A research report by RAND has suggested that the U.S. Army “start a rigorous operational analysis of the potential military value that conventional land-based theater ballistic missiles (TBMs) could add to the U.S. portfolio of strike capabilities.”
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By United States Army (United States Army) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
There has been calls for Washington to abandon the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty after the U.S. Department of State concluded in 2014 that Russia is in violation of its treaty obligations.
The focus of this report by Jacob Heim is to examine the argument that leaving the INF treaty will free the United States to develop and deploy conventional theater ballistic missiles (TBMs) to the Pacific region to counter China.
There were two main themes in supporting the argument to field land-based TBMs in the Pacific:
- gaining leverage over China to expand arms-control agreements
- gaining an important new military capability to prevail in high-intensity conflict against advanced adversaries, such as China, which could include using TBMs
– to impose costs on China
– to suppress Chinese air bases
– to make extensive attacks on Chinese transporter- erector-launchers (TELs)
– as long-range “snipers” to disrupt targets of opportunity.
But, fielding such weapons in the Pacific would require regional access agreements, something Washington will find difficult to obtain from its allies.