Rogue bomber squad flying towards the soviet union

What if during the cold war a heavily anti communist nuclear bomber squad decided to go rogue and target the Soviet union without SAC or Norad realizing it until they are close to their targets. Unrealistic but I am curious on what would happen if they hit their targets before the soviet air force could shoot them down. The scenarios were this can happen allowed are: the cuban missile crisis, able archer, soviet coup in 1991, the wargames scenario. Targets are major soviet cities.
 
From 1958 with Operation Head Start thru 1968 with Operation Chrome Dome, fully armed B-52 flew racetrack patterns around Canada and over to Europe

After the crashes of B-52s at Thule and Spain, was decided too dangerous, and armed airborne alert flights were cancelled.

Has to be in this timeframe, and before 1964, when PALs were fully integrated on freefall bombs
 
Okay also what you said reminds me of dr strangelove and failsafe so I could see it happening here. So let's say soviet cities of Moscow,Stalingrad, Vladivostok, Saint Petersburg, Omsk, a few closed cities and a few military (specifically icbm silos or air bases were hit. How would this effect the soviet union's position in the cold war.
 
If one rogue squad has the ability to destroy all those targets without any kind of backup,the US is so far ahead of the USSR they could probaly just quickly stop their second strike...
 
So would the soviet union just collapse decades earlier? Or would they try to keep up and keep troops in eastern Europe?

USSR didn't have enough ICBMs to fully wreck the USA till 1966 in a full exchange, even before an entire Bombardment Squadron gets a free shot in.

WWIII still starts, it just gets worse for CONUS each year after 1962.

And I don't think you would have found anybody in SAC to do what the President wanted at the end of _Fail Safe_.

That novel/film should have been named Fail Deady, as that's the system in play in that story
 

trurle

Banned
What if during the cold war a heavily anti communist nuclear bomber squad decided to go rogue and target the Soviet union without SAC or Norad realizing it until they are close to their targets. Unrealistic but I am curious on what would happen if they hit their targets before the soviet air force could shoot them down. The scenarios were this can happen allowed are: the cuban missile crisis, able archer, soviet coup in 1991, the wargames scenario. Targets are major soviet cities.
I doubt many targets would be hit. Although radar coverage of Soviet Union was spotty in 195x, once first bomb is dropped, any (B-52) bomber would be intercepted within a 60 minutes. Enough to hit 3-4 cities (if picking smaller ~200000 population cities) in European part of Russia for each bomber, but protected by nearby airbases and widely dispersed ICBM sites are not likely to suffer significant damage. Larger cities at 195x invariably has an interceptor bases, making a bombing run on them suicidal too.
 
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The crews flying BUFFs* had to know better than anyone just what would happen if such an occurance took place. This belongs in ASB imo

*Big Ugly Fat F#ckers
 

GarethC

Donor
Can a BUFF evade V-PVO radar coverage if a single bomb wing were to go rogue and launch on the USSR? There can be only one answer, I'm afraid.

If the pilot's good, I mean if he's reeeally sharp, he can barrel that thing in so low, oh it's a sight to see. You wouldn't expect it with a big ol' plane like a '52, but varrrooom! The jet exhaust... frying chickens in the barnyard!

That does make it rather difficult to escape the blast of a freefall bomb, mind.
 
Um, isn't that why they had fail-safe release codes ?? Or did those come AFTER those 'Broken Arrow' incidents ??

At least Dr. Strangelove had a rogue ground commander who was in 'chain of command' in-extremis issue the go-codes.//
 
Can a BUFF evade V-PVO radar coverage if a single bomb wing were to go rogue and launch on the USSR? There can be only one answer, I'm afraid.

If the pilot's good, I mean if he's reeeally sharp, he can barrel that thing in so low, oh it's a sight to see. You wouldn't expect it with a big ol' plane like a '52, but varrrooom! The jet exhaust... frying chickens in the barnyard!

That does make it rather difficult to escape the blast of a freefall bomb, mind.

"Does he have a chance?! Hell, yeah, he has a chance!!!"
 

trurle

Banned
Can a BUFF evade V-PVO radar coverage if a single bomb wing were to go rogue and launch on the USSR? There can be only one answer, I'm afraid.

