Prompt Global Strike

The Prompt Global Strike ( PGS ; German  " umgehender, weltweiterschlag " ) is an armaments project to implement a military strategy of the armed forces of the United States that has existed since the turn of the millennium . PGS should make it possible for them to hit any target within an hour , which previously could only be achieved with ICBMs . Such an operation could easily be misinterpreted by uninvolved nuclear powers , even if they were equipped with conventional warheads . The PGS weapons are based on various concepts, such as hypersonic weapons, which critics see as destabilizing because they could bypass missile defense systems and thus as a possible factor in a renewed arms race .

history

On January 10, 2003, the US Department of Defense's revised Unified Command Plan established a new task for the US Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM): Global Strike. This "unified leadership plan" defined the new strategy as that

"Presentation of a holistic planning for a worldwide strike and the assistance with command and control tasks to quickly kinetic (nuclear and conventional) and non-kinetic (components of space and intelligence operations) precision combat equipment with increased range to support objectives in [foreign] theaters of war and to be provided in the country itself. "

"USSTRATCOM (as previously the Strategic Air Command (SAC) and the US Navy ) have provided skills for a global strike under the Single Integrated Operational Plan (SIOP) for decades , but the SIOP was formally dropped in 2003 and replaced by the Operations Plan ( OPLAN) 8044 replaced. "The name change reflects an effort to transform the very extensive SIOP into a family of smaller, more flexible deployment plans to more appropriately address the decline of the Soviet Union , the rise of China and the planning of measures against weapons of mass destruction suppliers, it said on the part of the Nuclear Information Project . - “Global Strike is different from OPLAN 8044. It focuses on small, immediate and preventive strikes against weapons of mass destruction (targets) anywhere on (and below) the surface of the earth. The military implementation of the Global Strike Mission is Contingency Plan 8022 (CONPLAN 8022), which came into force in autumn 2004. "

Possible carrier systems

• Conventionally equipped ICBMs or submarine-based ballistic missiles (SLBM) or hypersonic speed gliding devices such as the Chinese DF-ZF .
• Hypersonic missiles like the Boeing X-51 or the Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 .
• Kinetic weapons in spacecraft in orbit .

See also

• DARPA FALCON Project

literature

• Todd C. Shull: Conventional Prompt Global Strike: Valuable Military Option or Threat to Global Stability? ( Naval Postgraduate School , September 2005 - Dissertation , PDF, 159 p., 805 kB)

Web links

• Georg Schöfbänker: CONPLAN 8022 ( Telepolis , March 17, 2006)
• Hans M. Kristensen: Global Strike: A Chronology of the Pentagon's New Offensive Strike Plan ( Federation of American Scientists , March 2006 - PDF, 3.99 MB)
• The China-US Hypersonic Arms Race Is Having a Little Trouble (2014)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ CONPLAN 8022: Joint Staff plan briefing (August 2003 - photocopy, PDF, 251 kB - an originally secret document; see Joint Chiefs of Staff )
2. ^ Global Strike (Nuclear Information Project) nukestrat.com