A Comparison of Nuclear Explosion Effectiveness against Underground Terrorists.

Bluebay | OCT 26 01 | VANNROX

[vannrox]

A comparison of different types
of Nuclear Explosions...

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<2 Kton Nuclear Explosion (Micro-Nuke)

Bush's Baby Nuke, by Alistair Millar

On October 2, 1992, President George Bush signed into law a moratorium on nuclear testing. Now his son is preparing to end that moratorium.

The current Bush Administration is studying options for the development and production of a small, low-yield nuclear weapon called an earth-penetrator or bunker-buster, which would burrow into the ground and destroy a deeply buried hideaway of a "rogue" leader like Saddam Hussein.

But such a bomb would take many more people with it.

"The use of any nuclear weapon capable of destroying a buried target that is otherwise immune to conventional attack will necessarily produce enormous numbers of civilian casualties," writes Dr. Robert Nelson, a professor of theoretical science at Princeton University, in a recent study for the Federation of American Scientists. "No earth-burrowing missile can penetrate deep enough into the earth to contain an explosion with a nuclear yield even as small as 1 percent of the 15-kiloton Hiroshima weapon. The explosion simply blows out a crater of radioactive dirt, which rains down on the local region with an especially intense and deadly fallout."

The blast from one of these weapons would "knock down nearly all homes and apartments--and kill nearly all the people in them--out to distances of greater than half a mile from the blast," says Greg Mello, who directs the Los Alamos Study Group, a nuclear weapons policy research and education group based in Santa Fe. Those who survived the blast would suffer a lethal dose of radiation, he predicts. "To take a specific example," says Mello, "if the target in question were the Iraqi presidential bunker located in south-central Baghdad, there would be very roughly 20,000 people located within one-half mile of this target."

If the Bush Administration proceeds with the bunker-buster nuke, it would signal a frightening departure for U.S nuclear policy. The United States would be reneging on its pledge not to develop new nuclear weapons, and this would violate the spirit if not the letter of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which are geared to the elimination of nuclear weapons, not the making of new ones.

What's more, it would, for the first time in almost fifteen years, confer legitimacy on the idea that nuclear weapons have a suitable role to play even in conventional warfare. This leaping of the firewall would increase the likelihood of nuclear weapons being used in the next decade or so. And it could turn a conventional war into a full-blown nuclear catastrophe.

But that's not how the bunker-buster would be sold. Chances are, it would be coupled with an announcement that the United States is reducing its strategic nuclear stockpile, which Bush pledged to do in the Presidential campaign. And we would hear how it is a designer weapon that is ideal for targeting "rogue" dictators.

"One senior adviser to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that the Iraqi leader would not be deterred by current U.S. nuclear weapons 'because he knows a U.S. President would not drop a 100-kiloton bomb on Baghdad' and destroy the entire city," Walter Pincus of The Washington Post reported on April 15. The implication is that if the United States builds a bunker-buster, it would feel free to use the weapon.

Scientists at the nuclear labs, anxious to keep themselves busy, boast of how functional these weapons would be.

C. Paul Robinson, the president and director of the Sandia National Laboratory, this spring released a paper on the subject, entitled "Pursuing a New Nuclear Weapons Policy for the 21st Century." In it, he stresses the need for nuclear weapons for the foreseeable future and says low-yield--but not too low-yield--nukes are the way to go. "I believe that we would desire primarily low-yield weapons with highly accurate delivery systems for deterrence in the non-Russian world," Robinson argues. "Here, I'm not talking about sub-kiloton weapons (i.e., 'mini-nukes'), as some have advocated, but devices in the low-kiloton regime, in order to contemplate the destruction of some buried or hidden targets, while being mindful of the need to minimize collateral damage. I believe we can achieve the low-yield levels that are likely to be most appropriate for deterring wider threats, particularly if we are unable to design and test new weapons under a nuclear testing moratorium."

Robinson's faith in "highly accurate" bombs would surprise the families of the victims of the Chinese embassy bombing in Belgrade or of the bombings in Iraq. "Highly accurate" bombs often miss their target.

But the drive for the bunker-buster is gaining momentum. Republican Senators John Warner of Virginia and Wayne Allard of Colorado added a provision to the 2001 defense authorization bill that requires the Departments of Energy and Defense to conduct a new study on the use of nuclear weapons in small-scale conventional conflicts against dictators who are holed up in "hard and deeply buried targets." The study is expected to appear in July.

This may lead to the undoing of a Congressional prohibition on testing new nuclear weapons. In 1993, Representatives Elizabeth Furse, Democrat of Oregon, and John Spratt Jr., Democrat of South Carolina, recognized that something had to be done to prevent the development of useable nuclear weapons. They wisely added a provision to the fiscal year 1994 defense authorization bill prohibiting nuclear laboratories from research and development that could lead to a low-yield nuclear weapon. Bush, Warner, and Allard are likely to favor legislation that would negate the Furse-Spratt provision.

