Talk:Nuclear weapon/Archive 4

wheres the pictures
are their any tasty pictures of the kids who < > enjoyed the after math of the nuclear recoil? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.202.73.120 (talk) 01:40, 24 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Sure. See and . Real hee-larious stuff. --Fastfission (talk) 16:21, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

POV Title of page
i consider that the title of this page is a euphemism designed to avoid the word "BOMB. it should be changed to "atomic (OR) nuclear bomb. i may therefore place a neutrality check tag hereBenny the wayfarer (talk) 20:07, 14 March 2008 (UTC)


 * There are other types of nuclear weapon besides bombs. Bombs are dropped from planes.  In addition there are ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and other types of missiles, and there have been weapons such as artillery rockets and torpedoes.  If any  think, calling nuclear weapons "the bomb" is a euphemism. NPguy (talk) 01:40, 15 March 2008 (UTC)


 * "Atomic bomb" means it is a fission weapon. This page is about all nuclear weapons. "Nuclear weapon" is not a euphemism in the slightest — as NPguy points out, many nuclear weapons are not "bombs" in the literal sense. In any case, "nuclear weapon" is the most common term used today for armaments which use nuclear reactions for their explosive power. Rather than worrying about the article title in such a case, read the article itself. You'll see it covers them pretty even-handedly. --Fastfission (talk) 01:56, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Adding to intro
I think we need to resist adding lengthy content to the intro. The intro is meant to be a concise summary and point directions to other pages. It is not a place for a lengthy discussion of Iraq's nuclear history. It's not even a place for a more-than-one-sentence discussion of the current controversy regarding Iran—just a link to the relevant page and a concise sentence ("US says this, Iran says that, it's a current issue") is enough. We can't, and shouldn't, cover every instance of proliferation worries in the intro. There's a whole article on nuclear proliferation—we mention the ones that are in the headlines (since people might be coming to this article to learn about them), and link to the relevant sub-articles, and that's it... it starts looking very wooly and unprofessional when there are two paragraphs on Iraq in the intro and none specifically on any of the countries that actually HAVE developed nuclear weapons! --Fastfission (talk) 14:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I think we could easily dispense with the paragraphs on Iran, Iraq and Libya, and replace them with a cross-link to the article List of states with nuclear weapons. NPguy (talk) 01:32, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with that cross-link to another section. Dispensing of paragraphs with Iraq, Libya, and Iran will be simple if we do this. --DavidD4scnrt (talk) 05:24, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Inline Citations
The entire article needs more citations, but in particular this sentence came to my attention:

"Iran currently stands accused by the United States of intending to develop nuclear weapons capabilities, though its government states that its acknowledged nuclear activities, such as uranium enrichment, are for non-weapons purposes."

Currently stands accused how? Any quotes? Is the US the only country making such an accusation? Iran's statements would also have to be sourced. This doesn't need to be in the opening anyway. --64.149.35.114 (talk) 17:12, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Israel entry
If there is something that I'm very sorry about it is the fact that the Jews allmost choosed to share their amazing abilities with non Jews of European heritage instead of keeping the knowledge of nuclear power (which is almost 100% Jewish) ,that could not be made withoput them, to themselves only-making little israel to the only world super power. Ironically, it was because that almost 2000 years as hunted minority in Europe dropped them off correct thinking in terms of patriotism.


 * It's not true that knowledge of nuclear power was "almost 100% Jewish". Yes, there were many prominent Jewish scientists involved. But it was hardly restricted to them at any point, much less post-WWII. The trick to nuclear technology is not in "amazing abilities"—it's about investment of resources. --140.247.240.177 (talk) 20:38, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Urk, semi-protected
Since I do actually have a wikipedia account, I have no trouble logging in to make an edit. Still, I'd rather not have to? Is there any current vandalism spree going on? --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:48, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

It was a heavy target of vandalism until March, when it was semi-protected. NPguy (talk) 02:42, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

The Idiot's Loop
I'm thinking about starting an article called 'The Idiot's Loop', which a manoeuvre used by an aircraft to avoid the blast from a nuclear bomb. However, I need some reinforcements and citations which are irritatingly hard to obtain on the internet. Please help! Racooon (talk) 10:57, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Neutrality questioned
It looks like somebody went through the page with a few axes to grind, so I nominated it for neutrality review. These are minor edits, but large enough to make me not want to do them myself. Noohgodno (talk) 04:11, 10 August 2008 (UTC)


 * It looks not so bad to me. --Fastfission (talk) 20:49, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Media
I removed the one little "media" clip (Image:Enewetak_atomic_detonations.ogg). For one thing, all by itself I always thought it looked odd. And out of all the many clips of nuclear tests, it hardly seems worth showcasing. It's also not a very great clip — colors are washed out, the sound is lousy. It also gives the false impression that that's the only "media" Wikipedia has for this article. In fact there is a very rich collection devoted to nuclear things at Commons. So I took it out. --Fastfission (talk) 20:49, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Disambiguation
A well known song called "Atom Bomb" that was once featured on the popular House MD TV series should be put in. At least a disambiguation link on the top page should be made visible. The artists who created the song are called Fluke and I should at think that whoever kept on reverting my disambiguation edit please stop as this is unencyclopaedic and wrong. I tried to find the song but didn't manage - a long while ago - to locate it until I had to go to Google and I was surprised that it actually existed. Should we have the disambiguation link at the top? I think so. Or at least in the see also section. Lord of Moria  Talk   Contribs  19:04, 14 October 2008 (UTC)


 * It seems a little ridiculous to have a link to some song (which I had never heard of, admittedly) at the top of a major page about a major thing. Personally I'd shuffle it to somewhere else in the article or to the nuclear weapons in popular culture page. The appearance of it trivializes the content of the page ("Did you mean Holocaust, the Musical?") in my opinion, and we'd be better off with a formal disambig page or putting it somewhere else. My two cents. --Fastfission (talk) 23:02, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

edited away not constructive???
well please explain why this new development in nuclear tactics was not discussed openly here on wikipedia? i mean we have several to relay here....please all who are watching we are releasing weapons technology such as on the nuclear weapons page... this is wikipedia, it is an international orgamization or an american one? who is in control of it? if it is international, then i can clearly relay such information openly if i want cant i... if it is merely an american mouthpiece and tool to manipulate scoring influence and position.... well then i cant now can i.... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.218.39.160 (talk) 23:35, 8 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Your edit asserts, in a somewhat rambling manner, than in 2007 nuclear weapons technology "expanded dramatically". This is not true. Nothing in your edit is based in anything other than your own speculation about what Russia "could do" and what the Americans would do in response, from what I can see. That is what is meant by "non-constructive". --Fastfission (talk) 03:00, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

