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Gravity bombs became the pillar of the United States on the battlefield. Photo / usaf / the unit
This made the use of nuclear weapons conceivable for the first time since the 1940s. The presence of B61-12 pushes this trend further.
The United States is known for having a large nuclear arsenal. According to the Federation of Atomic Scientists, the United States had an arsenal of more than 7,200 nuclear bombs as of April 2018.
Of these, more than 2,000 bombs were deployed with details of 1,900 strategic nuclear weapons and 180 non-strategic nuclear weapons.
America also retains a large number of deployment options for its nuclear bombs. As part of its nuclear triad, the United States maintains approximately 94 nuclear-capable bombers (B-2 and B-52), more than 400 Minuteman III ICBMs, and 12 nuclear submarines with Ohio-class ballistic missiles.
The latter is equipped with the modern Trident II submarine ballistic missile, which represents a drastic improvement over their land-based competitors.
In fact, as Keir Lieber and Daryl Press noted, “In 1985, a single US ICBM warhead was less than 60% likely to destroy an ordinary silo … Today, a multi-warhead attack on a single silo using a Trident II missile would have they have about a 99% chance of destroying it.
But the most dangerous nuclear bomb in the American arsenal is probably the new B61-12.
This is why gravity bombs are so dangerous in the US arsenal.
1. Expensive development cost
