When did this happen?D Tibbets wrote:I suspect Iran would already have several plutonium bombs if Israel had not bombed their Russian provided nuclear reactor.
Crunching the numbers
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Joseph Chikva
- Posts: 2039
- Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 4:30 am
Possibly Dan is thinking of when the Israelis bombed the Iraqi Osirak nuclear reactor?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera
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Joseph Chikva
- Posts: 2039
- Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 4:30 am
My only one conclusion is that China can build as many nuke warheads as they need with quality making them serious threat for any their potential enemy. If they have not more than existing quantity, so they mean that there is no such need.ladajo wrote:Joe,
This was your homework. You look it up. I already have. I want you to look at it and then think about it, and then tell me what your conclusions are and why.
Joe,
So you didn't do your homework? Ok, choice is yours.
So you didn't do your homework? Ok, choice is yours.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
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Joseph Chikva
- Posts: 2039
- Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 4:30 am
That was not my homework. And statement that China has lower quantity of Nuke warhead because they are not ready for that financially and technologicaly is noncence.ladajo wrote:Joe,
So you didn't do your homework? Ok, choice is yours.
China today is creditor even for USA. So, they have enough financies for their own defence.
Technologically - they made technological aid to Pakistan and may be North Korea and they have their own inventory. May be their warheads are not as advanced as US has. But quite workable.
This is that homework that I've done not today/yesterday. But long ago. These are the very well known facts. I am wondering what do you want to say.
Expensive? They have money. And are much more free in spending of that money.
Technology needed? They have such technology.
Sure, but you are missing the point of the resources required just to get to that point. And what do you do with all that infrastructure you just spent years and big bucks on that provided your weapons grade material?The entity building the weapons is intending to actually use them within a period of months after having fabricated sufficient quantity of devices thus eliminating the need for a command and control infrastructure and significant ongoing maintenance thus reducing both cost and complexity.
Seems like a waste of resrouces if you are going to do all that and then flush it. There are much cheaper and equally effective ways to skin the cat. What is the objective?
And so why not spend a whole lot less time, money, and risk and buy a chemical tanker, drive it in and blow it up? That would do the same thing would it not? Again, what is the objective? And with any objective, one must balance it (end) against ways and means.The weapons are intended to cripple the target's import/export shipping capability...
So again, why go through years of infrastructure development, effort and resource expenditure to maybe produce a couple of 'one-offs' that may yield 5 to 15Ktons? Remember, in your plan, you don't actually know what they will do as you can not test them (program hand-tip). When you could much more easily and cheaply buy and load up a Handysize class Dry Bulk ship with say, 20Ktons of fertilizer, and, well you know the rest...Granted that the yield from such a device would not be as high as from a...
For fun you could even mix in barrels of some noxic highly toxic chemical to spread around when it pops...
Well yes and no. I think you are very much under considering what it actually takes to get enough weapons grade material to make a device. And understand the cruder and lower quality it is, the more material you will need, which in turn drives up cost. Remember weapons grade material does not magically pop out of the ground, nor fall from the sky. Even if you find someone to buy it from, it ain't going to be cheap. And most folks who have it, understand if it is used, it will be geographically traceble via isotope analysis, and this generally makes them VERY reluctant to sell.I just want to make a point that there's a huge, huge difference in cost and complexity between building weapons to actually be used against very specific targets
Really bad example. After over 50 years of trying, they now have what exactly? Maybe material for 10 or less devices, but still have not conclusively proved they can put it together. That speaks more to how hard it is to do.Using North Korea as an example is intended to show what is possible by a financially strapped aggressor nation...
Really??? What makes you think they haven't thought of putting it in a truck and driving it in a tunnel under the border? Of course, they still need to figure out they can actually build one that is worth it. Not seen yet.Also remember the NKs are incurring a huge expense that they don't need to under these assumptions because they are attempting to build a missile delivery system.
India is not poor. Indians are poor. India also spent a ridiculous amount of resources on building an expertise and physical infrastructure for a long time.India, on a per capita basis is certainly destitute even now.