When did the general public find out about nuclear weapons?
Wouldn't this be worht mentioning? I personally do not know, but it sure would be worth mentioning! --Scouto2 (talk) 02:27, 19 November 2008 (UTC)


 * With the publicity of the bombing of Hiroshima. They got more information from the Smyth Report, a few days after Nagasaki. --Fastfission (talk) 22:42, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Semi-protection
So I un-semiprotected this article in August as an experiment and since then it has been vandalized about 10 times a day by anonymous IPs. The amount of positive good done by anonymous IPs and newly-registered accounts to the article during that time seems to be fairly minimal if anything (but really, who could tell, since the history has become pages and pages of vandalisms and reverts?). Anyway, I don't think this is healthy for the article content—when something is so frequently vandalized, it becomes harder to add legitimate content and not have it reverted accidentally, and it becomes much harder to track the additions of legitimate content and revert to previous versions if need be. So I'm semi-protecting it. It's a pretty low price to pay, IMO, given the high level of visibility of this articl. Other admins should feel free to overturn this if they disagree. --Fastfission (talk) 22:47, 6 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree with the above decision. --mav (talk)

Fourth generation weapon content discussion
See the discussion on Talk:Nuclear weapon design Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 10:01, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

non-neutral POV on Israel/Iraq
I don't think the section relating to the Israel attack on Iraq's nuclear reactor in 1981 is written without bias:

"in an attempt to halt Iraq's previous nuclear arms ambitions."

looking at the article relating to the incident, the attack was based on an assumed intention on the part of Iraq, and there was no, and still is no indication of any planned intention for Iraq to seek nuclear arms using this reactor, or at all during this time period.

I didn't want to just change the article without discussion.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Fireflies (talk • contribs) 00:00, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Old talk
The first line of this article is clearly not a factual statement and is highly political in nature. Please change it from "A nuclear weapon is the desired weapon of choice for the american in there pursuit to destroy Iran, they want to use this explosive device as it derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission or a combination of fission and fusion." To "A nuclear weapon is a weapon that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission or a combination of fission and fusion."
 * Pictogram voting wait.svg Already done —Ms2ger (talk) 18:50, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Other delivery systems
I think that the text "for anti-submarine warfare" should be removed as nuclear torpedos for anti-shipping also exists. See "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_65"192.71.219.1 (talk) 07:15, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

In the history of warfare, only two nuclear weapons have
I don't like the word "only" in that contex. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.14.198.2 (talk) 15:40, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism.
The article has been vandalised, but I can't quite figure out what's happening. The first line reads "Aaron Lee Martin Created the atomic bomb through microtechnology of achabah simpson" in my browser, but I can't see it in the edit page, and I can't figure out which edit it was in the history.

ManicParroT (talk) 08:01, 12 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Vandalism to Template:nuclear weapons. On it... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 10:08, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Additions
Apparently no fail safe can prevent a nuclear bomb going off at any moment in theory. We should add this.

Premierstate (talk) 00:27, 31 December 2009 (UTC)


 * You would need a reliable source for this. Euryalus (talk) 02:52, 31 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes, please. In theory, nothing prevents all the steel in a major bridge from developing sudden cracks at the same time, and it collapsing overnight.  In practice, it's so unlikely as to be statistically negligible.
 * I study nuclear weapons pretty extensively, and safety aspects are one of the things that worries me. But I'm not sure that the comment above accurately reflects any reliably sourced research or educated commentary on the topic.  The US spent about 35 years developing increasingly complicated safety mechanisms into the current set of weapons we use, and other nations have been following along that path.  Even critics such as Scott Sagan, whose book on nuclear safety is one of the major reads in the field, acknowledge that the safety systems are extensive and capable.  That they could fail, and with enough time and normal human accident rates may well fail one day, is a legitimate concern.  But it's a much more complicated and nuanced argument than the rather simplistic opinion above.  Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:29, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

We should erase the section that tells of the inner workings of the bomb
I really don't think is a good idea to tell people how a nuclear bomb works, this could seriously aid them if they were trying to build a bomb. This is especially unwise as there could be Al Qaeda members living in New York City right now trying to assemble a nuclear weapon. You could argue that there is not enough detailed information in there to actually complete a bomb, but certainly, the information in there encourages people, and it reaffirms what ever work they may have done already. I believe in the non-proliferation of nuclear arms. I believe the fact you've put information in there is highly stupid and irresponsible. Do you really think that Al Qaeda does not know how to use Wikipedia? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.5.224.226 (talk) 00:18, 2 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Don't worry, there's so much info out there that it will take national resources to sort it out. No one can tell what is the right or wrong path. Moreover, the main barrier to making nuclear explosives is getting the fissile materials to do the job, and they are well safeguarded.  Never say never, but those are the two reasons why it hasn't happened yet.  Don't believe everything you read, even in Wikipedia. waterfox1 20:58, 2 February 2010 (UTC)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Waterfox1 (talk • contribs)

