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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Donald Sensing on the Yield Question |
| 2006-10-10 |
| I don’t mean to belabor the point I have made before, but I was trained in the Army as a nuclear-target analyst. A yield of 550-800 tons (.55-.8 KT) is not too small by any means as an achievable yield. It does not require a lot of fissionable material, either, which is one factor militating against the “hoax” conclusion. If the test was a “proof of concept” test rather than one intended to validate an actual warhead, then it makes sense for the DPRK to use as little nuclear material as possible. They don’t get the stuff very easily. It’s also worth pointing out that an atomic bomb of .6KT or so is no city flattener, but would work quite spectacuarly as a terrorist weapon. If detonated on the ground or from the top of a building, it would also result in serious fallout, increasing the terror effect and the number of deaths. Further, it would contaminate the terrain at and near ground zero for a long time. Cleanup and decontamination would be lengthy and very expensive. Imagine such a weapon being detonated in an American harbor. Using the US Geological Survey figure of 4.2 magnitude body wave of the seismic shock, giving a 1 KT achieved yield, actually buttresses the case that this test was not a fizzle, in my view. For battlefield purposes, say, against the South Korean or US forces on the peninsula, a 1 KT device is more usable than a 20 KT bomb. A 1 KT weapon is smaller, thus easier to conceal, and can be designed to be fired from existing artillery pieces, whether cannons or rockets. A Nagasaki-yield weapon would be of little military utility in fighting against South Korea or American forces. And you much more easily can get from a tested 0.6-1.0 KT proof-of-concept device to a usable terror weapon of the same yield, than from a test of a much larger yielding device. rtwt. |
| Posted by:Phil |
| #16 Chinese and Russian miitary get the weekend off. |
| Posted by: J.D. Lux 2006-10-10 19:57 |
| #15 And then there's the political decision to be made about what to say and what to do. What are the implications of a US say nothing, do nothing scenario? |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-10-10 19:49 |
| #14 I read it could take up to 72 hours for the downwind reports. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2006-10-10 19:15 |
| #13 Assuming they have decent filtering systems, that's true OS. We'll see what transpires. But so many are taking the claim of a successful nuclear reaction at face value that IMO it's worth emphasizing that so far there's no evidence that actually happened. |
| Posted by: lotp 2006-10-10 18:58 |
| #12 Actually, if you know what its all about, you know there will be no proof either way of nuclear activity until enough time passes for outgassing and the winds to blow from the test site over non-NKor for testing. So of course nobody has anything. Wait till later this evening. |
| Posted by: Oldspook 2006-10-10 18:52 |
| #11 Michael Yon's sources say there is no evidence of nuclear activity in the blasts. What the intent was is a separate and unanswered question. But Sensing's reasonable extrapolations don't hold if we really find no traces of radioactive byproducts at all. |
| Posted by: lotp 2006-10-10 18:25 |
| #10 Angie: Rev. Sensing's point was that they do have a motivation to do it if they want to go to war with South Korea. It would make a much better warhead for a MLRS-type system than a chemical explosive warhead. |
| Posted by: Abdominal Snowman 2006-10-10 18:21 |
| #9 I admit to not being an expert on the psychology of crazed dwarf Commie dictators with bad hair, but logic suggests that if he's going to pour large portions of his pathetic GDP into a bomb, he's going to want a Big Bomb. He wants a bomb like the other big kids have, so they won't laugh at him and pick on him and send baggy old Secretaries of State to dance with him, but hot young ones. That's some nifty scribbling there, Angie! You made my morning. Your whole post was fun. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-10-10 12:58 |
| #8 The point is not that you cannot get a yield that low. Of course you can. The point is that a) it's harder to do than building Nagasaki-type weapons, and b) Kim has no clear motivation to do it. It's theoretically possible that NK is building compact, low-yield bombs for the terrorist market. But first they'd have to learn how to build the simpler type. But, OK, let's say that Kim bought AQ Khan's Complete Junior Bombmaker Kit (with real neutron action!), so he has no need to take the baby steps everyone else did. What's his motivation for building a low yield weapon? The terrorist market? That's plausible, but if you're going to do that, you're going to want to keep it dark. You don't go announcing it to the blabbermouth Chinese. I admit to not being an expert on the psychology of crazed dwarf Commie dictators with bad hair, but logic suggests that if he's going to pour large portions of his pathetic GDP into a bomb, he's going to want a Big Bomb. He wants a bomb like the other big kids have, so they won't laugh at him and pick on him and send baggy old Secretaries of State to dance with him, but hot young ones. Alternatively, he may believe it's a matter of national pride. He may believe that the people will think, "By Golly, we may be eating grass, but our scientists can make a really big bang!" He may be right about that, after fifty years of indoctrination. But for these purposes, too, smaller is not better. So I think low yield=dud. |
| Posted by: Angie Schultz 2006-10-10 11:48 |
| #7 AP, that's what happens when you cut and paste when you should already be in bed. Sorry. |
| Posted by: RWV 2006-10-10 09:14 |
| #6 #2 Information on the 'Davy Crockett' can be found at: Goes back a few years, but the long standing joke among Crockett crews was ... "get to the jeep fast as you can," as the kill radius encompasses the launch site in pretty short order. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2006-10-10 07:50 |
| #5 Correct, AP, not that you'd know the difference if you were close....;-) |
| Posted by: Bobby 2006-10-10 06:47 |
| #4 RWV---0.18 kilotons yield equals 180 tons, not 18 tons. |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2006-10-10 01:57 |
| #3 http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/systems/w54.htm The Davy Crockett was developed to give U.S. Army units an effective nuclear capability against potentially larger units of Soviet armored forces. The Davy Crockett was designed in the late 1950's primarily for frontline use by the U.S. infantry in Europe against Soviet troop formations. The weapon system used a spin-stabilized, unguided rocket fired from a recoilless rifle. It's 51-pound nuclear warhead had an explosive yield of 0.18 kilotons (equivalent to 18 tons of TNT, with an added radiation effect). The Davy Crockett's warhead was launched from either a 120-millimeter (M-28) or 155-millimeter (M-29) recoilless rifle. The 155 millimeter version, which became the standard issue, had a maximum range of 2.49 miles and could be fired from either a ground tripod mount or from a specially designed jeep mount. The system was deployed with U.S. Army from 1961 to 1971, and over 2,100 were produced. The heavy version was transported by either an armored personnel carrier or a large truck. The light version was generally carried on and fired from an Army jeep, but could be carried for a short distance and fired by a 3-man team. The W-54 nuclear warhead in a projectile was launched by the Davy Crockett and had a subkiloton yield. The projectile was 30 inches long, 11 inches in diameter, and weighed 76 pounds. The l55 mm launcher had a maximum range of 13,000 feet, and the 120 mm could reach a distance of 6,561 feet. |
| Posted by: RWV 2006-10-10 01:01 |
| #2 Information on the 'Davy Crockett' can be found at: http://www.brookings.edu/FP/PROJECTS/NUCWCOST/DAVYC.HTM |
| Posted by: Michael Sheehan 2006-10-10 00:52 |
| #1 I'd be interested to hear a nuclear bomb engineer's read on how easy/hard it is to build a bomb of this size. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2006-10-10 00:45 |