Really? I am glad you believe Wikipedia on this. I am also glad you choose to cite it in a real debate. South Africa most likely did NOT produce weapons. There is little evidence that they might have. There is evidence they were intereted. What matters more is how much effort and resources did they expend on the interest. Care to comment?South Africa actually did produce nuclear weapons and then later dismantled them although at least according to the Wiki article, not for cost reasons.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Afri ... estruction
Again, you are dismissing how hard it is to get to the 'one-off' weapons.Juvenile Weapons...
As for delivery, see above comments on ships.
Again, ends, ways & means. War is a resource fight. Wasting resources is the best way to lose. Ways and Means take resources.
No kidding. I said that. Thanks for repeating. Trinity was done to validate the Fat man design. The "lab work" done for Little Boy included bench tests. Those tests were enough to validate its design.Trinity was a test of the conceptual design of Fat Man not of the actual design of the Fat Man device. Much as lab work was used to verify the conceptual design of Little Boy.
Not at all. And again, you demonstrate a significant lack of understanding the infrastructure created and resources expended to get to those three booms.They were barbarian primitives And yet the bombs still went boom.
Yes, that would be correct. And if you think it through and understood what it really took in resources and infrastructure to get those aforementioned three pops, that is entirely the point. It has not gotten any easier.I believe the answer to how many devices we had after the use of The Gadget (Trinity), Fat Man and Little Boy was zero due to insufficient additional fissile material.
The bulk of the work to make the first bombs was in getting the material. You need to understand this; Getting material is expensive and arduous.It's now an engineering issue rather than requiring any scientific advances. This doesn't make it easy but it certainly is much, much easier now than it was for the first bombs.
Now you are starting to get it. Take the next deductive step.Viable.... The main blocking issue to building a viable device is having sufficiently pure fissile material.
Nope, not at all. My argument has always been at its core about getting to your first weapon. Now if you want to be 'credible', you need to be able to deliver, and more than once.Miniaturization and delivery vehicles. Your mindset seems to be locked there.
I do have a layman's grasp...
Yes, you are. In being a layman, you are, in your approach, dismissing out of hand the realities of getting the material. Which, in the non-layman world is the real issue.
Ends, ways, means. What is your objective? What can you do? What can you afford?I'm very aware of the fire damage that occurred and that incendiary bombs can be as effective if not more so than those bombs used on Japan. Incendiary bombs have the disadvantage of requiring a lot more of them to achieve the same effect.
Again, you cite wikipedia. There was a whole lot more to Millenium Challenge 02 than the axe to grind that Paul Van Kirk showed up with.Think about the lessons to be learned from Lt. General Paul Van Riper's strategies in the Millennium Challenge 2002 war games:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002
Ends, ways, means. You do not yet sufficiently grasp the full wieght of ways and means in this discussion.Take an approach of doing what you can with what you have. Not what you'd like to have or believe you should have.
McGuyver would invent a fantastical solution that in the real world has no practical possibility. But from the Hollywood perspective, it looks great on TV.How would McGuyver do it?
I really do find it funny that you are trying to argue that I do not think out side of the box. If you are going outside of the box, you need to know what the box is that you are in. If you do not, you will never know if you are outside of it or not.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
Ladajo,
I've never said that producing fissile material was easy. In fact I've said "I'll accept that a nuclear weapons program is expensive". And the resources required to produce a weapon are quite substantial. So we're in violent agreement on that part.
You were arguing that there were additional considerable costs to be considered in the form of delivery systems and ongoing maintenance which you are not arguing in your last post. I'm not sure if that means you accept my arguments that they are not needed/can be mitigated or that you are choosing to ignore my arguments.
Regardless, expensive costs and huge resource requirements don't make it impossible even for destitute countries/countries under international sanction.
Who said the facilities were going to be flushed? The could be. Or they could be mothballed or they could continue to be used to produce fissile materials. And yes, that implies expensive ongoing costs for those facilities. Which is not the same as bearing the costs of multiple delivery systems and of maintenance/security for built and dispersed weapons.
