Iran - Nuclear Test
Discussion
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/defence/...
If this is indeed the case then this is going to change the dynamics.
Will Israel back off, or will they think if they dont get in now then the chance has been lost ?
Who knows but if iran has achieved Nuclear capability then things are going to get worse.
If this is indeed the case then this is going to change the dynamics.
Will Israel back off, or will they think if they dont get in now then the chance has been lost ?
Who knows but if iran has achieved Nuclear capability then things are going to get worse.
ruggedscotty said:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/defence/...
If this is indeed the case then this is going to change the dynamics.
Will Israel back off, or will they think if they dont get in now then the chance has been lost ?
Who knows but if iran has achieved Nuclear capability then things are going to get worse.
Have you lined the back of your couch with lead yet?If this is indeed the case then this is going to change the dynamics.
Will Israel back off, or will they think if they dont get in now then the chance has been lost ?
Who knows but if iran has achieved Nuclear capability then things are going to get worse.
nuyorican said:
Hmm, if I were Putin, might it be a good idea to furnish/enable Iran with nuclear capability on the sly? Because ten minutes after handing them the bomb you just know they'll be lobbing it at Israel. Then with 'the west' preoccupied with that, time to go heavy on Ukraine.
The idea that so far Putin has been ‘restrained’ in the invasion on Ukraine is absurd. Russia has thrown almost everything it has at Ukraine bar tactical nuclear weapons.
Sure, Russia could kill more people, but it doesn’t have a way to take and hold land.
Tango13 said:
Epicentre 10km or 6.2 miles below the surface? I'm not sure bomb tests are carried out that deep, I thought 2000~2500m was the usual test depth depending on the type of ground/rock.
The deepest bored hole on Earth was 12.2 km. A massive engineering feat, with a diameter of 23 cm.To dig a full nuke 10 km down? It's not even clear such a thing is possible, and certainly would be massive overkill.
Solocle said:
Tango13 said:
Epicentre 10km or 6.2 miles below the surface? I'm not sure bomb tests are carried out that deep, I thought 2000~2500m was the usual test depth depending on the type of ground/rock.
The deepest bored hole on Earth was 12.2 km. A massive engineering feat, with a diameter of 23 cm.To dig a full nuke 10 km down? It's not even clear such a thing is possible, and certainly would be massive overkill.
Tango13 said:
Epicentre 10km or 6.2 miles below the surface? I'm not sure bomb tests are carried out that deep, I thought 2000~2500m was the usual test depth depending on the type of ground/rock.
A twitter post about it was community noted that none of the nuclear test sensors were triggered either.eharding said:
Solocle said:
Tango13 said:
Epicentre 10km or 6.2 miles below the surface? I'm not sure bomb tests are carried out that deep, I thought 2000~2500m was the usual test depth depending on the type of ground/rock.
The deepest bored hole on Earth was 12.2 km. A massive engineering feat, with a diameter of 23 cm.To dig a full nuke 10 km down? It's not even clear such a thing is possible, and certainly would be massive overkill.
ks. Nobody is testing a nuke that far down. Particularly not Iran. If they get a nuke it won't be a test designed to hide it, they'll want to advertise it as an invasion deterrent.Eh, naw. Earthquakes were a regular occurrence when i lived there, was quite exciting as a kid the first couple of times it happened. Everyone will know the day the Iranians are either close to having or have a nuclear weapon capable of being sent outside of Iran as there will be a big smoking hole in the ground where it was. Given the current regime there is no way on earth they will be allowed to get anywhere near nuclear weapons.
Would be willing to bet a significant proportion of the people working on their nuclear programs either work for or are in contact with the CIA, UK Secret Service and Mossad at the very least.
Would be willing to bet a significant proportion of the people working on their nuclear programs either work for or are in contact with the CIA, UK Secret Service and Mossad at the very least.
wc98 said:
Eh, naw. Earthquakes were a regular occurrence when i lived there, was quite exciting as a kid the first couple of times it happened. Everyone will know the day the Iranians are either close to having or have a nuclear weapon capable of being sent outside of Iran as there will be a big smoking hole in the ground where it was. Given the current regime there is no way on earth they will be allowed to get anywhere near nuclear weapons.
Would be willing to bet a significant proportion of the people working on their nuclear programs either work for or are in contact with the CIA, UK Secret Service and Mossad at the very least.
Agree with all of this. Would be willing to bet a significant proportion of the people working on their nuclear programs either work for or are in contact with the CIA, UK Secret Service and Mossad at the very least.
With regards the last paragraph Heisenberg, the head of the German atomic research during WW2 basically lied about the feasibility of building an atomic bomb stating it couldn't be done. He maintained this position when captured and questioned by the allies at the end of the war in Europe until he heard of the attacks on Japan. At that point he was overhead explaining to his fellow captive scientists exactly how to build an bomb.
