Iranian missile test

OK, I have a question. When it comes to weapons of mass destruction, what is the critical limiting factor? Is it delivery? Is it having a facility where one can manufacture the requisite plutonium? Could one make plutonium in one's own garage? Just curious. Can anyone enlighten me?

[tw]

Originally Posted by marichiko

OK, I have a question. When it comes to weapons of mass destruction, what is the critical limiting factor? Is it delivery? Is it having a facility where one can manufacture the requisite plutonium? Could one make plutonium in one's own garage? Just curious. Can anyone enlighten me?

Which WMD? I assume this is a question about plutonium or uranium based weapons. It is extremely difficult. First one must obtain sufficient quantities of a material harder to obtain than precious metals. Tons of material must be unearthed just to extract grams. Then there is the major effort of refining this bomb material into weapons grade. The amount of energy necessary to make the first three US atom bombs was so great that processing facilities were located where electricity was plentiful - Hanford in WA and in the Tennessee River Valley. After two bombs were dropped on Japan, there was insufficient weapons grade material remaining for another bomb. It is that difficult to obtain weapons grade material.

To get around that problem, one must steal pounds. And remember, weapons grade uranium and especially weapons grade plutonium will kill quckly if not properly contained. How does one steal what must be in a large container?

So we have this material. Now we must make a bomb. Idea is to compress the material so tight to create a chain reaction. Again not so easy. One cannot just explode dynamite around it to cause the compression. The explosive forces must be carefully sized, timed and placed to make compression without any leakage in all three dimensions. Less accurate compression means even more weapons grade material is required - and bomb must be physically heavier.

But it does not stop there. Neutrons must be slowed to properly create the chain reaction. A moderator material is required. How much? Just more reasons why a bomb design involves so much time on super computers. Where does a terrorist steal super computers with advanced development software?

Now clearly the facility is getting quite large. Massive amounts of electricity, computer development time, carefully selected explosive materials of refined purity, special moderator materials, highly accurate machine shops, and a host of control equipment that is not routinely available in international markets. All this and the resulting radioactive shielding must be hidden from public, law enforcement, and satellite view.

Then there are the so many other little facts and special materials we are not even going to discuss.

In short, it takes the full resources of a nation's government to make a bomb sufficient to be a terrorist weapon.

Clearly a nuclear bomb in the hands of terrorists is almost impossible. It is also unlikely that lightning will strike you and only you while inside your car. That one lightning event only to you and no one else is many times more likely than a terrorist with a bomb. However no one cares if you are struck by lightning. We do care if something much more impossible happens - terrorists with a nuclear device. Therefore we ignore you verses lightning in the car but give serious consideration to something thousands of times less likely - a terrorist with a nuclear device.

Again I must emphasize how much nonsense and fear is used instead of logic and numbers. A terrorist with a nuclear device is mostly stuff of fiction. Terrorists using airplanes was always a realistic scenario as even noted in a PDB to George Jr. A smart president must be able to put these two events in proper perspective.

Terrorist with a nuclear device could only happen if top leadership was outrightly subverting the little people in government from doing their job - as George Jr administration did to this nation's top anti-terrorists including John O'Neil and Richard Clark and to ongoing investigations that were about to expose the terrorist plots. Yes a nuclear device is something we must worry about - but not from terrorists. Just another reason why our international relations are so important to this nation's security. That bomb cannot exist when America worries about having friends - and therefore the threat would be discovered long before the threat exists. What is the best defenses against a nuclear bomb terrorist attack? Good relations with virtually every nation in the world. Something we no longer have.

Look at that last paragraph. I have gone from being ho-hum about George Jr to being one of the most vocal critics of this mental midget president. Notice how we best avoid a nuclear terrorist attack. This is but another in a long list of reasons why I openly, aggressively, and unconditionally say that George Jr is a very bad president. He has made the nearly impossible just a little more possible by being both mentally weak and politically dangerous. I cannot say enough to the moderates and centrists among us - are you registered to vote? Your vote is probably more necessary this November than anytime in the last 30 years. Things have gotten that bad. Are you registered?