Whether this would be a waste of resources on the part of the whoever built them would depend on their own cost/benefit analysis. Given that historically countries have invested huge sums of money in nuclear weapons systems to the point of extreme overkill would suggest that rational cost benefits analysis may hold little sway against fear and national pride.
I specifically stated an objective in my last post:
"The weapons are intended to cripple the target's import/export shipping capability and induce as much collateral damage to the surrounding non-port facilities..."
Which would be a military objective. If you want to discuss political objectives or justifications we could open that can of worms as well.
Agreed, absolutely there are much, much cheaper ways to skin the cat. Since the discussion started based on nukes I've constrained my arguments to nukes.
Chemical and fertilizer tankers are certainly viable alternatives.
Testing of a device may result in a hand tip due to site preparation, seismological monitoring and from atmospheric testing. So the question would be what could be done to mitigate the hand tip? Do the testing in deep bore holes in a mountain under the guise of mining? Atmospherically seal the test site and filter the resulting air to remove radiological particles? Test the minimum yield of a device? Test in an already seismologically area and trigger the weapon during an active earthquake? Or load the test device up in a truck and drive it into somebody else's country to do the test and implicate them.
Their weapon might yield 5 to 15Ktons or 20Ktons or ?Ktons depending on the amount of fissile material that is available and can usefully contribute to the yield. Depending on the skill and knowledge of the weapons designers/builders. Skills that the NKs are definitely lacking in but which are likely to vary considerably from country to country and culture to culture.
One advantage weapons builders of today would have is the ability to model the device on computers. How far that would take them I couldn't say.
I've already made the point that cruder weapons require more fissile material:
"Granted that the yield from such a device would not be as high as from a more sophisticated device and that more fissile material may be required to achieve a suitable yield. The yield only need be sufficient to achieve the destruction of the port facilities. The use of more fissile material would marginally drive up cost and time to produce the additional material."
The "marginally drive up cost" point is as compared to the development costs to produce a more sophisticated design as well how the more sophisticated design might drive up cost and complexity of the built weapon. It would be premised on already having the facilities and knowledge to produce weapons grade material.
Not knowing much/enough about weapons design I'd also have to consider that a more sophisticated design might actually be simpler and less expensive to build.
I've never said that building nuclear weapons would be cheap or that fissile material falls from the sky. In fact I've argued that building them are expensive but that apparently the level of expense is such that it can be born by even destitute countries. This is not to say that any country could build a weapon even if they had sufficient funds.
NK as a bad example.... It's more of: If the NKs can do what they have done as badly screwed up as they are then think of what a competent state actor might accomplish. Again, this is not to say that it is easy only to say that it is possible and to provide some base measurement of what might be required in terms of GNP, industrial base, education... I'm not holding NK out as an example of something to aspire to.
I'm sure the NKs have thought of putting it on a truck. Putting it on a truck doesn't do you much good if your objective is to create a credible deterrent. I believe the NKs goal is to create a minimal deterrent but also to use their bomb and missile projects to validate their regime and provide internal justification for the hardships the regime imposes on the country. The truck driving scenario is for somebody that actually wants to use a bomb.
India is poor. Would you say the NKs are not poor just because they've spent a ridiculous amount of resources on building expertise and physical infrastructure for a long time? Being poor is not necessarily a barrier to having sufficient resources for a nuclear program.
I like Wikipedia
Are they 100% accurate or unbiased. No and lots of evidence that the articles are inaccurate and deliberately manipulated.
I'm happy to investigate/accept information that contradicts what I read in Wikipedia.
They might be somewhat more accurate than say the representations made by the US to the UN by Colin Powell that chicken coops in Iraq were missile facilities and helium balloon facilities were biological weapons facilities.
So wrt South Africa you're willing to accept that they were interested in developing nuclear weapons. You're not stating that they absolutely did not produce nuclear weapons only that there is little evidence that they did. So the point I believe you're trying to make is that there should be evidence of significant costs and resources being committed to actually enriching uranium which would be needed to support any argument that they produced weapons.
