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Neutron Bomb Question

Should the US Resume Neutron Bomb Research?


  • Total voters
    20

Scarecrow Akhbar

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Since China has 1,300 million people and the United States has less than a quarter of that, should the United States resume intensive studies of enhanced radiation weapons to prepare for possible future armed conflict with an enemy that could field an army four times the size of ours?

I argue that it may become necessary for the US to employ nuclear weapons on US soil, and in that event, it would be ideal to minimize the damage from blast and fallout and concentrate the weapon's effects on the enemy invaders.
 
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What is the relative size and strength of the militaries? The goal in war is not and should not be to destroy all the people of a nation.
 
What is the relative size and strength of the militaries? The goal in war is not and should not be to destroy all the people of a nation.

The goal of war is first and foremost survival.

I say enhanced radiation weapons technology would give us an edge on minimizing damage to civillian structures, ours and theirs, and optimize the damage inflicted to the enemy military.

However, if the complete and total destruction of a nation's populace is the only way to secure survival, then such destruction becomes a legitimate goal.

I can't really see that happening, and that's not what the poll is asking.
 
Interesting you bring this up.

In the past China has threatened to send a Neutron bomb to Taiwain and send 200 Nuclear bombs to U.S.

They are bitter of Taiwains dissent...
 
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It just occured to me.

That China is our Number One worst enemy isn't something the American public should be allowed to forget.
 
Since China has 1,300 million people and the United States has less than a quarter of that, should the United States resume intensive studies of enhanced radiation weapons to prepare for possible future armed conflict with an enemy that could field an army four times the size of ours?

I argue that it may become necessary for the US to employ nuclear weapons on US soil, and in that event, it would be ideal to minimize the damage from blast and fallout and concentrate the weapon's effects on the enemy invaders.

Yes.

If we don't have it going on now, we should resume.

If we can't get public support, we should keep it secret.
 
The goal of war is first and foremost survival.

I say enhanced radiation weapons technology would give us an edge on minimizing damage to civillian structures, ours and theirs, and optimize the damage inflicted to the enemy military.

However, if the complete and total destruction of a nation's populace is the only way to secure survival, then such destruction becomes a legitimate goal.

I can't really see that happening, and that's not what the poll is asking.

Why do you think killing millions of innocent Chinease will make us safer. Destroy their military, which should be doable, and they are no threat.

Besides, we have more than enough nukes now to destroy any country in it's totality without making new weapons.
 
Yes.

If we don't have it going on now, we should resume.

If we can't get public support, we should keep it secret.

So you support the government doing whatever it wants, and just not telling the people? Interesting idea....
 
It just occured to me.

That China is our Number One worst enemy isn't something the American public should be allowed to forget.

I remember reading an artical in the late 90's that showed the US military ran computer simulations of a US vs China war. The outcome after several conflicts was near 50/50. At that time the US's strong point was its tec. and China had raw numbers but I worry that since then China has since improved while we havent.
 
Yes, that's exactly what I said :roll:

You are the first person I have ever said this too, but...Get the hell out of my country, we don't need your kind here.
 
Why do you think killing millions of innocent Chinease will make us safer. Destroy their military, which should be doable, and they are no threat.

Besides, we have more than enough nukes now to destroy any country in it's totality without making new weapons.

You're right, we need an anti-missile laser.

oh crap, but then they'll make an anti-missile laser missile.

So we'll need an anti-missile laser missile laser lego missile space station missile....laser...thingy....
 
China and the U.S. are unlikely to ever be able to invade each other. The logistics involved supported an army thousands of miles from home is incredible. I doubt either country could gain such a vast advantage over the other to make some sort of an Invasion possible.

The U.S. is the by far the hardest country to invade on the planet. We have a large population, a huge industrial base, and no powerful (or hostile) land connected neighbors. I doubt we will ever even face the possibility of invasion in my lifetime.

And all of this is assuming that China somehow figures out of way to negate our world-obliterating nuclear arsenal.
 
You're right, we need an anti-missile laser.

oh crap, but then they'll make an anti-missile laser missile.

So we'll need an anti-missile laser missile laser lego missile space station missile....laser...thingy....

Anti any weapon systems tend to be big failures. It is usually cheaper to change the weapon enough to defeat the anti system, than it is to make the anti system. AEGIS is something of an exception.
 
Anti any weapon systems tend to be big failures. It is usually cheaper to change the weapon enough to defeat the anti system, than it is to make the anti system. AEGIS is something of an exception.

Oh, well in that case we need a big ass weapon to threaten them with so that they don't launch first.

I hear the Neutron Bomb is in vogue.....
 
EMP high altitude attacks are pretty nasty if you want to take out critical infrastructures and communications.


2008 EMP Threat assessment



Maybe I am just vindictive but I would much rather my tax money go into special weapons research than the bankers pockets.

This guy invented the neutron bomb
Bomb inventor says U.S. defenses suffer because of politics

"Other nation's haven't been afflicted by the U.S. blindness regarding neutron bombs. According to Cohen:

Evidence exists that China has neutron bombs stockpiled, and that the United States gave the Chinese the technology to build them.

Russia has a large quantity of such weapons, as well as the world's largest arsenal of nuclear weapons.

Israel has hundreds of neutron weapons. The neutron bombs would allow Israel to stop advancing Arab armies and tank columns - even one on Israeli soil - without permanently contaminating the land.

South Africa, which constructed a cache of neutron weapons before the end of white rule, claimed it dismantled those weapons before handing over power to the Nelson Mandela government. Cohen, however, claims to have it on good authority that white military leaders still control the secret stockpile as "an insurance policy."