If the pilot's good, I mean if he's reeeally sharp, he can barrel that thing in so low, oh it's a sight to see. You wouldn't expect it with a big ol' plane like a '52, but varrrooom! The jet exhaust... frying chickens in the barnyard!

That does make it rather difficult to escape the blast of a freefall bomb, mind.

In the environment of the rolling glacial hills of Eastern Europe the really insane B-52 pilot may try to set altitude to 100 meters. May be 50-80 meters if over steppe regions. I assume no terrain-clinging computer. It mean radar LOS about 40 km and visual LOS about 10 km in typical weather. Also, the sound direction finders may contribute to detection, although these tends to be useless against low-flying targets on hot sunny days due reverse refraction. Therefore, low-level approach may be enough to release one bomb, but not enough to avoid interception after it for long time.
Also, parachute bomb would need a momentary pull-up to at least 300m altitude before release, worsening detection risks. One more problem is what parachute bombs are usually set to air burst, so minimal altitude for bomb detonator may apply.
 
I think it would be far better and much more likely if it happened by the means of Fail Safe. For those who have not seen it, it's set around the mid to late 60s. Due to a technical failure, the attack code is transmitted to a Bomber Group at their fail safe point to attack Moscow. Both sides work together, but the lead bomber is able to drop it's two 40-megaton payloads onto Moscow, vaporized as the same happens to NYC for the destruction of Moscow to be reciprocated and a Third World War avoided.
 
Also, parachute bomb would need a momentary pull-up to at least 300m altitude before release, worsening detection risks. One more problem is what parachute bombs are usually set to air burst, so minimal altitude for bomb detonator may apply.

This bomber group may not have a return option in any case. I can completely believe Slim Pickens riding the thing to the ground in that kind of scenario.

I mean, if they went rogue, America might have to agree to shoot them down.

If a large base went rogue like in Dr. Strangelove, there may not be so much America to get back to, and I'm not certain how difficult it would be to dodge America's response to the Russian response to their detection.
 
An issue discussed amongst aircrews who had SIOP missions was what to do if one survived the bomb run. For many crews returning to the USA, or bases in the UK meant be able to tank up on the way home - which might very well not happen as some tankers would be shot down, run out of fuel to transfer, or never get off the ground. Other crews, primarily those flying tactical aircraft especially those from aircraft carriers, would not have enough fuel to even exit the borders of the USSR/WP (this was true for some B-47 missions as well) and these folks were on one-way missions. Of course even if you had enough fuel your home base, and potentially any diverts you could land at, might be smoking holes in the ground or your carrier might have gone down. The best option would be to land at a US or NATO field of any sort or even bail out over the US or NATO if there was not a field available. After that a neutral country, preferably one that was "friendly". The worst option was to fly towards a NATO or neutral and bail out as close as possible and hope to be able to walk out. Whether because you were shot down or had to jump because you ran out of fuel, trying to escape and evade through a country where you had just dropped nuclear weapons was not a good thing. Aside from trying to avoid radiation exposure, the local population is not going to be very happy with you - if you are caught by the military you might survive, even if unpleasantly, but if civilians caught you it would not end well.

More than one crew discussed simply going up with their combat load when the last bomb went. By the 1970s it was obvious that there would not be much to come back to, unless there had been a slow build up to war their families would be gone and of course the mess that used to be the USA...
 

jahenders

Banned
What if during the cold war a heavily anti communist nuclear bomber squad decided to go rogue and target the Soviet union without SAC or Norad realizing it until they are close to their targets. Unrealistic but I am curious on what would happen if they hit their targets before the soviet air force could shoot them down. The scenarios were this can happen allowed are: the cuban missile crisis, able archer, soviet coup in 1991, the wargames scenario. Targets are major soviet cities.

That would depend a GREAT deal on what they're specific targets were. If that squadron was primarily targeted at near-coastal sites, some could get through and do some serious damage. If they have to fly all the way to Moscow, it's going to be a very rough day.
 
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