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The United Kingdom's Polaris programme, officially named the British Naval Ballistic Missile System, provided its first submarine-based nuclear weapons system. Polaris was in service from 1968 to 1996. Polaris itself was an operational system of four Resolution-class ballistic missile submarines, each armed with 16 Polaris A-3 ballistic missiles.
The first Polaris submarine outfitted with MRV A-3's was the USS Daniel Webster in 1964. [21] Later the Polaris A-3 missiles (but not the ReBs) were also given limited hardening to protect the missile electronics against nuclear electromagnetic pulse effects while in the boost phase. This was known as the A-3T ("Topsy") and was the final ...
The Polaris Sales Agreement was a treaty between the United States and the United ... entered operational service in December 1994, by which time the Cold War had ...
The short range of the early SLBMs dictated basing and deployment locations. By the late 1960s the UGM-27 Polaris A-3 missile was deployed on all US and UK ballistic missile submarines. Its range of 4,600 kilometres (2,500 nmi) was a great improvement on the 1,900-kilometre (1,000 nmi) range of Polaris A-1.
The short range of the early SLBMs dictated basing and deployment locations. By the late 1960s the Polaris A-3 was deployed on all US SSBNs with a range of 4,600 kilometres (2,500 nmi), a great improvement on the 1,900 kilometres (1,000 nmi) range of Polaris A-1. The A-3 also had three warheads that landed in a pattern around a single target.
In 1982, the Polaris Sales Agreement was amended to allow the UK to purchase Trident II missiles. [23] Since 1998, when the UK decommissioned its tactical WE.177 bombs, the Trident has been the only operational nuclear weapons system in British service.
The UGM-73 Poseidon missile was the second US Navy nuclear-armed submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) system, powered by a two-stage solid-fuel rocket.It succeeded the UGM-27 Polaris beginning in 1972, bringing major advances in warheads and accuracy.
During the Cold War, Rota became an advanced base for SSBN submarines of the U.S. Navy, which was very important as the Soviet Union was in range of Polaris missiles launched from Rota. The Chief of Naval Operations deployed Submarine Squadron 16 (SUBRON 16) to Rota on 28 January 1964 and embarked upon USS Proteus.