Doomsday Torpedoes: Live Testing of Soviet Naval Nuclear Weapons, 1954-1962 (Technology@war)

Description

In the aftermath of the Second World War relations between the Soviet Union and their former allies in the West quickly soured and developed into the Cold War. The USSR was at a huge disadvantage at sea and sought to redress this balance through the equipping of many of its warships with nuclear weapons ranging from torpedoes to strategic missiles. Doomsday Torpedoes examines the history of these weapons and their live testing during the Cold War.

The US Navy maintained a large fleet of aircraft carriers capable of encircling the Soviet Union and delivering airborne nuclear attack from many different directions. The Soviets were in dire need of finding ways to neutralise this threat, preferably with a single powerful blow: torpedoes with nuclear warheads as well as nuclear-tipped anti-ship missiles offered such a capability. Doomsday Torpedoes describes the development and fielding of such weapons by the Soviets and their navy in detail, along with strategic nuclear weapons launched from the sea, primarily submarine launched ballistic missiles. In addition, the Soviet development of submarines, as the primary launch platforms of naval nuclear weapons is examined.

The main focus of Doomsday Torpedoes is the time period from 1952 up until the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963. This book examines the events of that era, including those of the Cuban Missile Crisis in which Soviet submarines came close to firing nuclear-armed torpedoes in a chain of events that came extraordinarily close to initiating the Third World War.