"Juvenile Weapons"... No, I'm not dismissing how hard it is to get one-off weapons. I'm dismissing an attitude that says you have to have complex/sophisticated/expensive weapons delivery systems and their associated ongoing maintenance costs in order to have effective weapons. Effective nuclear weapons will still be expensive. An analogy might be the same mindset that comes into play between the merits of an M16/M4 vs an AK47. Both have their places and can be effective.
Agreed with all your points in the paragraph "Ends, ways & means are important. War is a resource fight". The discussion was started regarding nuclear weapons. It wasn't started as a discussion of the best way to wage war.
Trinity as concept. I was partially repeating what you said. What you said was "The Trinity test was a validation of the Fat Man Plutonium Design". Which could be taken to mean Trinity was validating the conceptual design or Trinity was validating the actual as built weapon design. I was restating to eliminate the ambiguity.
Obviously it's more desirable to test not only the weapon design but the full weapon system. However we were in a situation where that was not possible so we made do with what we could do. Just as somebody building a rudimentary bomb today would. Making do with what they can do.
Being barbarian and primitive weapons designers doesn't imply that it was simple or inexpensive. Apparently the costs were on the order of $23-$25billion inflation adjust dollars depending on who you read:
http://www.ctbto.org/nuclear-testing/hi ... n-project/
http://www.brookings.edu/about/projects ... /manhattan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project
Expensive but far less than I was anticipating. The barbarian and primitive refers to the tools they had available to use and the industrial facilities available to them at the time as compared to what is available today.
So it took $25Billion to produce two useable weapons using two different weapons materials from scratch in a crash war time effort. Conditions which don't apply today. Materials science, industrial capabilities, computers and above all the basic knowledge that is widely available about how to make a nuclear weapon make building a weapon today much easier than it was for the original Manhattan project. Additionally you don't have to incur the expense of developing two different weapons designs and two different fuel enrichment techniques. So the level of effort and expense should be substantially below $25Billion? Maybe. Yes it's expensive. Yes it's difficult. But it's still achievable. And the cost per device goes down once the facilities are in place. Keep in mind that I've stated a premise of taking out a target's port facilities which could be tens to a hundred devices. Not a one-off.
You've repeatedly brought up miniaturization, maintenance and delivery vehicles as expenses that you believe I haven't considered. Hence my statement about your mindset.
Agreed that the cost of the first weapon is a significant threshold both technically and financially. That volume production is necessary - in my case to meet to needs to eliminate the target's port facilities. In your case you say "If I want to be credible" which could mean me as the person making an argument here or the putative weapon's producer wanting to be credible. I'll presume as being able to pose a credible threat or a credible deterrent.
So, with respect to myself and the theoretical weapons producer - I've argued for targeting port facilities which implies some time of volume production. I'll state explicitly that volume production is a requirement and not just producing a one-off weapon.
Wrt to posing a credible deterrent I've argued that the weapons are intended to be actually used and so they are not intended to have a deterrent value.
I've not said anything about the realities of of getting the material other than that it is expensive and difficult but not so expensive or difficult that NK wasn't able to do it. It does help significantly if you have your own uranium deposits.
Again I cite Wikipedia I'm not ashamed to. Just because information comes from Wikipedia doesn't mean that it's wrong. It should be considered as at best, a starting point.
I'm not concerned with Paul Van Kirk showing up with an ax to grind. In fact at least as far as that contributes to the success of his team in the war games that can be considered a positive factor. The lessons I'm taking away from that article are that innovative tactics even given inferior resources can produce meaningful results. Asymmetric warfare. I know it's not a new concept.
Ends, ways, means. No, I don't have a sufficient grasp of the full weight of ways and means that might be used in a conflict. But we weren't talking about the full range of options that might be available we were talking about nukes. I am very aware that there is a whole range of options that could be employed in a conflict that are vastly more cost effective than nukes.
Of course McGuyver would invent a fantastical solution that would be geared towards Hollywood's need for a dramatic presentation. That's the fun of it. The seriousness behind that is that exploring fantastical solutions can lead to practical results.