i agree with not worrying about it, if there are state sponsored efforts like N. Korea, that still cant detonate one right, its probably not the type of bomb some al qaeda member would be able to put together in some apartment or what not. As well, that is correct about the fuel, most people speculate that N. Koreas problems are because they did enrich the fuel very well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.232.72.93 (talk) 22:58, 30 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The key issue here is whether Wikipedia reveals information which is more specific or widespread than other sources do, and therefore presents some sort of additional risk.
 * In this case - as an expert in the field - I can say in no uncertain terms that Wikipedia does not present any additional risk. We could go into ten times more detail than we do now - a level which would be completely inappropriate for an encyclopedia, in my opinion - and still be only a fraction of what other sites have available.
 * The Nuclear Weapon FAQ at http://www.nuclearweaponarchive.org has the math equations, physics, engineering, and so forth to form a basic course in nuclear weapon design. It is in fact somewhat of a proliferation risk.  But, even it has been confirmed to be operating within the envelope of disclosures made elsewhere, in other sources.  It's a convenient single reference point, but not leaking any new information to anyone.
 * There is a book with accurately dimensioned diagrams of both the Fat Man and Little Boy nuclear bombs, both of the first 2 models used. Neither is quite detailed enough to build one off of, but any good mechanical engineer or mechanically oriented physicist could complete the details and draw up plans from there, though you'd need a test program to validate the design.
 * I know people worry about this stuff, but it's just not worth worrying about. Wikipedia isn't the risk point here.  Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:46, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks to the experts who commented. I think it's obvious to them but maybe not to some laymen that you can't just cobble together a nuclear bomb in your apartment.  The work you have to do requires very specific equipment and materials, which at least seem to be controlled (in that there are trade laws regarding them and some methods of determining when people are trying to get them), even in the case of things like metal tubes, apparently.  so even if you put the stuff together in such a small space (unlikely ... I am willing to bet the power requirements alone would require special circuits), you'd still need the materials and equipment, and in the end really you need experts like nuclear physicists, engineers of other kinds, machinists, electricians, etc.  Lack of experts and access to materials used to build the equipment you need to *build* the bombs or even enrich the fissile materials, etc has actually deterred national governments from getting the bomb.  For individuals it must be harder.  "Dirty bombs" are easier to make, but what I have read about them suggests they are actually pretty ineffective or much less so than people tend to think (for instance, getting radioactive compounds on you or near you is not advised, but they can be washed off and in many cases might increase risk of cancer or something with prolonged exposure, but since some hazmat team is going to clean it up and people will not be sitting in the stuff for weeks, it's not so bad as you might think.
 * Regardless of all this, the policy that trumps all is that Wikipedia is not censored. Bomb and reactor plans have met challenges like this time and again, and the policy was upheld in the end.  So even if the information *was* dangerous, we couldn't remove it just because it is, because we shouldn't.
 * I also agree that getting rid of all nuclear weapons is a worthy goal, but this is not how to do it. Remember the lesson of Dr. Zaius.  Trying to get people to forget how to make weapons is a losing battle.  We have to know about, understand, and respect them to get any lasting progress.  Besides, Information wants to be free.  It will get out somehow.  As for now, it's been shown that Al Qaeda doesn't know the difference between real and fake plans, at least in the case of the "nuclear plans from the internet" that were printed, copied, and taken all the way to Afghanistan, where they were found and met with exclamations of horror from the news media.  Except that they were fake plans.  They were even MARKED as fake plans, because they came from the Journal of Irreproducible Results.  It is likely that an expert in the field could distinguish between real and fake plans, but they could also probably make their own and would be familiar with some extant plans.  So it's really an unlikely path that these kinds of plans are enough to get any traction on developing these weapons, and even if they could, you'd still need the experts (which obviate the plans) and materials, both of which are, as I said, very expensive and hard to get, even harder to get without some level of scrutiny (you do realize that certain chemicals and equipment are actively tracked, and someone who doesn't seem like they are a legitimate user (like, oh, the military or a nuclear power company) is probably going to get a visit from law enforcement whether they get the stuff or not (with some real intent toward NOT).   Rifter0x0000 (talk) 06:51, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

When did we reach explosive potential to upset gravitational balance
A point of significant historical interest to include in the article, would be to note when the world reached the knowledge-level sufficient to design a bomb big enough that to explode it would blow off a chunk of earth sufficient to destroy the gravitational balance of our solar system. Or, my being ignorant, haven't we reached that point of knowledge yet? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.215.157.155 (talk) 14:58, 2 January 2008 (UTC)


 * We are very, very far from affecting the gravitational balance of our solar system. The largest nuclear weapon ever tested released only 0.00005% of the energy of the impact which caused the Chicxulub Crater.  That impact may have caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, but did not affect our orbit. TomTheHand (talk) 15:13, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't think we will ever get to that point, because no one would invest the researches that are supposed to end with the ultimate dooms day device. Or would they? --77.105.24.182 (talk) 06:57, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

The impact that created Chicxulub Crater, was just that, ie., an impact, i.e. it added a tiny bit of mass to the earth, it didn't vaporize matter, like the atomic bombs do. The original question wasn't meant to refer to the matter of an explosion kicking the earth out of its orbit, it was meant to refer to the question of vaporizing matter in the manner of putting the earth into an ever-increasing deteriorating orbit, if it is not already in one, which is probably not a safe assumption.69.215.128.107 (talk) 23:50, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
 * It seems to me, to be more likely for an impact to throw dirt out of the atmosphere then a comparatively much weaker nuclear explosion to displace that much matter. You mentioned vaporisation, the gasses would still be in the earth's atmosphere unless ejected with enough force, and therefore, I assume still an equal contributor to our gravitational field.--Senor Freebie (talk) 03:10, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Iran entry
If we are to have an Iran entry on this page, it should be brief. There is no reason to recapitulate history by quoting outdated statements. Furthermore, ElBaradei's statement that he saw "no evidence" of a nuclear weapons program has always been problematic. First, it overlooks the very existence of a clandestine enrichment program as prima facie evidence of a weapons purpose. ElBaradei explained that he used "evidence" synonymously with "proof," which is not how most people use the term. Second it has changed the subject from where the NPT safeguards system says it ought to be - on detecting diversion (and other violations) to weapons or for purposes unknown - to attempting to determine the purpose of the violation. Third, it is now clearly outdated given the extensive evidence of weapons-related activities and military links in Iran's nuclear program. So I'm again deleting the reference. NPguy (talk) 21:03, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Something that is usually left out in western discussions of Iran is the fact that the enrichment they want to do is actually essential to peaceful applications like providing nuclear power. The enrichment make the reactor more efficient, basically, and countries like the US would not think of having a reactor that did not used enriched fuel.  I agree they should not have a nuclear weapon if such things can be prevented (although the best way to do that is put more good-faith effort into anti-proliferation ... saying you are against proliferation while building up stockpiles for yourself and your allies doesn't wash with a lot of people).  However, they should be allowed, nay ENCOURAGED, to use nuclear power.  Do we really want another country, especially one we think unstable, to be totally reliant on fossil fuels that are at the very least hotly contested for under extreme pressure of demand, and very probably will run out eventually, and sooner rather than later will at the very least be insufficient to meet energy demands?  That's a recipe for violence.  In any case, the fact there is an enrichment program in Iran is not evidence of nuclear weapons, prima facie or otherwise.  Rifter0x0000 (talk) 07:06, 23 September 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:LEAD aims for a brief and balanced article introduction. While I agree that this section should be short, multiple views also need to be presented. All of your personal opinions and insights aside, the quote is attributed and given a date so the reader is able to decide for themselves (especially as the new "extensive evidence of weapons-related activities and military links in Iran's nuclear program" is also given).
 * Wikipedia works on consensus, so it would be much better to either propose another factoid or to try to come up with another way to structure the paragraph.--Nosfartu (talk) 22:20, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

