The Nuclear Triad Boondoggle

Here is a decommissioned Titan Missile in a silo near Tucson. It was featured in a Star Trek movie.

The nuclear deterrent of France and Britain is based entirely on a handful of submarines armed with a few hundred nuclear weapons. China, until recent years, had only a few hundred land-based ICBMs for its nuclear deterrent. While the US and Russia both have more than 5,000 nuclear weapons each, only about 1,700 of them are deployed, meaning they are ready for immediate use. The Russians do have more tactical nuclear weapons and a slightly larger stockpile overall, but that is irrelevant as I will explain below. 

Interestingly, the US Navy and Air Force both have about 400 ballistic missiles deployed. The difference is the Navy's missiles cost more than four times as much: $30 million for a Trident II vs $7 million for a Minuteman III. If the goal is to have more missiles deployed than the enemy, land-based ICBMs get you the most bang for the buck, or rather, rubble for the ruble.

Much larger nuclear stockpiles were maintained during the Cold War. In 1975, the US and USSR both had about 45,000 nuclear weapons each. This build-up was every bit as ridiculous as the days of the strength of navies being based on displacement tonnage. The US and Russia are bound to a treaty limiting the number of deployed warheads to about 1,700 each. Thus, the stockpile sizes and proportion of tactical warheads has no strategic significance. 

As of 2022, the Russians had 316 deployed ICBMs of which only 10 were on submarines, at least according to these folks. 

Meanwhile, Newsweek reports:

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According to a fact sheet by the U.S. Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance published in September, 2021, the U.S. has 665 deployed ICBMs, including ones launched from submarines and deployed heavy bombers, while Russia has 527.

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The writers above appear to have conflated ICBMs and air-launched cruise missiles, but that is a minor point. 

Since Russian military spending is about a tenth of the US budget, they are forced to use cheaper land-based missiles if they want to maximize the number of deployed warheads and achieve parity with the US. For practical purposes, Russia, the main nuclear rival of the US, has abandoned the concept of a nuclear triad. In that case, there is no reason for Americans to keep paying for the upkeep of our triad. There wasn't a good reason to have a triad in the first place. 

The whole idea of the nuclear triad is based on faulty premises. First, there was supposedly a bomber gap, meaning the Soviets had more bombers. That turned out to be false, but it was a great way to get funding for more bombers. Then supposedly there was a missile gap, and that was false too. I have no doubt American admirals would have claimed a submarine gap if they thought anyone would have believed it, and if they had made that claim, it would have been false as well. It's important to remember that generals, admirals, and other government bureaucrats will lie to get funding.

Keep this in mind the next time you hear someone complain about the Chinese navy having more ships. Ukraine has been giving the Russian military a run for its money despite having lost most of its navy before the war started. The Taliban had zero warships and still managed to defeat the US and NATO. In strategy, not all numerical comparisons are equally important. 

Lastly, the whole advantage of submarines is their supposed stealth. That's bunk and the proof is all the times US and Russian submarines have collided while looking for each other:

-K-19 and the USS Gato in 1969

-USS James Madison and a Soviet sub in 1974

-USS Baton Rouge and B-276 Kostroma in 1992

There were also three other incidents where Soviet subs collided with US surface ships. 

Submarines are large, slow-moving metal objects that move along predictable routes to predictable destinations, which are almost always naval bases in relatively shallow water. Bottom line, they're not that hard to find. They are still useful platforms for launching conventional cruise missiles and are much more likely to survive in a hostile environment than a surface ship.