The development of these bunker-buster weapons would jeopardize, not enhance, U.S. security. It would give a further incentive to Russia to cling to its own extremely problematic tactical nuclear arsenal. It would compel other countries to embark upon their own programs and increase the perceived need to join the nuclear club. The small size and portability of these weapons would increase their vulnerability to theft by nonnuclear states and potential nuclear terrorists. And if the United States used these weapons against a nuclear power or an ally of a nuclear power, it would be toying with all-out nuclear war.

Plus, the very way these weapons would be used in battle adds to the potential for unauthorized or accidental use. Unlike strategic nuclear weapons, these smaller tactical nuclear weapons are deployed nearer the front line; they are far more susceptible to communications problems under crisis conditions, and they can be fired by a person in the field without going through the stringent safety precautions that govern the launch of strategic nuclear weapons.

The bunker-buster nuke lulls us into believing the dangerous and false notion that nuclear weapons can be used without posing a pernicious threat to human life and the environment. They cannot.

The path toward greater U.S. security is through cooperative measures of disarmament, not unilateral acts of rearmament. The last thing we need is a new kind of nuclear weapon.

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4 Kton Nuclear Explosion (Pocket-Nuke)
Used as warheads in the Cruise Missiles ALCM and SLCM.

Two stage radiation implosion weapon. The W-80 is based on the W-61 design, so the exterior appearance of the two warheads is probably very similar (if not identical). This is also true of other B-61 derivatives: the W-84 (in the inactive stockpile), the W-81 (no longer in existence), and the W-85 (converted to the B-61).

The 5 kiloton low yield option presumably represents the boosted primary yield alone, while the high yield adds the full secondary yield . The lowest yield option available for the B-61, 0.3 Kt, is not available with the W-80, presumably because a yield this low is of no strategic interest.

W-80 Characteristics

Available Yields (Kt)	5 / 150
Weight	290 lbs
Length	31.4 in
Diameter	11.8 in
Number In Service	Mod 0 (SLCM) 350 Mod 1 (ALCM) 1000 Mod 1 (ACM) 400

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10 Kton Nuclear Explosion (Local Nuke)
Little Boy - Hiroshima at 15 Kton.
Fatman used at Nagasaki at 21 Kton.

The 1962 articles in the New England Journal of Medicine described the destruction and medical implications of the detonation of a 20 megaton thermonuclear ground-burst explosion above Boston, Massachusetts. Changes in nuclear weapons targeting strategy make it more likely that a number of smaller-yield weapons - with possibly even greater cumulative destructive impact - would be used in the event of a modern-day nuclear strike.

The following summary of effects is based on a 20-megaton ground-burst nuclear detonation above a city with a population of 2.8 million during the day time when many people from outlying areas would be in the city working or shopping.

Ground Zero to Two Miles:
Within 1/1000th of a second, a fireball would form enveloping downtown and reaching out for two miles in every direction from ground zero, the point where the bomb went off. Temperatures would rise to 20 million degrees Fahrenheit, and everything--buildings, trees, cars, and people--would be vaporized.

Two Miles to Four Miles from Ground Zero:
Out to a distance of 4 miles, the blast would produce pressures of 25 pounds per square inch and winds in excess of 650 miles per hour. These titanic forces would rip buildings apart and level everything, including reinforced concrete and steel structures. Even deep underground bomb shelters would be crushed.

Four Miles to Ten Miles from Ground Zero:
As far as six miles from the center of the explosion, the heat would vaporize automobile sheet metal. Glass would melt. Out to a distance of ten miles in all directions, the heat would still be intense enough to melt sheet metal. At this distance, the blast wave would create pressures of 7 to 10 pounds per square inch and winds of 200 miles per hour. Reinforced concrete buildings would be heavily damaged and all other buildings--masonry and wood frame--would be leveled.

Sixteen Miles from Ground Zero:
At a distance of 16 miles from the center, the heat would ignite all easily flammable materials--houses, paper, cloth, leaves, gasoline, heating fuel--starting hundreds of thousands of fires. Fanned by blast winds still in excess of 100 miles per hour, these fires would merge into a giant firestorm more than 30 miles across and covering 800 square miles. Everything within this entire area would be consumed by flames. Temperatures would rise to 1400 degrees Fahrenheit. The death rate would approach 100%.

Firestorms of this type, though on a smaller scale, developed in Hamburg and Dresden and in parts of Tokyo after conventional bombing attacks during World War II. The information gained from these experiences has particular relevance to the question of fallout shelters. In these earlier firestorms only those who left their bomb shelters had any chance of surviving. Those who remained in underground shelters were killed, roasted as their bunkers were turned into ovens and suffocated as the fires consumed all of the oxygen in the air.

Beyond Sixteen Miles:
At 21 miles from ground zero, the blast would still produce pressures of two pounds per square inch, enough to shatter glass windows and turn each of them into hundreds of lethal missiles flying outward from the center at 100 miles per hour. At 29 miles away from the center the heat would be so intense that all exposed skin, not protected by clothing, would suffer third degree burns. To a distance of 32 miles second degree burns. Even as far as 40 miles from ground zero anyone who turned to gaze at the sudden flash of light would be blinded by burns on the retina at the back of their eyes.