For example, "In 2005, Iran was found to have violated its NPT safeguards agreement through a formerly concealed enrichment program.[1] Iran resolved many of these verification issues specified in an August 2007 workplan;[2] however, in May 2008 the IAEA reported on information it had received on 'alleged studies' indicating military aspects of Iran's nuclear program.[3] Iran states it will address the alleged studies and maintains that the allegations are baseless.[3]" --Nosfartu (talk) 22:49, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

This is all stupid and pointless. I'm tired of "negotiating" descriptions of Iran's nuclear program. Why does it have to be repeated over and over? Better to simply delete the reference to Iran and replace it with a reference to the article List of states with nuclear weapons. NPguy (talk) 02:46, 6 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree. Put in a one-sentence, "Hey the Iran thing is a hot issue LOOK AT THIS OTHER ARTICLE FOR DETAILS" and be done with it. This article is NOT the place to go into any detail over it—it should just shuffle the reader off to the more appropriate and detailed articles. Any attempt to summarize the "current state of things" of something which month by month gets a different spin and analysis is going to fail. Just agree to something bland! How about: "The question about whether Iran is attempting to develop nuclear weapons is currently an open debate, see (relevant article) for details." --98.217.8.46 (talk) 23:57, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Bioweapons as nuclear replacement
Perhaps it can be described that strategic long-range missiles (eg low cost ones as those of Bruce Simpson) with bioweapons (eg Botulism, Anthrax, Lassa fever, cheap neurotoxins (which is concentrated) extracted from eg Botulism bacteria, ...) aimed at some 150m? just above large cities can serve as a replacement for nuclear weapons. Reason to include this (probably very insensitive remark for the peace-community) would be in order to presevere life (silly enough). This as it allows the nuclear material from the nuclear weapons to be reused for nuclear energy facilities. This would make a jump possible to lower co² emissions of energy production (if more nuclear plants are built). The resulting lower amount of environmental disasters will decrease mortility (as weapons of mass destruction are never used anyhow, but environmental disasters do occur). Extracted neurotoxins instead of bacteria may decrease cost further as they may require less maintenance (and are more humane than true bacteria aswell as nuclear weapons; which kill or may kill slowly). It would also decrease the costs of maintaining a (small/reduced) arsenal of WMD-weapons. Also, bioweapons are non-hazardoes to the planet; a nuclear war would eradicate the planet due to dust and its resulting solar shielding —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.246.185.80 (talk) 14:17, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Bioweapons do not work, you cannot stop them, you cannot limit their effects to "enemy people" only, they backfire and also kill the attackers. No country is interested in bioweapons any more, only terrorists, but they do not make ICBMs. 87.97.48.253 (talk) 21:52, 7 September 2009 (UTC)
 * See No Original Research. We don't publish personal analyses here. --Fastfission (talk) 17:02, 8 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I think you understood the suggestion wrong; the text clearly doesn't describe using the bioweapons at all; as too nuclear weapons are not used; both weapons are simply political toys that cost allot of money, pose a great safety risk, and waste allot of emissionless fuel. The bioweapons + ICBM's would simply reduce these negative effects. It is very doubtful that any nuclear weapon will still be used in the future, and thus this idea is a very good one. Offcourse eliminating all nuclear weapons, and replacing them with "nothing" (or conventional weapons) is even better, but this is probably not viable as civil government leaders need a weapon they could "potentially" (but not really) use, in case a nuclear weapon-country attacks with its nuclear arsenal (and makes the planet unlivable in the process).

Regarding the sources, I'm sure there must be texts that describe similar ideas, it's only a matter of searching for them. They can then be added to the article here as sources. 91.182.82.133 (talk) 07:19, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

THE POTENTIAL FOR DESIGN IMPROVEMENTS TO NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND MILITARY IMPLEMENTATION OF THEM
There are some generally unexplored ideas which I have for enhancing the destructive utility of a variety of nuclear weapons. I am sure that, if well-investigated, these points would not be spurious, but quite militarily useful. Some of these points require the use of secondary military technologies whose use is so well-timed as to correspond to the co-ordination of several fast moving projectiles to within a high degree of accuracy – which can be difficult to implement on the field (though, in comparison to the technological difficulty of creating even a basic nuclear warhead, the aforementioned difficulties are of little consequence). 1) Nuclear weapons design enhancement.

a) Metal annealing with neutronic reflector.

The primary benefit of this UNVERFIED process is that it can enable more warheads to be created from smaller amounts of starting material. It is as of yet unexplored as to whether the annealing of uranium and plutonium with neutron reflectors can be implemented in such a way as to change the neutronic cross section of the resultant alloyed material in such a way as to decrease the effective mass of material required for criticality to be reached within a nuclear warhead (in particular, this would mean that the amount of plutonium required for criticality would be decreased, thus decreasing the economic burden associated with the creation of such a warhead). Metallurgically, annealing neutronic reflector with uranium or plutonium enables a change in the neutronic cross section of emission for the resultant alloy to such a degree as to reduce the critical mass of the bomb. In particular, note that the presence of a reflector is NOT to have the same effect as impurities (as occurs when dealing within plutonium based nuclear weapons, in which some isotope impurities are neutron emission – enabling a pre-detonation of such implosion type bombs to occur upon detonation of the surrounding high explosive lenses, before criticality [of density] is reached; thus yielding a 'nuclear fizzle' rather than a true nuclear explosion). A further observation is that the nanoscopic annealing process (which surrounds very fine uranium crystals with a very thin layer of neutron reflector before attempting to form crystals from the resultant material), may (will) reduce the average neutron energy of emitted neutrons from the material. This is unimportant as, when modelling the nuclear explosion under conditions of criticality, we are primarily interested in an integral measure of neutron kinetic energy and momentum distributions (very high energy neutrons DO pass through uranium atoms, but they are NOT likely to induce a further neutron-progeny creating fission within such uranium atoms as, informally, they pass through the uranium atoms too quickly to induce fission – a higher number of lower energy neutrons emitted within the annealed material would be more likely to result in a larger proportion of progeny-creating fissions – which is where the integral measure comes in, the “mean free path” that a neutron will have to travel before inducing a fission, something which is infinite for neutrons which have TOO lower an energy-momentum distribution). A complexity in implementing this design alteration (in either the gun type or implosion type bomb) is that there is a requirement for modelling the behaviour (thermal, mechanical, radiological and otherwise) of the annealed composite under compression (which may be more complex than as is inevitably required when dealing with conventional nuclear designs). Clearly, the above does not mention the potential benefits of annealing uranium with plutonium alone, or in combination with the above.