Makes me wonder what 'difficulties' the Iranian scientists are struggling with
Tango13 said:
wc98 said:
Eh, naw. Earthquakes were a regular occurrence when i lived there, was quite exciting as a kid the first couple of times it happened. Everyone will know the day the Iranians are either close to having or have a nuclear weapon capable of being sent outside of Iran as there will be a big smoking hole in the ground where it was. Given the current regime there is no way on earth they will be allowed to get anywhere near nuclear weapons.
Would be willing to bet a significant proportion of the people working on their nuclear programs either work for or are in contact with the CIA, UK Secret Service and Mossad at the very least.
Agree with all of this. Would be willing to bet a significant proportion of the people working on their nuclear programs either work for or are in contact with the CIA, UK Secret Service and Mossad at the very least.
With regards the last paragraph Heisenberg, the head of the German atomic research during WW2 basically lied about the feasibility of building an atomic bomb stating it couldn't be done. He maintained this position when captured and questioned by the allies at the end of the war in Europe until he heard of the attacks on Japan. At that point he was overhead explaining to his fellow captive scientists exactly how to build an bomb.
Makes me wonder what 'difficulties' the Iranian scientists are struggling with
Tango13 said:
Agree with all of this.
With regards the last paragraph Heisenberg, the head of the German atomic research during WW2 basically lied about the feasibility of building an atomic bomb stating it couldn't be done. He maintained this position when captured and questioned by the allies at the end of the war in Europe until he heard of the attacks on Japan. At that point he was overhead explaining to his fellow captive scientists exactly how to build an bomb.
Makes me wonder what 'difficulties' the Iranian scientists are struggling with
The basic principles of the physics are easy to grasp. Engineering and manufacturing the device, obtaining the raw materials and engineering, building, and running the facilities to produce enough fissile material, while under embargo, while your facilities are being sabotaged and your scientists assassinated - less easy. With regards the last paragraph Heisenberg, the head of the German atomic research during WW2 basically lied about the feasibility of building an atomic bomb stating it couldn't be done. He maintained this position when captured and questioned by the allies at the end of the war in Europe until he heard of the attacks on Japan. At that point he was overhead explaining to his fellow captive scientists exactly how to build an bomb.
Makes me wonder what 'difficulties' the Iranian scientists are struggling with
The design of the Hiroshima device was very simple, two big sub-critical lumps of highly enriched uranium smashed together by cordite propellant. Simple, and reliable enough that they didn't even test one before they used it, but very inefficient in bang-for-buck (problematic if you are struggling to make enough fissile material) and an unavoidably large assembly. The Nagasaki device (like the one tested in the Trinity test) was a plutonium based implosion design with a sub-critical sphere of enriched plutonium compressed to critical mass by shaped charges, much more efficient, much more complicated, much harder to design, and still too big to go on the end of a rocket. It took a lot more R&D to get to a device you could fit in a missile or even in a backpack or an artillery shell. Most nukes from the late 50's onward are multi-stage thermonuclear devices using a fission-fusion process to get massively more yield from a smaller device.
So, yeah, you can easily describe how one would work in principle, but actually making a viable weapon to rival those of other nuclear powers is a whole other thing.
otolith said:
Tango13 said:
Agree with all of this.
With regards the last paragraph Heisenberg, the head of the German atomic research during WW2 basically lied about the feasibility of building an atomic bomb stating it couldn't be done. He maintained this position when captured and questioned by the allies at the end of the war in Europe until he heard of the attacks on Japan. At that point he was overhead explaining to his fellow captive scientists exactly how to build an bomb.
Makes me wonder what 'difficulties' the Iranian scientists are struggling with
The basic principles of the physics are easy to grasp. Engineering and manufacturing the device, obtaining the raw materials and engineering, building, and running the facilities to produce enough fissile material, while under embargo, while your facilities are being sabotaged and your scientists assassinated - less easy. With regards the last paragraph Heisenberg, the head of the German atomic research during WW2 basically lied about the feasibility of building an atomic bomb stating it couldn't be done. He maintained this position when captured and questioned by the allies at the end of the war in Europe until he heard of the attacks on Japan. At that point he was overhead explaining to his fellow captive scientists exactly how to build an bomb.
Makes me wonder what 'difficulties' the Iranian scientists are struggling with
The design of the Hiroshima device was very simple, two big sub-critical lumps of highly enriched uranium smashed together by cordite propellant. Simple, and reliable enough that they didn't even test one before they used it, but very inefficient in bang-for-buck (problematic if you are struggling to make enough fissile material) and an unavoidably large assembly. The Nagasaki device (like the one tested in the Trinity test) was a plutonium based implosion design with a sub-critical sphere of enriched plutonium compressed to critical mass by shaped charges, much more efficient, much more complicated, much harder to design, and still too big to go on the end of a rocket. It took a lot more R&D to get to a device you could fit in a missile or even in a backpack or an artillery shell. Most nukes from the late 50's onward are multi-stage thermonuclear devices using a fission-fusion process to get massively more yield from a smaller device.
