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IOTL, there have been a number of proposals for rockets launched directly from the ocean. SLBMs are close to that, though most use a charge of compressed air to breach the surface before ignition. However, the Seabee, a modified Aerobee sounding rocket, was fired successfully in the ocean, as were a number of other USN sounding rockets. In 1980, the captain who managed that USN program proposed that the Minuteman series of missiles should be deployed at sea.

The advantages of such ocean launch are that there is no limit on the size of the floating rocket (Sea Dragon was the most notorious proposal for such a vehicle), that it eliminates the need for a launch pad, and that anyone with a boat can launch such a rocket from anywhere in the ocean to any orbital inclination. This would vastly increase the number of possible launch sites for orbital launch—for example, the US would not be dependent on Vandenberg AFB for polar launches if it had a floating satellite launcher. Israel, as another example, could launch from a ship in the Atlantic, avoiding issues with overflights of its neighbors. Britain would not rely on Woomera if it pursued a space program. The benefits to rocket size are also notable—the reason the US pursued segmented solid motors was that the USAF was reluctant to commit to barged delivery of monolithic solids to VAFB. With a floating launch (and, presumably, a world where the USN dominates American space launch), they could fire arbitrarily large monolithic rockets anywhere in the ocean.

So what would it take for sea-launched rockets to become the face of both military rocketry and space launch, with a POD anywhere in the twentieth century? A world without launch pads, so to speak?
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