b) Precise alternation of nuclear core temperature via the use of super-cooled fluid. The addition of liquid helium within an implosion type bomb (where the materials are arranged in a certain geometric configuration which enables the supercooled fluid to be aerated out of them upon compression), alters the criticality of the nuclear weapon in a way which enables a reduction of the amount of nuclear mass needed in order to successfully induce criticality (and hence detonation). Current nuclear implosion designs already alter the density of the internal core in such a way as to ensure that the shock wave of the implosion alters the density of the whole of the core in the optimal way to reach criticality with the smallest amount of starting material – thus it may be possible that the use of supercooled material can interfere in these fine tuned configurations (though whether the microscopic crystal structure of the metals involved in also varied in as mindful a way is not entirely clear – though this too would have potential benefits for the shock wave propagation within the core as well as the amount of mass required for criticality). Note that the an additional benefit of the use of supercooled fluid is that AFTER criticality is reached, there is a slight time delay between the initiation of criticality and the venting of the supercooled fluids, which act to reduce temperature for the very initial stages of criticality – this, increases the effective yield of the weapon ON TOP OF reducing the mass required for criticality.

2) More effective battlefield usage of nuclear weapons :

Creation of a localised inversion layer above a nuclear detonation (with precise timing) reflects more radiation toward the ground (and, possibly, some form of atmospheric lensing to occur with the reflected energy to increase the thermal effects of nuclear detonation). This requires the use of an air burst weapon which exists for only the short time period during which the nuclear weapon radiates energy.

3) External salting devices of materials which would not salt unless exposed to high radiation levels – most current salting techniques rely upon devices in, or in close proximity around the weapon.

There are many more ideas of potentially useful applicability. It should be noted that the annealing idea can be used to make more efficient use of limited fuels within a civilian power setting, or a nuclear battery setting.

ConcernedScientist (talk) 12:44, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Although I appreciate your enthusiastic description of your ideas - this is not the appropriate place for this. This talk page is for discussion of the article, not the subject itself.  There are many blogs and forums which would be an appropriate place to get feedback on your ideas. Thanks!    PhySusie (talk) 13:46, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I disagree. Iranian weapon design (on the blackboard at ref )shows a sphere of UD3 surrounding a 235U core. The documentary "Mission for Mussolini" verifies that Nazi Germany set off a nuclear weapon of 'low enriched Uranium alloyed with light elements'. See neutron source for the chemistry. Deuterium, Lithium, Beryllium, even Boron not only multiply the effective number of fission neutrons (therefore requiring lesser enrichment) but also generate fast neutrons that can split U. Shjacks45 (talk) 21:01, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Burma/Myanmar
I have read recently about Burma seeking nuclear reactors from Russia for "peaceful purposes" and also it is alleged that Burma has sought nuclear and missile designs from North Korea. WHy do we not do a Burma section —Preceding unsigned comment added by Manoflands (talk • contribs) 01:18, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * No coverage in mainstream intelligence, geopolitical, or nonproliferation media and analysis. There are a few blog hits about rumors of nuclear program(s) in Burma, but no reliable data or informed speculation.
 * If the rumors were from people who study proliferation full time, or passed on by them, that would be one thing - that at least would say that experts are saying that it's credible.
 * Lacking that - we have nothing to go on to post coverage of it.  We require reliable sources which are verifyable for information on Wikipedia.  A few blog mentions by people who are not proliferation experts is not enough.  Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:09, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * The Russia link has nothing to do with nuclear weapons and the North Korea link is not substantiated in reliable sources. NPguy (talk) 20:11, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, to be fair, any not-well-publicized fuel enrichment program is almost certainly a weapons program in early stages, but I think Burma's IAEA compliant on this stuff and it's just not well known... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:27, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * For what it's worth, I retract my statement immediately above. Burma's reactor site and enrichment sites seem not to be IAEA declared and monitored.  Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:18, 29 April 2010 (UTC)


 * As far as I can tell the Russia research reactor deal is not going anywhere fast, and it's very hard to find any substance behind the very intriguing rumors of undeclared facilities or nuclear assistance from North Korea. In all that I've never heard of an enrichment plant.  Burma has a safeguards agreement with an old style Small Quantity Protocol that holds most safeguards measures in abeyance. NPguy (talk) 02:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)


 * There exists visual evidence at the reactor site which confirms elements of leaks by dissidents, which named site locations and processing and reactor functions. This is non-includable "original research" (at least until we work up a publication on it) but there's evidence there...  Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:24, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

sould there be a "history" topic?
In this artical there should be a history topic link/rederection and also they sould mention EMP waves sent out from the nuclear wepon detanated. thanks for the links cubelurker 173.75.211.78 (talk) 01:34, 14 August 2009 (UTC)


 * The EMP info is here Effects_of_nuclear_explosions & history is here History of nuclear weapons.--Cube lurker (talk) 18:46, 13 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Should be a separate category. One theory of use for nukes is to lob one into the ionosphere over your target. Destroy tech infrastrucure and weapons (avionics) and it would be OK to use these nukes because people are not targeted. Shjacks45 (talk) 21:17, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

1971 orlando incident?
I just read a comic book that claims the FBI arrested a fourteen year old boy in Orlando in 1971 who had built a functional bomb design and was 'merely' lacking fissionable fuel (which didn't keep him from using it for blackmail).

