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11feetWestofEast t1_j7c87mb wrote

Portland, Brunswick NAS, maine Yankee. That's all based off of cold War Era ideals. Loring used to be on there as well. The reality is now that both Brunswick and maine yankee are basically worthless as targets, maine has almost no real worthy targets. Portland only because of size and deep water port, but even that is low on the scale

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biglymonies t1_j7c8xw8 wrote

I think the only worthwhile target in Maine outside of the ones you listed would be the VLF towers in Cutler. Not sure how much they're used, though.

Edit: apparently quite a bit

> This allows continuous transmission, crucial since the Navy closed Annapolis (NSS), the only other East Coast VLF station.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VLF_Transmitter_Cutler

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Coffee-FlavoredSweat t1_j7dembk wrote

You don’t need to nuke VLF Cutler to destroy it.

In the winter they routinely have to pump additional power into the antenna arrays to keep them de-iced.

A conventional bomb or missile hitting one of the antenna towers or the control building would take down the whole operation.

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ppitm t1_j7cpmdi wrote

BIW is definitely a target in a high use scenario. Portland was already leaked as a Chinese countervalue target because it is easy to hit over the poles. They aim to hit at least one city in each state.

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RobertLeeSwagger t1_j7cvdhv wrote

I don’t think BIW is worth using a nuclear weapon on. Could easily cripple it with something less destructive unless collateral damage is a goal.

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ppitm t1_j7dl7h7 wrote

Actual target lists from the Cold War would disagree with you. There's no scenario where someone would attack it with anything other than a nuclear weapon.

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spintrackz t1_j7e47jz wrote

Yep. Strategic target. Heavy industry and military production. They might as well paint a bullseye on the roof.

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spintrackz t1_j7e30fi wrote

The Chinese aren't crazy or stupid enough to start lobbing rockets our way. Pooty Poot on the other hand... is, and has a lot more missiles than Xi does.

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ppitm t1_j7e3k7f wrote

A guy who makes all his guests sit on the far end of a 50-foot-long conference table doesn't sound like someone too keen to die in a fireball.

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spintrackz t1_j7e41g1 wrote

No, but he would be the kind of guy to think he could get away with it without dying in a fireball. He's also got that nifty Dead Hand system he knows he can use.

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Filbertine t1_j7cwden wrote

I thought it was strange that Loring wasn’t there!

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Guygan t1_j7d5d5w wrote

> Portland only because of size and deep water port,

And it’s the closest port to Europe.

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spintrackz t1_j7e1y5x wrote

Rangely possibly as a secondary target in a counter-force exchange. Public knowledge that a US Navy SERE school is there. Doubtful they'd waste anything over 2 Kts on it though.

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Awkward_Mixture_8990 t1_j7f3tu4 wrote

As a guy who’s been there it wouldn’t take more than 50lb of tannerite to remove that structure.

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theresin t1_j7hfet5 wrote

BNAS would still be useful in an all-out scenario, because you know damn well the government would take it back over if they had to (all the facilities are still there, as is the long runway).

But barring that, a lot of BIW's infrastructure and work-force are located from Brunswick to Wiscasset so ... might as well be thorough.

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hike_me t1_j7lg1hy wrote

It takes years to build and launch a ship. BIW is basically irrelevant in total nuclear war

It’s only on the 2000 warhead scenario because they’re probably running out of strategically important things to nuke at that point

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AnythingToAvoidWork t1_j7hjr7r wrote

Yeah seems a little odd for northern new england in general.

I get NH has he Seabrook nuclear plant, but Manchester? And what's in western VT?

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