Strategic Nuclear Warfare

[acbennett3]

In this image the Zumwalt's radar has detected the inbound warheads (single SLBM/4 warheads).

[acbennett3]

In this image the AL-1A's are firing at the inbound warheads - which are still at high altitude/high speed. Pretty impressive.

[acbennett3]

In this image the AL-1A's fire at the last 2 warheads and take them out. Success - against 1 SLBM.

[acbennett3]

Against 3 SLBMs/12 warheads the defenses are overwhelmed. The AL-1A's take out some of the warheads but can't keep up. For whatever reason the Zumwalt fires the SM6's late so the missiles never build up enough speed to pick off the remaining warheads. Result - 1 target destroyed.

[acbennett3]

In the last case I fire 2 SLBM's and let the Zumwalt handle everything. This time the SM6 missile launches are more timely and take out a number of warheads. But in the far north you can see at least 1 warhead slipping by…

[acbennett3]

In my last example I setup a B-52D bomb run against a target in Cuba. The defenses for this test are a long range P-40/Long Track radar for detection, an SA-2b SAM battery and a single Mig-21MF. In the below image are a group of 3 B-52D's armed with B-28/1.45mT nuclear bombs. The JAM next to them indicates their Offensive ECM (OECM) is turned on. Just going feet wet to the south is the Mig-21. Finally near the bottom right corner is the target with the nearby radar and SAM battery.

[acbennett3]

The Mig-21 closed the bombers but by the time it had identified them as hostile they had flown by and the Mig-21 was stuck in a stern chase. Eventually it was able to catch up with the tail end B-52 and fire its Atoll AAMs at extreme range - but they missed. Intercepting high altitude/relatively high speed bombers is tough - hence Interceptor fighters were developed for this - which the Mig-21 is probably not.

[acbennett3]

In this image one of the SA-2 missiles is about to destroy the lead B-52. A number of other missiles were fired but they failed due to the B-52 OECM and maneuvering.

[acbennett3]

A remaining B-52 is able to successfully perform a bomb run over the target - the red dots/line just next to the target represent the bombs. The Mig-21 is still chasing the bombers but at this point it is Winchester/out of missiles and ammo. Not sure if CMNAO can model ramming - although in this case it would be warranted.

[acbennett3]

Detonation occurs and the damage area is growing. One of the B-52's appears to be already over the expanding damage area.

[acbennett3]

The damage area continues to grow and ultimately engulfs all the A/C and destroys them along with the ground targets. In hindsight probably not the best attack profile on the US side…

[acbennett3]

I did these experiments to determine the extent of what CMNAO can simulate in the area of strategic nuclear warfare. It seems pretty much anything at a high degree of realism/fidelity.

Scenarios can be created to simulate:
1. A/C based nuclear strikes
2. Submarine based nuclear strikes
3. ICBM based strikes/exchanges
4. Regional/limited nuclear exchanges - naval/land forces targets
5. Even an entire global nuclear exchange including detection via satellite/early warning systems, ABM defenses, bombers and interceptor/SAM defenses, SSBN strikes including SSN trail and prevention of launch, and even testing first strike/response wrt to ICBMs/Bombers/SSBNs.

Finally I reviewed the databases and all of the above can be simulated using weapons in any period from 1949 thru the near future.
This includes for example Strategic Bombers like B-29's, B-36's, B-47's, B-58's, B-52's, B-2's. SRBM/IRBM/ICBM/SLBM/cruise missiles like Atlas, Titan, Minuteman 1/2/3, Peacemaker, Pershing.
This is only US weapons - many other country's nuclear weapons are included.

I even found the XB-70 Valkyrie in the DB and had to test it - 90000ft at 1800kts. What's going to catch that?

In summary quoting a local radio add's final remark - "Mind Blown"

[Rob322]

Looking at post 30, the blast wave was not a perfect sphere, was that due to terrain? In fact, have you run any tests on what the blast wave over a target in a hilly/ mountainous terrain? It'd be interesting to see if that or other factors like weather has any affect.

[Tomcat84]

Very nice!

One thing that amazes me: I am an air war nut so that's what in focused on most. I have spent hours on command already in beta and yet there is so much detail I haven't even begun to explore yet like this or satellites. Truly awesome for me

[Emx77]

Are there cities in the simulation? What about civilians? I'm asking this because it would be interesting to recreate Bravo Romeo Delta inside CMANO.

[acbennett3]

Rob322 - just looked at the elevations surrounding the target and it does seem to correspond to the shape of the terrain but I would have to leave it to one of the developers to comment definitively on this and your weather question. Should be easy to test in the editor though.

Emir - From what I've seen all I can currently place is facilities (buildings, batteries, troops) not entire cities and populations. Once again a dev would have to definitively comment on that.

[Jakob Wedman]

With buildings, structures and bridges you could build pretty detailed cities. Years ago I made a program in R that generated random buildings given city size, radius, limiting arc (for coastal cities) and main axis, and then if you don't like random cities you could build them with buildings one by one in Google Earth [:D]

acb3, have you looked at the ICBM fields (US/USSR)?

[Maromak]

Thanks for recording your testing. Very interesting!

[Broncepulido]

Great report and apparently great game! Thanks acb3!

[Paul Wykes]

Thanks for posting this. Really interesting, and highlights what the game engine can do.