The authors explicitly claim this was factual information. Now they claim a lot of things in these comics. Still... I failed to find more info on Google, does anybody have an idea what this may relate to? I don't think it's the David Hahn the Radioactive Boy Scout, as the book in question was published long before 1994.--217.225.159.123 (talk) 12:03, 1 February 2010 (UTC)


 * The authors as you recount it have it somewhat mixed up. The 14-year-old boy sent in a bomb threat, claiming he had a hydrogen bomb (and including a drawing of the alleged bomb), but he did not. It was entirely a hoax. It wasn't Hahn; I don't think they ever released the name. It is mentioned in The Curve of Binding Energy among other places. It was discussed in open Senate testimony as early as 1971 (I think the actual event was in 1970). This New York Times article from 1973 describes the incident (with the Senate testimony) and even has the pictures of the letter sent. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:46, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Disarmament
I think that the article should include that Canada got rid of our Nuclear weapons. The following quote, found in the book "Canadian nuclear weapons: the untold story of Canada's Cold War arsenal", by John Clearwater verifies my claim; "By the time Canada divested itself of it's last atomic weapons in 1984, the country had been a direct participant for more than half of the nuclear-armed age." I believe that this should be added to the title of disarmament because Canada was a nuclear power, but gave up our weapons. Nagrills (talk) 02:46, 28 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Canada never had nuclear weapons of its own. In fact, Canada was arguably the first country to decide not to acquire nuclear weapons.  It participated in the Manhattan Project alongside the United States and UK, but alone among the three chose to forswear nuclear weapons.  I don't know the history, but I assume the John Clearwater book is actually referring to U.S. nuclear weapons that once were deployed in Canada. NPguy (talk) 01:14, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

TNT equivalent
I'm not sure if there is a link to TNT equivalent on this article, but "kilograms of conventional explosive" in the first paragraph could be linked to that article. Also TNT Equivalent should redirect to TNT equivalent.137.113.114.121 (talk) 17:53, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Civilian purposes?
Is there an article or indeed should there be an article on the civilian uses for nuclear weapons. Some of these projects have their own individual articles, but would a combined one be useful? If you're unfamiliar look up Project Plowshare and Project Orion for starters.--Senor Freebie (talk) 03:19, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
 * See Peaceful nuclear explosions. NPguy (talk) 03:14, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Closer citing needed
After I "accepted" this edit under thePending changes trial, I added Refimprove here. I did this because "immediate deaths of an estimated 200,000" was not sourced and unclear; the next sentence about long term deaths also needed a cite. In lieu of Refimprove I have used Citation needed.

Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has this partly-sourced claim: acute effects killed 90,000–166,000 people in Hiroshima and 60,000–80,000 in Nagasaki,[5] with roughly half of the deaths in each city occurring on the first day. If "immediate" is interpreted to mean the same time period as "acute" then we have 150,000 to 246,000 deaths, which is consistent with about 200,000 acute deaths and about 100,000 deaths the first day (this last part un-sourced at present).

However, after having read the source I have reworded the first sentence and removed this unsourced one:

When factoring in deaths from long-term effects of ionizing radiation, acute radiation sickness and cancers, the total death toll is reinforced with aditional tens of thousands.'

My very quick Google for "long term deaths hiroshima nagasaki" found which has "The five-year death total may have reached or even exceeded 200,000"; I leave it to others to decide whether and how this could be used to improve the article further. -84user (talk) 18:52, 29 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I have no trouble with asking for citations — just don't add a blanket "citation needed" tag without being specific about what you are talking about on the talk page, because it doesn't give us any clue what you are talking about, whether it is sensible, etc.
 * I took your sentence and streamlined it a bit. The intro to this article is not really a place for precise details or haggling over the debate about total deaths and etc. The goal of the sentence is to give the briefest possible indication on the history of their use in WWII, that's all, orders of magnitude. The place for the precise figures and etc. is the relevant sub-article (Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki), which is linked to from this article. The footnote you added is fine for this article. --Mr.98 (talk) 01:56, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from 137.90.130.216, 15 November 2010
137.90.130.216 (talk) 22:27, 15 November 2010 (UTC) errors all over on this artical


 * What areas do you believe need improvement? Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:03, 16 November 2010 (UTC)


 * unclear request The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 14:23, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Edit Request
I am certainly not an expert, but I believe that the end of Paragraph 4, which states that:

"The only countries known to have detonated nuclear weapons—and that acknowledge possessing such weapons—are (chronologically) the United States, the Soviet Union (succeeded as a nuclear power by Russia), the United Kingdom, France, the People's Republic of China, India, Pakistan, and North Korea. Israel is also widely believed to possess nuclear weapons, though it does not acknowledge having them.[4]"

is incorrect. I think the author mixed up North Korea and Israel, and the last 2 sentences should read:

"The only countries known to have detonated nuclear weapons—and that acknowledge possessing such weapons—are (chronologically) the United States, the Soviet Union (succeeded as a nuclear power by Russia), the United Kingdom, France, the People's Republic of China, India, Pakistan, and Israel. North Korea is also widely believed to possess nuclear weapons, though it does not acknowledge having them.[4]"

Thanks, --TripMills (talk) 03:05, 15 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Yellow check.svg Partly done: Please see this page about Israeli nuclear weapons and this page about North Korean nuclear weapons. Both pages are indirectly linked from the reference already given, and confirm that the current ordering is correct.  However, I have added the former reference to the article to help clarify.  Thanks, Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 03:32, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Agree with edit as done. Edit as requested was incorrect. --Mr.98 (talk) 03:13, 16 December 2010 (UTC)


 * OK Great! Thanks for looking into it!
 * --TripMills (talk) 01:56, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Nuclear explosives
There seems to be some dispute whether peaceful nuclear explosions should be discussed on this page at all. The argument is that PNEs are, by definition, not weapons.

Admittedly we have a somewhat odd taxonomy here, with a page for nuclear weapons and a separate page for nuclear explosives and a separate page for PNEs (and a separate page for nuclear explosions, which seems entirely redundant to me). Obviously our weapons page is the most important one (and things like "atomic bomb" redirect here), and is the one which discusses how the packages work, though of course their action of working is not what makes them a "weapon" vs. an "explosive".

My inclination is to keep the brief PNE discussion on this page, simply as it rounds out the general topic, and because PNEs, even in their name, have to take some great effort to say that they are nuclear weapons that are not being used as weapons. (You wouldn't have to specify them as "peaceful" if it were not the case that they are being defined in the negative.) Obviously I would not want the PNE aspects to overwhelm the page, but I think the current little section is just about right.