I'm glad you find it funny That's a good thing. In general, following your postings on the message boards I do see you as a person that thinks outside the box.
Where I've developed a sense that you're not thinking outside the box in this discussion is when you've repeatedly raised miniaturization, delivery vehicles, ongoing weapons maintenance and sophistication as requirements for our putative weapons producer and then arguing for them again after I explain how to mitigate or eliminate the requirement/issue. On those points you appear to be bull-headed to me and I appear to be naive to you.
I've never said that producing fissile material was easy. In fact I've said "I'll accept that a nuclear weapons program is expensive". And the resources required to produce a weapon are quite substantial. So we're in violent agreement on that part.
You were arguing that there were additional considerable costs to be considered in the form of delivery systems and ongoing maintenance which you are not arguing in your last post. I'm not sure if that means you accept my arguments that they are not needed/can be mitigated or that you are choosing to ignore my arguments.
Regardless, expensive costs and huge resource requirements don't make it impossible even for destitute countries/countries under international sanction.
Who said the facilities were going to be flushed? The could be. Or they could be mothballed or they could continue to be used to produce fissile materials. And yes, that implies expensive ongoing costs for those facilities. Which is not the same as bearing the costs of multiple delivery systems and of maintenance/security for built and dispersed weapons.
Whether this would be a waste of resources on the part of the whoever built them would depend on their own cost/benefit analysis. Given that historically countries have invested huge sums of money in nuclear weapons systems to the point of extreme overkill would suggest that rational cost benefits analysis may hold little sway against fear and national pride.
I specifically stated an objective in my last post:
"The weapons are intended to cripple the target's import/export shipping capability and induce as much collateral damage to the surrounding non-port facilities..."
Which would be a military objective. If you want to discuss political objectives or justifications we could open that can of worms as well.
Agreed, absolutely there are much, much cheaper ways to skin the cat. Since the discussion started based on nukes I've constrained my arguments to nukes.
Chemical and fertilizer tankers are certainly viable alternatives.
Testing of a device may result in a hand tip due to site preparation, seismological monitoring and from atmospheric testing. So the question would be what could be done to mitigate the hand tip? Do the testing in deep bore holes in a mountain under the guise of mining? Atmospherically seal the test site and filter the resulting air to remove radiological particles? Test the minimum yield of a device? Test in an already seismologically area and trigger the weapon during an active earthquake? Or load the test device up in a truck and drive it into somebody else's country to do the test and implicate them.
Their weapon might yield 5 to 15Ktons or 20Ktons or ?Ktons depending on the amount of fissile material that is available and can usefully contribute to the yield. Depending on the skill and knowledge of the weapons designers/builders. Skills that the NKs are definitely lacking in but which are likely to vary considerably from country to country and culture to culture.
One advantage weapons builders of today would have is the ability to model the device on computers. How far that would take them I couldn't say.
I've already made the point that cruder weapons require more fissile material:
"Granted that the yield from such a device would not be as high as from a more sophisticated device and that more fissile material may be required to achieve a suitable yield. The yield only need be sufficient to achieve the destruction of the port facilities. The use of more fissile material would marginally drive up cost and time to produce the additional material."
The "marginally drive up cost" point is as compared to the development costs to produce a more sophisticated design as well how the more sophisticated design might drive up cost and complexity of the built weapon. It would be premised on already having the facilities and knowledge to produce weapons grade material.
Not knowing much/enough about weapons design I'd also have to consider that a more sophisticated design might actually be simpler and less expensive to build.
I've never said that building nuclear weapons would be cheap or that fissile material falls from the sky. In fact I've argued that building them are expensive but that apparently the level of expense is such that it can be born by even destitute countries. This is not to say that any country could build a weapon even if they had sufficient funds.
NK as a bad example.... It's more of: If the NKs can do what they have done as badly screwed up as they are then think of what a competent state actor might accomplish. Again, this is not to say that it is easy only to say that it is possible and to provide some base measurement of what might be required in terms of GNP, industrial base, education... I'm not holding NK out as an example of something to aspire to.
