ICBM Capabilities and Comparisons

Comments debate the strategic roles, reliability, interception difficulties, advantages, and limitations of ICBMs compared to alternatives like Starship, cruise missiles, and other delivery systems.

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Keywords

US news.sky OK ICBM LEO MIRV DF UK USA START strike missile launch nuclear missiles launched russia rocket targets cruise

Sample Comments

cwkoss Jul 22, 2021 View on HN

Do ICBMs have any practical uses besides delivering explosives?

jvanderbot May 30, 2023 View on HN

Is it true that a single icbm cannot be intercepted?

forgotmypw17 Feb 23, 2021 View on HN

ICBMs are like nation-scale guns. Once you're at a certain level of technology, they don't need any more upgrades. They are proven technology and reliable. They can do a shitton of damage. They are best left unused. You can't reliably defend against them. And if you have them, even just one, others are reluctant to fuck with you.

dwighttk Jun 18, 2024 View on HN

ICBMs are gonna have collateral damage

randyrand Jun 25, 2018 View on HN

There's really no reason. ICBM's are just as good and carry less political risk

mbreese Jun 11, 2013 View on HN

ICBMs don't move around... so they are easily targeted themselves.

c3833174 Aug 29, 2017 View on HN

ICBM seem like a good deterrent compared to infantry and animal-carried weapons

TrainedMonkey May 21, 2019 View on HN

This bit is specifically about ICBM's, presumably they will be targeted when they are outside of the atmosphere.

jandrese Sep 4, 2024 View on HN

What advantage does this have over ICBMs?

tomatotomato37 Mar 2, 2022 View on HN

ICBMs can't be used against mobile targets like ships. High balletic arcs and travel times measured in the tens of minutes means anything that can move will easily do so. And judging by Russia's current military louadout, every warhead fancy enough to actually manuever to compensate either only exists on paper or partially disassembled in a Moscow lab