The Air Force plans to keep the missile in service until at least 2030. This force has shrunk to 400 Minuteman-III missiles as of September 2017 deployed in missile silos around Malmstrom AFB, Montana Minot AFB, North Dakota and F.E. They were initially armed with the W62 warhead with a yield of 170 kilotons.īy the 1970s, 1,000 Minutemen were deployed. In 1970, the Minuteman-III became the first deployed ICBM with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV): three smaller warheads that improved the missile's ability to strike targets defended by ABMs. The Minuteman-II entered service in 1965 with a host of upgrades to improve its accuracy and survivability in the face of an anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system the Soviets were known to be developing. However, the development of the United States Navy (USN) UGM-27 Polaris, which addressed the same role, allowed the Air Force to modify the Minuteman, boosting its accuracy enough to attack hardened military targets, including Soviet missile silos. The Minuteman entered service in 1962 as a deterrence weapon that could hit Soviet cities with a second strike and countervalue counterattack if the U.S. The missile was named for the Colonial Minutemen of the American Revolutionary War, who could be ready to fight on short notice. ![]() nuclear triad, along with the Trident submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) and nuclear weapons carried by long-range strategic bombers.ĭevelopment of the Minuteman began in the mid-1950s when basic research indicated that a solid fuel rocket motor could stand ready to launch for long periods of time, in contrast to liquid-fueled rockets that required fueling before launch and so might be destroyed in a surprise attack. As of 2020, the LGM-30G Minuteman III version is the only land-based ICBM in service in the United States and represents the land leg of the U.S. land-based intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), in service with the Air Force Global Strike Command. See also ARCHITECTURE: Cold War Architecture / WAR: Cold War.The LGM-30 Minuteman is a U.S. Not much of a silo is visible from above, but the depth of a missile silo that accommodates either a Peacekeeper or Minuteman missile exceeds 100 feet. The missiles are stored underground to provide protection from the elements and from attack. Stored below is the missile that, in a true launch situation, would emerge after the door was blasted off the silo opening by explosive charges. Visible from the surface is each silo's 110-ton blast door, which looks like a well-guarded slab of concrete. Armed guards routinely inspect each site and respond immediately to any attempted unauthorized access. A chain-link fence, barbed wire, and an array of motion-detection devices enclose each silo. Warren Air Force Base includes portions of western Nebraska, northern Colorado, and eastern Wyoming, an area of more than 12,000 square miles. ![]() Missile silos are scattered across such vast expanses so that potential adversaries would have to target each missile individually. ![]() Each of these missiles is stored, ready to launch, in its own hardened launch facility, commonly called a missile silo. Warren Air Force Base, Wyoming, and Minot Air Force Base, North Dakota, has oversight and control over the missile force, which is comprised of Minuteman III and Peacekeeper missiles. Each of the three Strategic Missile Wings at Malmstrom Air Force Base, Montana, F. Across the Great Plains, from northern Colorado into western Nebraska and throughout Wyoming, North Dakota, and Montana, are the missile fields of the United States nuclear program.
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