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30 Kton Nuclear Explosion (Strategic Nuke)

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74 Kton Nuclear Explosion (Tactical Nuke)

30 Kton Betty Depth Bomb B-7

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300 Kton Nuclear Explosion (Strategic Nuke)

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1000 Kton Nuclear Explosion (City Buster)

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8900 Kton Nuclear Explosion (County Buster)

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15000 Kton Nuclear Explosion ( !!!! )

The largest explosion ever conducted was 61,000 Kton, and the largest weapon ever stocked in the US arsnel was 52 Kton. Pictures of the explosions are difficult to come by.

[vannrox]

I compiled this list. It concerns the current discussion on tactical nuclear weapons and their applications against Bin Laden.

[vannrox]

52 Kton should read 52,000 Kton. Sorry.

[1000Mhz]

The largest explosion ever conducted was 61,000 Kton, and the largest weapon ever stocked in the US arsnel was 52 Kton.

What the heck have you been smokin? There are tons of weapons in the megaton + range. The largest detonated was over 50 megatons which dwarfs this kiloton stuff.

Buh-bye.

[CatOwner]

Although it was corrected, 52,000 Ktons is 52 Megatons. You both are talking the same story. Geez, the math education in this country ...

[1000Mhz]

I posted that while the other one was being posted so I did not see that correction.

However, it is appropriate to talk in terms of megatons, not thousands of kilitons.

If you win the 10 million dollar lotttery, are you going to scream "I won ten thousand thousand dollars!"

I didn't think so.

[MaxwellWolf]

Screw the treaty. There is no time to worry about this crap when our survival is at stake. Dead people and countries don't have to worry about rules.

[onedoug]

A megaire.

[Diogenesis]

Thank you.

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""One senior adviser to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that the Iraqi leader would not be deterred by current U.S. nuclear weapons 'because he knows a U.S. President
would not drop a 100-kiloton bomb on Baghdad' and destroy the entire city," Walter Pincus of The Washington Post reported on April 15. The implication is that if the United States
builds a bunker-buster, it would feel free to use the weapon. "

No wonder they have felt free to give us Nile Fever, Anthrax and 911.

So far, these weapons have not deterred because they are only potential energy.

[Taxbilly]

OK now let's pick one and drop the darn thing.

[CatOwner]

Yeah, except most people in this country can't relate a kiloton to a megaton. Most are too deficient in mathematics to understand kilo- and mega- anything. Having all of the pictures specified as kilotons does make it easier to understand the relative amounts. I say we start with 1 megaton bombs and go from there! ;)

[onedoug]

...or 1Ghz?

[vannrox]

[Cobra64]

Instead of dropping a bunker blaster ON a cave where it may not reach the objective penetration for a cave under thousands of feet of granite (like our military operations in Cheyenne Mt.,CO), Why not mount one of the mini-nukes onto the nose a laser guided rocket and laser guide the rocket IN-TO a cave?

This would take care of the "under ground" terrorists hiding IN the cave. Those not mist-i-fied by the explosion, could dance and cheer while letting the radiation and their biological weapons overwhelm them while the entrance to the cave crumbles shut.

No atmospheric radiation, the bad guys are with their allah, and we get a significant military score.

No muss, no fuss!

[Kevin Curry]

Although it was corrected, 52,000 Ktons is 52 Megatons.

Also 104 billion pounds or 1.664 trillion ounces.

[Vinomori]

necessity is the mother

[glock rocks]

The United States would be reneging on its pledge not to develop new nuclear weapons, and this would violate the spirit if not the letter of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which are geared to the elimination of nuclear weapons, not the making of new ones.

after all, gotta be nuclear pc... whilst the chinese and north koreans pass us up. thanks, x42.

great post, vannrox

[jimtorr]

Explosivley impressive. Thanks. Hopefully it will dampen the eagerness of some to use these things. I do support the use if someone unleashes a mass bio or chem or radiological attack on the U.S., if we can figure out who done it. I won't like it, but it will be necessary.

I never knew how small the micro nukes are, or that the B61 was capable of a yield under 1kt. These would be the bombs to convert into bunker-busters, I would think. I wonder if they were ever made?

[Economist_MA]

Given your screenname, you gotta be kidding.

[Brett66]

Excellent post. Here's a couple of interesting links:

High energy weapons archive

Cobalt Bombs(doomsday weapons)

[95Tarheel]

I could be wrong, but I think the reason is that the biggest explosion the US ever set off was more like 15 Mtons. (Castle... Bravo, I think) Therefore, a US picture of a 51 Mton explosion doesn't exist. (I think the US might have made some bombs that big though.) The Soviets detonated the largest device, and I think the estimates are it was 50+ Mtons. If anyone knows of where I can get a picture of this, I would be grateful!

As an aside, I've read that there is no practicality to building a weapon capable of anything more than 200 Mtons b/c the additional explosive force cannot practically be directed toward the earth's surface, and would instead blow a hole in the atmosphere.

Cool pictures- I'm saving some!