this is bad.
now let me go find out he differences among an atomic, nuclear and hydrogen bomb and i’ll let you know how bad.
give me about a week, since it’s all Greek to me.
wake me up when they create something bigger than the Tsar Bomba.
Greek
Atomic bomb=nuclear bomb (fission of plutonium 239) Used on Japan - small to medium yields possible. Fission of a kilogram of plutonium-239 can produce an explosion equivalent to 21,000 tons of TNT or 21 Kilotons
Hydrogen bomb=thermonuclear bomb (fusion of hydrogen triggered by fission of plutonium 239) Never used in war, only tested. Yield is theoretically unlimited. Largest ever tested was by Russia at 50,000,000 or 50 Megatons
give me about a week, since it’s all Greek to me.
Well, at the time, that is what “we” said ... It was Obola’s ADMINISTRATION that was claiming the NorK’s did not try to explode a hydrogen bomb.
The Greek.
An atomic bomb (as normally used) IS a nuclear bomb. Two kinds of proven designs: The Hiroshima-style long linear u235-enriched bomb. A conventional explosion at one end of a “cannon-like” tube blows a carefully-fitting chuck of U235 down the tube and into the other chunk of U235. Nuclear fission occurs, and the bomb blows up. Maximum yield is (obviously) going to vary, but up from the 12,000 tons of the Hiroshima bomb up to about 35,000 or 45,000 tons of explosives.
Enough to take out a city center. Damage but not absolutely destroy the surrounding suburbs.
Sim[ple, easy design, easy to build, don't even really need to “test” it. Just put it in a shipping container and stack it on the next train to the nearest port.
A Nagasaki-style Pu239 bomb is normally made of very, very carefully shaped conventional explosives around a loose core of uncompressed Pu239. The conventional explosives “squeeze” the Pu239 into a denser crystal structure, that strucutre is dense enough to cause fission reactions with little loss of neutrons, and so the bomb goes off.
Much, much harder to design and multiple “tests” are essential. A Pu239 bomb is a little easier to get the material - IF a properly set up nuclear power plant is available without monitoring and inspections. A “power-producing” always produced “some” Pu239, but you have to work very hard to get a LOT of Pu239 in the reactor, then separate it out into bomb material.
But, a Pu239 bomb is lighter, smaller, easier to make a “bomb” out of the material for a aircraft or missile warhead. Pu239 bombs are virtually limitless in their power: easily up to 150 - 200,000 tons if you want to go that large. Most are smaller though: again, 12,000 - 20,000 tons are enough to destroy a city. Better to use two or three spread around if you want to blow up everything in large area.
A hydrogen bomb can be built several ways: The first is what the Russians started with back in the mid-50’s. Start with a regular nuclear bomb, then wrap lithium or tritium or deuterium around it in layers. The extra fusion material increases the yield, but it MUST have the regular a-bomb to go off first, and the wrapping and the isotopes are very, very hard to get adjusted right.
Again: Much testing is essential. If the real bomb fails, you have lost both the fusion material AND the original a-bomb detonator. And the guy whose city you tried to blow up is not harmed, but definitely irritated. Hydrogen bombs vary in size: all are larger than the a-bombs. Often, they start with 2,000,000 tons; 5,000,000 to 25,000,000 tons of explosive power. Biggest was 50 Mtons, biggest designed by the Russians was 110 Mtons.
City is gone. Suburbs are gone. County and the sides of the surrounding counties are burnt out and blown down.
I went and looked.
It’s a “this is _bad_” scenario.
Turns out it’s not really that hard to build a fusion bomb. Easy to screw it up, yes, but once you can make & mill plutonium and uranium, it’s just a matter of shaping two hollow uranium cylinders and a plutonium rod, and packing them with plastic & hydrogen.
Look up “Teller–Ulam”.
Mostly a hydrogen bomb uses an atomic bomb as a trigger, lithium as an accelerator/catalyst and deuterium as the fuel. The deuterium is the hard part.