Nuclear Cruise Missile Program example essay topic

A few years before the Vietnam War the United States started developing a new type of weapon, something that could be launched from land or sea, and something that could go a long distance without a US pilot risking his life. Something that could carry a powerful warhead and destroy its target with deadly precision, the answer was simple, Cruise Missiles. Cruise missiles have advanced a lot since the early forms. Most early forms were not very successful, they were big and bulky. There was a lot of developing and designing being done on cruise missiles until the Vietnam War took all the attention off of Cruise missiles and put them on the back burner. While the United States was at war the Russians continued their studies and developed a deadly Missile that could be launched from a ship and sent to an enemy ship and destroy it.

They kept advancing and developing the missile and the United States saw that they were getting ahead. One year the Russians sold a few cruise missiles, called "termites", to the Egyptians and on October 21, 1967 they launched these missiles at an Israeli ship called the Eilat. "The two missiles struck the Eilat and nearly split the ship in two". Soon after the United States produced a new program for the cruise missiles, they requested $20 Million for research and studies on this topic thus new cruise missile was created. The united made new models and improved on the soviet Unions' design and created a nuclear cruise missile. They made their missile able to be launched from land or sea.

This was a huge achievement in the program. The US continued to improve on this and the USAF (United States Air Force) began to get jealous and disliked the cruise missile aside from its great abilities. They thought the government was trying to replace the manned aircraft, such as the F-16 and other aircrafts at the time. It did however slightly replace the need for a plane for a simple mission. The Russians soon found out about the nuclear cruise missiles and developed some them selves. By the time of the Gulf war the need for nuclear cruise missiles diminished almost completely so the president met with the president of Russia and agreed to put limits on our cruise missiles if they would do the same.

Soon after The Nuclear cruise missile program was dropped, same with the Russians, so the US started to improve on the radar guided missiles and developed Precision Guided Missiles using GPS to designate the target and hit 90% of the time. We are now using those missiles in Iraq in today's War. "Cruise missiles fired from Navy ships in the gulf and Indian ocean can accurately strike targets 1,000 miles away through satellite guidance" In conclusion Cruise Missiles have advanced a lot since the giant missiles to small volatile accurate weapons of war. The United States could very well pick back up the nuclear program again; Improvement on this and all weapons will never stop.