MissileThreat.com

Country:	USA
Warhead:	Nuclear, 400 kT
Range:	400 km
Basing:	Land

Details

The Nike-Zeus, although never deployed, was the first concerted U.S. effort to develop an anti-ballistic missile system capable of addressing the threat posed by Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).(1)

 

During the 1950s and 1960s, as missile technology made rapid advances, the U.S. military realized that the gravest threat to national security came not from long-range Soviet bombers, but from ICBMs. The two existing surface-to-air missile systems, the Nike-Ajax and the Nike-Hercules, had little or no capability against this new threat. For these reasons, a new defensive system needed to be developed, one that could destroy an ICBM with its own defensive warhead.

 

In the late 1950s, the U.S. Army repeatedly sought authorization to begin developing an anti-ballistic missile system known as Nike-Zeus, the first step toward a nationwide defense system capable of protecting urban, military, and industrial centers. The initial Nike-Zeus model, known as Nike-Zeus A, was essentially a further development of the Nike-Hercules that used the same command guidance ground equipment. It was cancelled in favor of a longer-range interceptor known as Nike Zeus B, which would be armed with a 400 kT nuclear warhead capable of destroying incoming ICBMs above the atmosphere.

 

On January 16, 1958, the Army received approval to develop the Nike-Zeus system.(2) The interceptor itself was 14.7 m long, 2.44 m wide, and 0.91 m in diameter. Since the missile was designed to intercept its targets in space, it did not need large maneuvering fins (like its predecessors). Rather, it featured a special third rocket stage with small control jets to maneuver in space, bringing its total weight to 10,300 kg. The missile had a maximum range of 400 km and altitude of 280 km.(3) In August 1959, the Nike-Zeus demonstrated a top speed of 12,875 km/h.(4)

 

During the early 1960s, the Nike-Zeus successfully demonstrated its capability against incoming ICBMs in a series of test flights. On July 19, 1962, a Nike-Zeus fired from the Army’s Kwajalein Missile Range in the Pacific Ocean “intercepted” an Atlas ICBM launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California. Although the Nike-Zeus did not collide with the Atlas, it came within two kilometers of its target, close enough that the 400 kT nuclear warhead of a fully operational Nike-Zeus would have destroyed the ICBM.(5)

 

On December 22, another Nike-Zeus missile fired from Kwajalein came within 200 m of a target reentry vehicle, thus increasing its demonstrated accuracy. Over the next two years, 10 out of 14 flyby “intercepts” of mock target reentry vehicles were successful. This proved that that U.S. military had finally acquired the ability to hit a bullet with a bullet, provided that the interceptor was armed with a nuclear bullet.(6)

 

Yet the Nike-Zeus had its drawbacks. It was vulnerable to decoys and countermeasures, unable to discriminate between targets, and relatively slow compared to the incoming ICBMs. In addition, each interceptor cost $1 million, which meant that it would cost the U.S. military more to offset the Soviet ICBMs than it would cost the Soviets to deploy them.(7) For these reasons, the Kennedy administration was unconvinced that Nike-Zeus would work. In 1961, the program was deferred.(8) In 1963, it was phased out in favor of a new project: the Nike-X.(9)

 

Although the Nike-Zeus system was never deployed, its contributions to anti-ballistic missile technology were considerable. It was the first major U.S. effort to defend against Soviet ICBMs, and its successes led to further developments in missile defense architecture over the coming decades.(10)

 

 

 

 

Footnotes

 

1. Bradley Graham, Hit to Kill: The New Battle Over Shielding America from Missile Attack (New York: Public Affairs, 2001), 4-5.
2. Council on Foreign Relations, “The Missile Defense Debate, Chronology of National Missile Defense Programs,” available at http://www.cfr.org/virtualbooks/reference/timeline.html, accessed on 10 January 2005.
3. Stephen P. Moeller, “Vigilant and Invincible,” Air Defense Artillery Magazine (May-June 1995).
4. Wikipedia.com, “Project Nike,” available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Nike, accessed on 10 January 2005.
5. Moeller, “Vigilant and Invincible.”
6. Gregory H. Canavan, Missile Defense for the 21st Century (Washington, DC: The Heritage Foundation, 2003); U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Ballistic Missile Defense Technologies, OTA-ISC-254 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, September 1985).
7. Donald R. Baucom, The Origins of SDI, 1944-1983 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1992), 12, 17, 19, 21.
8. Council on Foreign Relations, “The Missile Defense Debate, Chronology of National Missile Defense Programs;” GlobalSecurity.org, “Nike Zeus Description,” available at http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/nike_zeus.htm, accessed on 10 January 2005.
9. Moeller, “Vigilant and Invincible.”
10. The Brookings Institution, “Nike Defensive Missiles,” available at http://www.brookings.org/FP/projects/nucwcost/nike.htm, accessed on 10 January 2005.