But this seems like something that ought to be discussed more widely. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:26, 6 February 2011 (UTC)


 * A section on PNE doesn't seem to be undue weight. ( Hohum  @ ) 16:55, 6 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I didn't weigh in on the edit war because I don't have a strong opinion. I think at a minimum this page should have a cross-reference to to the one on peaceful nuclear explosions.  The maximum might be a single sentence, along the lines of "Nuclear explosives have also been used for peaceful purposes, such as stimulating natural gas production, and proposed for other purposes, such as excavation of harbors and canals and space propulsion." NPguy (talk) 18:28, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

request
i'm looking for a family who may have survived the atomic bomb/s, possably still living in Hiroshima. The girl that died, died in the university of Saskatchewan hospital, and gave my grandpa some friendship rings. She was japanese. He just recently passed, and i'm looking for her family so we can return the rings. If anyone has any information or questions, please email me: Dolphinoceans101@hotmail.com

thanks. --unsigned by 67.225.107.249 on August 18, 2010
 * My mother's birthday is Hiroshima Day...82.0.25.104 (talk) 23:22, 24 February 2011 (UTC)Lance Tyrell

Mixing units?
In the second paragraph of the lede, the order of units is reversed from that used in the rest of the article, i.e. kilograms (pounds) rather than pounds (kilograms). I believe the article was originally written in US English and, according to WP:UNITS, the latter order should be used.

I'm changing it. It seems to be a choice between changing paragraph 2 and changing everything else, so it makes sense.

Anyone have any different ideas? &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 21:09, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Errors like this creep in over time. I've fixed this one. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 14:12, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry... UncleBubba fixed it, I un-fixed it, and Quasihuman re-fixed it. Must be bed time.  Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 14:58, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Falsehood
This is a total falsehood: "Unlike fission weapons, there are no inherent limits on the energy released by thermonuclear weapons." Do thermonuclear weapons violate the law of conservation of matter/energy? No. I am amazed such horribly misinformed statements like that are 1) posted and 2) not immediately erased. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.6.5.64 (talk) 07:46, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the comment. I've removed this vague and uncited statement (WP:BURDEN). For interest's sake, the text originally read "Because fusion material cannot go over-critical, no matter the amount used, and because fusion weapons can be staged, these kind of weapons may be made significantly more powerful than fission bombs." – That text was changed to the version you saw in this copyedit.  I think the meaning is adequately covered in the last paragraph of the current Fusion weapons section.  Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 12:06, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Citing WP?
This article cites another WP article, B83 nuclear bomb, as a reference. Is this proper in light of WP:RS and other guidelines? &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 21:35, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It's explicitly forbidden under WP:CIRCULAR, a subsection of the policy of verifiability. B83 nuclear bomb might have a reference you can put into this article. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 14:12, 12 March 2011 (UTC)


 * It's not citing it (assuming we are talking about fn. 2). The reference is just a note as to what specifically is being discussed in the abstract in the lede. There are two such notes — the lede obliquely discusses Trinity and Ivy Mike, without naming them, and the note indicates which tests it is referring to (for the curious). It then also mentions the weight/yield ratio of the B83 without naming it, and the note indicates this. Both of these are provided for convenience, not as proof. At worst they can be considered unreferenced. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:29, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Incorrect working principle of fusion bomb
Unlike mentioned here, heating of fusion fuel is a problem it does not do any good. Fission stage is used only to compress lithium deutheride and plutonium tube, by vaporization outer layer of uranium or any other heavy metal. this is happens by using X-rays that easily pass everything else, besides mentioned metals, without heating. Imploded plutonium tube reaches supercritical state and acts like usual but extremely boosted fission bomb. So in practice fission stage is just fancy replacement for conventional explosives used for imploding fission core, and it is only used for generating X-ray burst. It also says in the article that in a fusion bomb that plutonium can only be used. This is because if uranium core is used not enough energy is released and the reaction will not sustain itself.

Explosion of fission stage must happen before particles coming from fission stage disintegrate everything. and this is possible because X rays travel at speed of light while everything else is much slower. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.118.79.244 (talk) 12:46, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

WWII Axis nuclear program
The documentary "Mission for Mussolini" verifies that Nazi Germany set off a nuclear weapon of 'low enriched Uranium alloyed with light elements'. They found fission products at the test site. See neutron source for the chemistry. Deuterium, Lithium, Beryllium, even Boron not only multiply the effective number of fission neutrons (therefore requiring lesser enrichment) but also generate fast neutrons that can split U. We could reference Germany's bomb program. Shjacks45 (talk) 21:05, 8 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Sounds like Hitlers Bombe, which is generally considered to be "unproven" and "unlikely" to say the least. Low-enriched uranium does not detonate (though it could be made into a reactor). Boron absorbs neutrons, I believe. German nuclear energy project describes what is considered the "reliable" account of Germany's activities. --Mr.98 (talk) 04:09, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Must of what I have read has stated that Germany had a nuclear program, but that they didn't start it until mid- to late- WWII, and that they never pursued it with much effort. I could be wrong about this, but I don't believe that WWII Germany ever had anything beyond Heavy Water. kc0wir [Student] (Talk|User) 08:16, 14 February 2011 (UTC)


 * US military propaganda? We still have documents from the Civil War marked "Top Secret". The Soviet and the British governments have declassifies WWII documents. The Russians don't joke about thousands of prisoners-of-war murdered by the Nazis. Nagasaki and Hiroshima show only traces of fission products as they were air burst weapons. The release of neutrons can be inferred to have occurred there but not proven. Testing methodology by pro and con sides is lacking. "Too much Chernobyl background"? Please. The fission products of steady state thermal U235 fission are different than fast neutron bomb event; and as noted re Japan, the amount of fission products is small and mostly vaporized into fallout. For a Reactor (gee, that requires STABILITY) a moderator is used to optimized U235 slow neutron absorption. Enrico Fermi in the US created the first reactor with low purity unenriched Uranium Oxide using Graphite as a very efficient moderator which turned out to be "too efficient" in the Chernobyl case. Note that typically (average 15%; 5-25% depending on design) fast neutrons generated from U235 fusion cause fission of U238 before getting to the Moderator and slowing down. Basic Physics people: "similar weight objects split energy of collision better (e.g. neutron-1 and carbon-12), the U238 "tamper" in a bomb may make it "dirty" but also reflects back fast neutrons with little energy sharing (loss). H-bomb info is classified but 30-50% of the Energy released is from Fission of the U238 tamper; AND not from just the fast neutrons but from the 40+ MeV Gamma rays contained inside the bomb structure by the tamper! (Consider that when U235 absorbs a thermal neutron it becomes a high energy state of U236, which occasionally emits a high energy Gamma ray to become the naturally occurring long lived U236 isotope. This long lived U236 can absorb a high energy Gamma ray, becoming the higher energy version of U236, and then fission.) Thorium is also a heavy nucleus and can be used as a "tamper". The Th232 isotope found in nature does not fission from thermal neutrons, however will fission with more energetic "fast" neutrons. The reason we don't make reactors with U238 is that the U235 reaction gives off 2-5 neutrons to continue and U238 reaction releases fewer neutrons to continue the reaction to critical mass. Then remember that Uranium bombs require a neutron source to trigger the reaction. See [Neutron source]. Standard source is Polonium-210(alpha emitter) mixed with Berylium-9 (+ alpha = C12 + n + energy). Other combinations such as Radium and Lithium or high energy x-ray tube and light metal (e.g. Li, Be) also generate neutrons. Yes, Boron-10 has a high affinity for absorbing neutrons, but the product Boron-11 has so much extra energy that it splits into high energy Alpha particle and high energy Lithium-7 fragment. Boron-10 plus alpha (Helium-4) gives Carbon-13 plus neutron. Fast neutron reacts with Lithium-7 to yield Li-6 and TWO neutrons (overcoming the major objection to U-238 bomb). Boron-11 also generates neutrons from Alpha absorbtion and can also participate in spallation (fast n > 2 n) reactions . Documentation: The Russian Army took custody of all documents and witnesses as Thuringia was in the Soviet occupation zone.

