-3
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