ARMED FORCES: Deep Deterrence

ARMED FORCES Deep Deterrence

Dull orange underside and shaded slate topside, the world's biggest submarine this week poised for its slow, stern-first slide into the Thames River at Groton, Conn. The submarine George Washington SSB(N) 598—longer than a football field (380 ft.) and, at 5,600 tons, almost twice the weight of Nautilus—would carry with it the U.S. Navy's highest hopes for the future. It is the first of the submarines designed around the Polaris ballistic-missile weapons system.

When the $110 million George Washington joins the fleet in the fall of 1960, it will carry 16 solid-fuel, nuclear-nosed Polaris missiles (range:...

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