Shjacks45 (talk) 17:17, 5 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Technically, the category "Top Secret" was not created until 1944, so it seems unlikely there would be any Civil War documents marked as such. (I've never heard of any Civil War documents still classified. There are apparently some WWI documents still considered secret, pertaining to cryptography.) On the rest of it, it's really quite unclear what you're getting at. It is still completely unclear how you would try to make a bomb using LEU. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:58, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Actual testing
N-weapons untested don't always work. Do we have verified Canadian and Israeli tests? FYI the 'theft of yellow cake from Nigeria' WMD story first surfaced in the 70's and it involved Israel stealing and the French government being paid off for the "inconvenience". Shjacks45 (talk) 17:34, 5 August 2011 (UTC)


 * There has never been a Canadian nuclear weapon. So there has never been a Canadian nuclear test. Canada is not a weapons state.
 * It is unknown whether Israel has tested. They have certainly conducted non-nuclear tests. They may have conducted at least one clandestine test (see Vela Incident). It is true that if they have never tested, their confidence level would probably be lower that the design was successful and would have a known yield. But a lot can be done without full yield testing if the scientists are clever, so they have no doubt taken that into consideration.
 * On the latter point, I think you're referring to Operation Plumbat, which is different from the Nigeria thing. --Mr.98 (talk) 22:49, 11 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Canada participated in US weapon sharing programs, but they never manufactured or maintained weapons. The weapons sharing programs make clear lines somewhat ambiguous but Canada unambiguously didn't build their own weapons or test any.  Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:36, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Edit for a typo
These lines are in the See Also> History list, at the bottom:

Weapon of mass destruction

Nuclear strategy Nuclear warfare

Weapon of mass destruction

the two "weapon of mass destruction"s listed link to the same place. 74.132.249.206 (talk) 17:56, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Addendum: Those four entries are all links on the actual page. And I do not know why it put "nuclear warfare" and "nuclear strategy" in a gray box when I wrote this. 74.132.249.206 (talk)


 * I've removed the duplicate link. Thanks for the note!  The gray box is what happens whenever you start a new line with a blank space.  You can use a colon  for indentation, like I did in this post.  Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 08:35, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from 66.183.228.189, 4 October 2011
Sources need to be verified and some information is a bit bias.

66.183.228.189 (talk) 06:08, 4 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Can you be specific with the issues? --Jnorton7558 (talk) 13:47, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

not sure if this is the best location for Saudi Arabia resource
Prince Hints Saudi Arabia May Join Nuclear Arms Race by theAssociated Press published December 6, 2011 New York Times, excerpt ...

99.181.136.158 (talk) 00:29, 10 December 2011 (UTC)


 * It doesn't really fit here. It also doesn't fit in List of states with nuclear weapons, since that is about countries that actually have/had weapons or weapons programs.  Some reference might fit into Nuclear proliferation. NPguy (talk) 03:07, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

edit request
The interwikilink for yi: has bad markup. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.69.223.136 (talk) 13:37, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
 * . Thanks! Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 00:08, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

edit request
"Only two nuclear weapons have been used in the course of warfare, " is wrong wording. "nuclear weapons" and "psycholgical warfare" are often coupled, and they were an important weapon in the cold war. They have been used in the course of warfare in the same way that rifles can be used in the course of warfare - as a threat. "Only two nuclear weapons have been used as weapons of war," is preferable.87.194.46.83 (talk) 05:04, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Other types - antimatter
Perhaps something like this (in this wording of mine or similar) should be added?:
 * Antimatter, which consists of particles resembling ordinary matter particles in most of their properties but having opposite electric charge, has been considered as a trigger mechanism for nuclear weapons. A major obstacle is the difficulty of producing antimatter in large enough quantities. However, the U.S. Air Force funded studies of the physics of antimatter in the Cold War, and began considering its possible use in weapons, not just as a trigger, but as the explosive itself. Switchcraft (talk) 09:38, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

Category:Nuclear weapons in fiction
There is already a category for world war three in fiction and post apocalyptic films and games; however there is a distinguishable aspect to the threat of nuclear bombs even when if not ever used. That was the per norm holly wood villain scheme during the 90's; and it's a pretty defining element of many action movie and science fiction plots. CensoredScribe (talk) 21:43, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

Edit Request
In the first paragraph of this page, it says "The first thermonuclear ("hydrogen") bomb test released the same amount of energy as approximately 10,000,000 tons of TNT."

However, to be exact, it was 10,400,000. (10.4 Megatons) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nathanweetman (talk • contribs) 18:33, 4 March 2014 (UTC)

Why was Dr. Mueller removed from the disarmament section?
Professor John Mueller of Ohio State University, the author of Atomic Obsession, has also dismissed the need to interfere with Iran's nuclear program and expressed that arms control measures are counterproductive. During a 2010 lecture at the University of Missouri, which was broadcast by C-Span, Dr. Mueller also argued that the threat from nuclear weapons, by terrorists and governments alike, has been exaggerated, both in the popular media and by officials.


 * The video works fine, http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/AtomicO — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.44.234.63 (talk) 20:59, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

Duplicated info
"Weapons of mass destruction" infobox is included twice in the article. I don't know what policy WP has about duplication but I find it annoying. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.12.182.56 (talk) 06:28, 15 March 2014 (UTC)


 * I removed the second one.NPguy (talk) 01:23, 16 March 2014 (UTC)