[calenel]

Read through the rest of the thread. I gave you the courtesy of pinging you when somebody misattributed your (apparently boilerplate) comments. We aren't talking about suitcase, backpack or other baby nukes. We are talking about any type of nuclear weapon brought in whole or piecemeal and hidden in the US.

Reposting the comments that the other Freeper attributed to SouthTrack contributes exactly nothing to the discussion as most of it doesn't apply and the rest has been dealt with in earlier posts. For example, the link to Beryllium trigger isotopes that have a 53 day half-life means nothing. I hope the islamofascists waste all their money on such technologies. They would have to replenish more often than they change their underwear. And we already discussed oxidation (although your so-called worthless rust can be refined pretty easily).

So before you slap me around with some more boilerplate responses, please take the time to read the rest of the thread.

[Southack]

"And we already discussed oxidation (although your so-called worthless rust can be refined pretty easily)." - calenel

On the contrary, the well-funded, well-staffed Nazis found that process to be a bit more tricky. QED.

My point is that all nukes, regardless of size, require professional maintenance.

Nuclear triggers can't, due to atomic decay, last very long. That's just a fact of life.

As for nuclear cores/pits...they decay much more slowly (e.g. the Soviets were on a 7 year replacement cycle), but the isotopes that they decay into, though small in quantity early on, greatly inhibit chain reactions.

Furthermore, radioactive decay impacts electronics and even wiring (e.g. resistance, heat, capacitance, inductance). That decay also affects the conventional explosives (this is why the Soviets had to steal Britain's RDX). Even RDX has to be periodically replaced.

Contrary to urban myths, none of the above are easy to remedy in the field. Cutting and shaping fissionable metals is beyond the ability of your corner-store machine shop.

Obtaining trigger material itself (e.g. Po-210) requires full access to a nuclear reactor.

Larger atomic devices *can*, if desired, be built with slightly longer shelf-lives (e.g. using more shielding material), but the desired neutron radiation (which is, by definition, tied to short a half-life) to initiate even the large devices mandates rather constant maintenance cycles.

In short, you need State resources to build new or maintain old nukes (e.g. nuclear reactor for trigger replenishment, clean room labs for machining pits/cores, special conventional explosives, etc.).

Slight errors in shaping the replacement conventional explosives, or in the resistance or capacitance of the wiring, or in a mismatch in the electronics, or in the purity of the fissionable material, or in the decay rate of the chosen trigger materials...will all void a nuke's ability to go "boom."

Still be a "dirty nuke?" Sure. Re-visit Hiroshima? No.