I'm sure the NKs have thought of putting it on a truck. Putting it on a truck doesn't do you much good if your objective is to create a credible deterrent. I believe the NKs goal is to create a minimal deterrent but also to use their bomb and missile projects to validate their regime and provide internal justification for the hardships the regime imposes on the country. The truck driving scenario is for somebody that actually wants to use a bomb.
India is poor. Would you say the NKs are not poor just because they've spent a ridiculous amount of resources on building expertise and physical infrastructure for a long time? Being poor is not necessarily a barrier to having sufficient resources for a nuclear program.
I like Wikipedia
Are they 100% accurate or unbiased. No and lots of evidence that the articles are inaccurate and deliberately manipulated.I'm happy to investigate/accept information that contradicts what I read in Wikipedia.
They might be somewhat more accurate than say the representations made by the US to the UN by Colin Powell that chicken coops in Iraq were missile facilities and helium balloon facilities were biological weapons facilities.
So wrt South Africa you're willing to accept that they were interested in developing nuclear weapons. You're not stating that they absolutely did not produce nuclear weapons only that there is little evidence that they did. So the point I believe you're trying to make is that there should be evidence of significant costs and resources being committed to actually enriching uranium which would be needed to support any argument that they produced weapons.
"Juvenile Weapons"... No, I'm not dismissing how hard it is to get one-off weapons. I'm dismissing an attitude that says you have to have complex/sophisticated/expensive weapons delivery systems and their associated ongoing maintenance costs in order to have effective weapons. Effective nuclear weapons will still be expensive. An analogy might be the same mindset that comes into play between the merits of an M16/M4 vs an AK47. Both have their places and can be effective.
Agreed with all your points in the paragraph "Ends, ways & means are important. War is a resource fight". The discussion was started regarding nuclear weapons. It wasn't started as a discussion of the best way to wage war.
Trinity as concept. I was partially repeating what you said. What you said was "The Trinity test was a validation of the Fat Man Plutonium Design". Which could be taken to mean Trinity was validating the conceptual design or Trinity was validating the actual as built weapon design. I was restating to eliminate the ambiguity.
Obviously it's more desirable to test not only the weapon design but the full weapon system. However we were in a situation where that was not possible so we made do with what we could do. Just as somebody building a rudimentary bomb today would. Making do with what they can do.
Being barbarian and primitive weapons designers doesn't imply that it was simple or inexpensive. Apparently the costs were on the order of $23-$25billion inflation adjust dollars depending on who you read:
http://www.ctbto.org/nuclear-testing/hi ... n-project/
http://www.brookings.edu/about/projects ... /manhattan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project
Expensive but far less than I was anticipating. The barbarian and primitive refers to the tools they had available to use and the industrial facilities available to them at the time as compared to what is available today.
So it took $25Billion to produce two useable weapons using two different weapons materials from scratch in a crash war time effort. Conditions which don't apply today. Materials science, industrial capabilities, computers and above all the basic knowledge that is widely available about how to make a nuclear weapon make building a weapon today much easier than it was for the original Manhattan project. Additionally you don't have to incur the expense of developing two different weapons designs and two different fuel enrichment techniques. So the level of effort and expense should be substantially below $25Billion? Maybe. Yes it's expensive. Yes it's difficult. But it's still achievable. And the cost per device goes down once the facilities are in place. Keep in mind that I've stated a premise of taking out a target's port facilities which could be tens to a hundred devices. Not a one-off.
You've repeatedly brought up miniaturization, maintenance and delivery vehicles as expenses that you believe I haven't considered. Hence my statement about your mindset.
Agreed that the cost of the first weapon is a significant threshold both technically and financially. That volume production is necessary - in my case to meet to needs to eliminate the target's port facilities. In your case you say "If I want to be credible" which could mean me as the person making an argument here or the putative weapon's producer wanting to be credible. I'll presume as being able to pose a credible threat or a credible deterrent.
So, with respect to myself and the theoretical weapons producer - I've argued for targeting port facilities which implies some time of volume production. I'll state explicitly that volume production is a requirement and not just producing a one-off weapon.
