[Colinsky]

Detonate a nuke 250 miles above Omaha and 90% of the US population would be dead in a few months.

I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed, but I think the EMP threat is overblown. Our main evidence is the 1962 Starfish Prime nuke test, 1.5 megatons detonated 250 miles above Johnston Island about 800 miles away from Hawaii, and the electromagnetic pulse knocked out 300 streetlights in Honolulu and also set off lots of burglar alarms, and damaged a microwave link that shut down telephone service to Kauai.

Also, Starfish was an H-bomb; all North Korea has produced so far is wet-firecracker A-bombs. The first US hydrogen bomb was fueled by 82 tons of liquid deuterium in a cryogenic tank as big as a railroad car; if the Norks could put that kind of hardware into orbit, they would have put a man on the Moon by now.

[doorgunner69]

No disrespect, but you may want to update your tech knowledge. Solid state electronics were not in much use back then. Check into EMP effects and what is vulnerable vs. what was used back the.

Regarding the size and weight of 2 stage nukes, it was a long development path from Ivy Mike to what was popped over Johnston island.