REPORT OF THE UNDERSEAS WARFARE ADVISORY PANEL 13 



Under existing funding regulations, Polaris submarines must com- 

 pete for money with the rest of our shipbuilding program. This 

 total construction budget is limited . Even if none of this money were 

 spent on Polaris submarines, the funds would be stretched to the 

 limit in meeting the Navy's minimum requirements for its traditional 

 mission of controlling the seas. 



From the standpoint of national deterrent strategy, the Polaris 

 system should therefore not be treated as part of our regular ship- 

 building program. In assigning money and priority to it, this system 

 should be compared, not with other naval ships, but with the manned 

 aircraft and land-based strategic missiles of our national deterrent 

 force. 



We recommend that, for funding purposes, the Polaris system be 

 entirely removed from the Navy's shipbuilding budget. 



We recommend that construction budget requests for the Polaris 

 system be determined by the Secretary of Defense and the National 

 Security Council, as part of our overall strategic deterrent budget. 



VIII. Nuclear Armaments and Undersea Warfare 



The lethal destructive radii of nuclear depth charges and torpedoes 

 would appear to make atomic weapons highly effective armaments for 

 an ASW force. On the face of it, they reduce the problem of localizing 

 the enemy and permit less stringent guidance requirements on ASW 

 weapons. 



Nuclear armaments, however, place more exacting demands on 

 target recognition, and there is some evidence suggesting that under- 

 water nuclear explosions may affect the operation of the detection 

 and identification devices now employed for ASW work. 



In the 13 years since Hiroshima, our country has detonated many 

 nuclear devices or weapons for test purposes, but there have been 

 only a few underwater shots, which yielded limited amounts of infor- 

 mation. Two more underwater tests are scheduled for the current 

 Eniwetok series. They do not promise, however, to produce all the 

 data needed properly to evaluate the role of nuclear weapons in ASW. 



It is important that we secure more authoritative information 

 through additional tests of the effects of underwater nuclear weapons. 

 Such tests would also have a vital bearing on the design of new nuclear 

 weapons and the tactical employment of submarines in all types of 

 operations. They would, in addition, furnish data about possible 

 hazards from radioactive contamination of food fishes. 



We are not persuaded that we have in the past moved with sufficient 

 vigor and imagination in developing nuclear weapons specifically 

 optimized for undersea warfare. Nor are we certain that the weapons 

 now being stockpiled or developed for ASW work take full advantage 

 of the contributions which nuclear armaments can potentially make 

 to destroying enemy forces. 



We recommend that the Navy and the Atomic Energy Comrnission 

 increase their efforts to develop new nuclear weapons specifically 

 optimized for underseas warfare. 



We recommend that the Atomic Energy Commission and the 

 Department of Defense perform such additional underwater test shots 

 as are needed to augment weapons effects data, to increase weapons 

 efficiency, to improve ship design, and to minimize the size and yield 



