Larry J said:

>In the case of MIRVs, the PBV also serves to send each warhead
>to it's specific target. The PBV is usually liquid fueled with hypergolic
>propellants due to the need for very fine tuning of the trajectory
>combined with the need for long term storability. The old
>Minuteman IIIs use this technology, as do the Trident SLBMs.

I didn't think the Minuteman III RV bus used hypergolics but I was mistaken as shown by this website.

>A MARV warhead could increase accuracy substancially, as was
>the case with the Pershing II IRBM back in the 1980s. It could also
>make it harder to intercept the warhead with a terminal defense
>weapon like the old Sprint ABM.

The Pershing II RV was a nice piece of work. It's my understanding they've been using old Pershing II RVs as targets (flying straight ballistic trajectories) for this new antiballistic missile system that the Air Force is developing.

>Recently, Russia tested a new ICBM that was said to contain
>some form of maneuverable warhead, perhaps one powered
>with scramjet technology.

My officemate is a Russian aeronautical engineer and was originally trained to design ICBMs. He told me the Soviet Union was developing their own version of AMaRV but never got it off the drawing board. Presumably this new Russian RV that appeared in the news was a continuation of that earlier design work. Putting a scramjet on an ICBM RV makes zero sense. The big problem for an RV is getting rid of kinetic energy, not adding it. Also rumor has it the hydraulics in AMaRV for its body and yaw flaps took up so much space that there was no room for a warhead. Supposably AMaRV flew so well that it was frightening (no ABM could shoot it down). This payload volume problem would be even worse with a scramjet which would also need control flaps.

Gary