So, yeah, you can easily describe how one would work in principle, but actually making a viable weapon to rival those of other nuclear powers is a whole other thing.
That's before you get to stuff like the high speed detonators etc...
otolith said:
The basic principles of the physics are easy to grasp. Engineering and manufacturing the device, obtaining the raw materials and engineering, building, and running the facilities to produce enough fissile material, while under embargo, while your facilities are being sabotaged and your scientists assassinated - less easy.
The design of the Hiroshima device was very simple, two big sub-critical lumps of highly enriched uranium smashed together by cordite propellant. Simple, and reliable enough that they didn't even test one before they used it, but very inefficient in bang-for-buck (problematic if you are struggling to make enough fissile material) and an unavoidably large assembly. The Nagasaki device (like the one tested in the Trinity test) was a plutonium based implosion design with a sub-critical sphere of enriched plutonium compressed to critical mass by shaped charges, much more efficient, much more complicated, much harder to design, and still too big to go on the end of a rocket. It took a lot more R&D to get to a device you could fit in a missile or even in a backpack or an artillery shell. Most nukes from the late 50's onward are multi-stage thermonuclear devices using a fission-fusion process to get massively more yield from a smaller device.
So, yeah, you can easily describe how one would work in principle, but actually making a viable weapon to rival those of other nuclear powers is a whole other thing.
I'm reminded of a project in the 1960s where the US pulled two physics post-docs, without any security clearance or classified knowledge, and tasked them with designing a nuclear weapon.The design of the Hiroshima device was very simple, two big sub-critical lumps of highly enriched uranium smashed together by cordite propellant. Simple, and reliable enough that they didn't even test one before they used it, but very inefficient in bang-for-buck (problematic if you are struggling to make enough fissile material) and an unavoidably large assembly. The Nagasaki device (like the one tested in the Trinity test) was a plutonium based implosion design with a sub-critical sphere of enriched plutonium compressed to critical mass by shaped charges, much more efficient, much more complicated, much harder to design, and still too big to go on the end of a rocket. It took a lot more R&D to get to a device you could fit in a missile or even in a backpack or an artillery shell. Most nukes from the late 50's onward are multi-stage thermonuclear devices using a fission-fusion process to get massively more yield from a smaller device.
So, yeah, you can easily describe how one would work in principle, but actually making a viable weapon to rival those of other nuclear powers is a whole other thing.
They succeeded in 2.5 years, making detailed blueprints that would be functional for an implosion device.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jun/24/usa....
Of course, in the modern world, there's even more public information on the design. The problem is the materials.
The gun type assembly is inefficient, yes, but perhaps the biggest obstacle is that you need weapons grade Uranium. that requires extensive enrichment, which is a huge outlay. Isotopic enrichment is a hard problem, because you're trying to separate U-235 from U-238 - they're identical chemically, so you need to use centrifuges and lots of them, as U-235 is slightly lighter.
On the face of it, Plutonium is harder to acquire. Uranium can be dug out of the ground, but with Plutonium, you actually have to make the element. Modern day alchemy.
However, U-238 subjected to neutron flux will occassionally absorb a neutron, becoming U-239. This then undergoes beta decay (half life 23 minutes) to Np-239, which then has a half life of 2.5 days and decays to Pu-239.
Pu-239 has a half life of 24,000 years, and is the weapons grade plutonium you need for a nuke.
Unlike U-235, this is a different element, which means you can separate it chemically. And these days, you can look up that Hydroxylammonium Nitrate will reduce the Pu without reacting with Uranium, allowing separation.
So, how do you get the neutron flux? Well, there's one really good source. A nuclear reactor. Which can run on low-enriched uranium, or even natural uranium with certain designs like RBMK or Magnox (as used at Calder Hall/Sellafield). All that U-238 then becomes your plutonium, easy peasy.
Well, not quite. Pu-239 readily absorbs another neutron to become Pu-240. This is basically poison for a nuke, as it has a high rate of spontaneous fission. Thus why a gun-type design can't realistically be used with plutonium - the Pu-239 will start a chain reaction before they get into an optimal configuration, resulting in a fizzle. Same problems with implosion, but manageable with purity.
Thus, to breed weapons grade Plutonium, you need to take out the reactor fuel for reprocessing very regularly. Again, a reason both Magnox and RBMK were designed to allow refuelling while the reactor was operating.
Then, engineering the actual bomb, while not trivial, requires fairly straightforward physics with explosive lenses.
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