Most frightening for Cohen is the relative ease by which neutron bombs can be created with a substance called red mercury. Red mercury is a compound containing mercury that has undergone massive irradiation. When exploded, it creates tremendous heat and pressure - the same type needed to trigger a fusion device such as a mini-neutron bomb.

Before, an obstacle to creating a nuclear bomb was the need for plutonium, which when exploded could create a fusion reaction in hydrogen atoms. But red mercury has changed that. The cheap substance has been produced in Russia, Cohen said, and shipped on the black market throughout the world.

Cohen said that when U.N. inspectors went to Iraq to examine the Iraqis' nuclear weapons capabilities, the U.N. team found documents showing that they had purchased quantities of red mercury. The material means a neutron bomb can be built "the size of baseball" but able to kill everyone within several square blocks."
 
China and the U.S. are unlikely to ever be able to invade each other. The logistics involved supported an army thousands of miles from home is incredible. I doubt either country could gain such a vast advantage over the other to make some sort of an Invasion possible.

The U.S. is the by far the hardest country to invade on the planet. We have a large population, a huge industrial base, and no powerful (or hostile) land connected neighbors. I doubt we will ever even face the possibility of invasion in my lifetime.

And all of this is assuming that China somehow figures out of way to negate our world-obliterating nuclear arsenal.

The current US National debt is approximately 11 trillion 305 billion dollars. China is our single largest creditor, and holds 739.6 billion of US debt - about 6.5%.

In a few more years China won't have to invade us, they'll own us!

America will be the world's first tri-lingual country - English, Spanish, and Mandarin will be the official languages... ;)
 
I argue that it may become necessary for the US to employ nuclear weapons on US soil, and in that event, it would be ideal to minimize the damage from blast and fallout and concentrate the weapon's effects on the enemy invaders.

Uh, to produce sufficent quantities of neutrons to have the desired effect as a viable weapon, you need to produce a fission reaction of such size that everyone you're trying to kill with neutron radiation is already vaporized.

Thus, your weapon idea is self defeating. Also, that's one of the (many) reasons why neutron bombs never were feasibly built.
 
Ha, found it. Skip ahead to the 4 minute part for the relevant portion.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvJSlMcKcR4&feature=related]YouTube - Classic Repo Man - Part 2[/ame]
 
Uh, to produce sufficent quantities of neutrons to have the desired effect as a viable weapon, you need to produce a fission reaction of such size that everyone you're trying to kill with neutron radiation is already vaporized.

Thus, your weapon idea is self defeating. Also, that's one of the (many) reasons why neutron bombs never were feasibly built.


Not so much.


Red Mercury - The WMD No
One Wants To Talk About



"On Friday, September 24, 2004, British police arrested 4 suspects for allegedly trying to purchase a 'highly powerful, radioactive material, originally made in Russia, know as' Red Mercury'.

These four supposedly were willing to pay $ 541,000 a kilogram, on behalf of a Saudi Arabian, (described as sympathetic to the Muslim cause'), whose name was not disclosed.

"The News of the World said that the material was developed by Soviet scientists during the Cold War for making briefcase nuclear bombs that could kill people within a few city blocks."

Sam Cohen, the physicist who invented the neutron bomb, sheds a little more light on the destructive power of red mercury. As quoted from a June 15, 1997 interview with neutron bomb inventor Sam Cohen
article by Christopher Ruddy of the Tribune-Review, it states:

'Most frightening for Cohen is the relative ease by which neutron bombs can be created with a substance called red mercury. Red mercury is a compound containing mercury that has undergone irradiation. When exploded, it creates tremendous heat and pressure - the same type needed to trigger a fusion device such as a mini-neutron bomb.

Before, an obstacle to creating a nuclear bomb was the need for plutonium, which when exploded could create a fusion reaction in hydrogen atoms. But red mercury has changed that. The cheap substance has been produced in Russia, Cohen said, and shipped on the black market throughout the world.

Cohen said that when UN inspectors went to Iraq to examine the Iraqi's nuclear weapons capabilities, the U.N. team found documents showing that they had purchased quantities of red mercury. The material means that a neutron bomb can be built "the size of a baseball" but able to kill everyone within several square blocks." "
 
Not so much.

Seriously? You're going to have to provide a much more credible (and scientifically accurate) site.

Furthermore, it appears that Red Mercury is nothing more than red dyes used by counter terrorist groups to essentially entrap potential terrorists.

[ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_mercury]Red mercury - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]
 
Seriously? You're going to have to provide a much more credible (and scientifically accurate) site.

Furthermore, it appears that Red Mercury is nothing more than red dyes used by counter terrorist groups to essentially entrap potential terrorists.

Red mercury - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I saw that. Its a lot of back and forth.


Dispelling the myths about Red Mercury

"That the red mercury fusion device is not a scam has been confirmed by responsible British investigators. One, Dr. Frank Barnaby, a veteran nuclear weapon designer, secretly interviewed knowledgeable Russian scientists. These scientists confirmed to him the existence of red mercury and its great significance.
The professed Los Alamos skepticism was hardly sincere in view of an intensive investigation of such explosives mounted at Los Alamos during the 1990s. The nature (and very high level of security classification) of the investigation belied claims of its being only a half-baked scam. The subject was so serious at Los Alamos that discussions of ballotechnics were held in their highly secure Aztec SCIF (Special Compartmented Intelligence Facility). "


Frank Barnaby
 
I saw that. Its a lot of back and forth.

C'mon. If this was legit, why isn't there anything reputable on it?

Furthermore, do you have anything by Dr. Frank Barnaby himself rather than someone else saying he did it?

Not to mention trusting the Russians during the 1990s was generally a bad idea.
And your own article shows that the substance was a fraud which appeared to be nothing more than a get rich quick Kremlin scheme.

This whole thing looks like something the Russians concocted to make money. Physics based, it doesn't make much sense at all.
 
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