Wrt to posing a credible deterrent I've argued that the weapons are intended to be actually used and so they are not intended to have a deterrent value.
I've not said anything about the realities of of getting the material other than that it is expensive and difficult but not so expensive or difficult that NK wasn't able to do it. It does help significantly if you have your own uranium deposits.
Again I cite Wikipedia
I'm not ashamed to. Just because information comes from Wikipedia doesn't mean that it's wrong. It should be considered as at best, a starting point.I'm not concerned with Paul Van Kirk showing up with an ax to grind. In fact at least as far as that contributes to the success of his team in the war games that can be considered a positive factor. The lessons I'm taking away from that article are that innovative tactics even given inferior resources can produce meaningful results. Asymmetric warfare. I know it's not a new concept.
Ends, ways, means. No, I don't have a sufficient grasp of the full weight of ways and means that might be used in a conflict. But we weren't talking about the full range of options that might be available we were talking about nukes. I am very aware that there is a whole range of options that could be employed in a conflict that are vastly more cost effective than nukes.
Of course McGuyver would invent a fantastical solution that would be geared towards Hollywood's need for a dramatic presentation. That's the fun of it. The seriousness behind that is that exploring fantastical solutions can lead to practical results.
I'm glad you find it funny
That's a good thing. In general, following your postings on the message boards I do see you as a person that thinks outside the box.Where I've developed a sense that you're not thinking outside the box in this discussion is when you've repeatedly raised miniaturization, delivery vehicles, ongoing weapons maintenance and sophistication as requirements for our putative weapons producer and then arguing for them again after I explain how to mitigate or eliminate the requirement/issue. On those points you appear to be bull-headed to me and I appear to be naive to you.
Ok,
lets boil it down to the basics:
Sufficent Material is long, hard, expensive. In the crude device regime, the cost (means) and ability (ways) far exceeds alternative ways to meet some objectives (ends).
One-offs remove 'inventory maintenance' future costs, but do not address the infrastructure costs. You had to build and jump a lot of hoops to get there. Now what do you do with all those hoops and hoop jumpers?
More advanced weapons are exponentially harder and more expensive to build than crude ones.
Getting material is the biggest hurdle (and major portion of cost) to getting a weapon. The cost of keeping weapons is entirely dependant on number and sophistication. This is also a non-linear function.
Inflation adjusted dollars do not account for real cost changes. GDP expenditure is probably a better measurement.
I am fully familiar with the concept of assymetric attacks. Paul Van Kirk's axe was he thought no-one else got it but him. The point he missed was that Millenium Challange 02 was not about assymetric warfare threat. In fact, the modeling and game mechanisms used did not realistically support what he was doing, and he knew this and used it to game the game for his own ends. He tried to re-purpose the game. he was not succesful, and he got a boo-boo lip over it.
My argument boils down at its most basic level to be that there is a reason that only two countries in the world have 'thousands' of nuclear weapons. And also that the other few that have them are 300ish or less. And finally that we are talking in reference to out of 200(ish) countries total on the planet.
The reason is cost. Cost measured in dollars and effort.
For the purposed of this discussion we can treat the topic separately and equally as warhead and delivery systems. The argument is the same for both, with a non-linear qualifier when you are ready to merge the two together for the integrated package: advanced weapon with advanced delivery.
lets boil it down to the basics:
Sufficent Material is long, hard, expensive. In the crude device regime, the cost (means) and ability (ways) far exceeds alternative ways to meet some objectives (ends).
One-offs remove 'inventory maintenance' future costs, but do not address the infrastructure costs. You had to build and jump a lot of hoops to get there. Now what do you do with all those hoops and hoop jumpers?
More advanced weapons are exponentially harder and more expensive to build than crude ones.
Getting material is the biggest hurdle (and major portion of cost) to getting a weapon. The cost of keeping weapons is entirely dependant on number and sophistication. This is also a non-linear function.
Inflation adjusted dollars do not account for real cost changes. GDP expenditure is probably a better measurement.
I am fully familiar with the concept of assymetric attacks. Paul Van Kirk's axe was he thought no-one else got it but him. The point he missed was that Millenium Challange 02 was not about assymetric warfare threat. In fact, the modeling and game mechanisms used did not realistically support what he was doing, and he knew this and used it to game the game for his own ends. He tried to re-purpose the game. he was not succesful, and he got a boo-boo lip over it.
My argument boils down at its most basic level to be that there is a reason that only two countries in the world have 'thousands' of nuclear weapons. And also that the other few that have them are 300ish or less. And finally that we are talking in reference to out of 200(ish) countries total on the planet.
The reason is cost. Cost measured in dollars and effort.
For the purposed of this discussion we can treat the topic separately and equally as warhead and delivery systems. The argument is the same for both, with a non-linear qualifier when you are ready to merge the two together for the integrated package: advanced weapon with advanced delivery.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
Yup, and it was French, not Russian.Netmaker wrote:Possibly Dan is thinking of when the Israelis bombed the Iraqi Osirak nuclear reactor?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera
Adn while on the topic, let us not forget the cargo ship BBC China and its impact on Qaddafi's nuclear weapons program.
Once again demonstrating that nuclear weapons do not grow on trees.
Once again demonstrating that nuclear weapons do not grow on trees.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
Many years ago I read this book:
The Curve of Binding Energy: A Journey into the Awesome and Alarming World of Theodore B. Taylor
http://www.amazon.com/Curve-Binding-Ene ... 0374515980
The entire purpose of the book was showing how easy it would be to make a nuclear weapon and it includes directions down to the chemical steps for converting the chemical forms fissile materials are stored in to extract the metal and how to build a 'gun' type device.
The Curve of Binding Energy: A Journey into the Awesome and Alarming World of Theodore B. Taylor
http://www.amazon.com/Curve-Binding-Ene ... 0374515980
The entire purpose of the book was showing how easy it would be to make a nuclear weapon and it includes directions down to the chemical steps for converting the chemical forms fissile materials are stored in to extract the metal and how to build a 'gun' type device.
At one point in the book the author describes being taken by Taylor on public roads to stand next to a rickety barbed wire fence feet away from an unguarded building full of PU239 oxide birdcages.
The main thrust of the book was we need to guard such stuff much better because it would be so easy to use. Hopefully, the stuff is much better secured now... (read book in the 70's)
How many tons of highly enriched fissionables went 'missing' after the fall of the soviet union again?
The main thrust of the book was we need to guard such stuff much better because it would be so easy to use. Hopefully, the stuff is much better secured now... (read book in the 70's)
How many tons of highly enriched fissionables went 'missing' after the fall of the soviet union again?
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kunkmiester
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10,000 warheads are there to support a much, much lower delivery rate. I've seen this hashed over before--A number of missiles will be down for maintenance when the call comes, B number of missiles won't fire, or fail before they get on their final trajectory, C warheads will fail to detonate, and D number of warheads are needed to replace warheads removed from missiles for maintenance to keep the missile up, etc. etc. etc. Quick google didn't find much, so I don't know how easy proper rates would be to find, but even a 1% rate would be trouble.
For every warhead you know won't blow up on target, you have to have another you know will, and this leads to substantial inventories for missiles and warheads. Even more if you want some left over after an exchange. Add to that the kind of security you want for the whole supply chain and stuff, and the costs get crazy.
If we'd continued some sort of proper real nuclear testing and upgrades, we'd be looking at many fewer warheads since their reliability would be much higher, needing less maintenance. This is the point of using the lasers, and hopefully they'd figured how well NIF tests simulate actual bombs.
For every warhead you know won't blow up on target, you have to have another you know will, and this leads to substantial inventories for missiles and warheads. Even more if you want some left over after an exchange. Add to that the kind of security you want for the whole supply chain and stuff, and the costs get crazy.
If we'd continued some sort of proper real nuclear testing and upgrades, we'd be looking at many fewer warheads since their reliability would be much higher, needing less maintenance. This is the point of using the lasers, and hopefully they'd figured how well NIF tests simulate actual bombs.
Evil is evil, no matter how small