Yes, I'm registered for what good it will do. Colorado always goes Republican, and we are hardly a swing state. I was wondering about the possibility of terrorism from within this country. Out in western Colorado near a little town called Naturita there are about a million abandoned uranium mines. There's still plenty of the stuff there. Everywhere you go in the mountains there are huge radiation warning signs. No one ever pays much attention to the area these days. I have a friend who is building several houses on an abandoned mining claim and no one - even the locals - knows he exists. It's a pretty remote and lonely area. Just wondered what the possibilities were of a terrorist group forming a "commune" in some place like Naturita?

[Elspode]

There's plenty of plutonium in the world which has gone unaccounted for. The desire for hard cash in the former Soviet bloc pretty much assures that.

Probably a warhead or two out there somewhere, waiting for the right time and place.

I don't think the likelihood of a nuclear detonation somewhere in the world within this decade is at all small. Who's to say that someone somewhere won't arrange to get a weapon into the hands of someone who would be glad to have it? Korea could do it. China could do it. Iran can, in all likelihood, do it. Pakistan and India could do it.

I'd be real surprised if we *don't* have someone blow up some non-Muslim city somewhere in our lifetimes.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by marichiko

OK, I have a question. When it comes to weapons of mass destruction, what is the critical limiting factor? Is it delivery? Is it having a facility where one can manufacture the requisite plutonium? Could one make plutonium in one's own garage? Just curious. Can anyone enlighten me?

We (the US) made some of our first batch in a Squash Court at the University of Chicago. It's not easy by any stretch of the imagination, but it's fairly do-able. The tricky stuff in nuclear material production is the separation of U235 from a mix of U235 and U238.

[russotto]

Plutonium is produced "naturally" in nuclear reactors by bombardment of U-238 with neutrons and the subsequent beta decays of U-239 to Pu-239. If you've got a neutron source (always the tricky part -- the best source is a nuclear reactor), and you've got U-238, you can make plutonium.

Making a bomb with plutonium is tricky, as you've got to assemble it quickly and precisely. Probably just not that hard with today's technology, though. Make sure you have an expert at high explosives on your staff.

You also need a neutron source; the traditional one is a berillyum-polonium device called an "urchin" for some reason.

All of this is 1940s technology. Yes, supercomputers are used to design weapons -- but that's because you want maximum yield for minimum material, or you want a certain type of yield (e.g more radiation and less blast for a neutron bomb). If you just want something that makes a really big bang, that's a different matter. If you can get enough U-235, it's even easier. U-235 is much less toxic than plutonium, and much easier to make go bang.

So, in theory, it would be possible for me and my band of Bin Laden enthusiasts to hoof it out to Naturita, work a few uranium claims for all we can get (we don't care about radiation poisoning because Allah has promised us all those virgins), and viola! We have a dirty little bomb to take to Phoenix or L.A. Possible?

[xoxoxoBruce]

In short, it takes the full resources of a nation's government to make a bomb sufficient to be a terrorist weapon.

But it only takes money to buy one.

[lookout123]

Originally Posted by marichiko

We have a dirty little bomb to take to Phoenix or L.A. Possible?

what are you saying? you want to get rid of me and SM?

[tw]

Originally Posted by Elspode

I don't think the likelihood of a nuclear detonation somewhere in the world within this decade is at all small. Who's to say that someone somewhere won't arrange to get a weapon into the hands of someone who would be glad to have it? Korea could do it. China could do it. Iran can, in all likelihood, do it. Pakistan and India could do it.

This is hype and fear that George Jr promotes. The more "Al Qaeda is planning to .... " stories, then the more we run to support a mental midget president. I have long become tired of all these plans that bin Laden has been making, especially when a real threat is Muslim Brotherhood - not from the disorganized remains of Al Qaeda.

A major amount of plutonium has gone unaccounted for. Yes many pounds. Stuff lost in dust, cleaning, processing, etc. Literally ounces scattered everywhere. But even many pounds is not enough to make one bomb. If we take all the missing plutonium lost in factory ducts, open fields, etc, then there are dangerous plutonium bombs hiding everywhere waiting to be discovered by terrorists. Fictional nonsense from Rush Limbaugh types because our president must promote fear.

A 1940 technology atom bomb required a massively large amount of weapons grade material to compensate for its crude design. Where do these terrorists get many times more weapons grade material when obtaining enough for a single sophisticated bomb is itself so difficult? Again, too many people only know this is easily accomplished by reading too much bad fiction - written by authors who never did years of research before writing.

Of course we only need mine uranium in one of those abandoned CO mines? Problem is the numbers - so many tons of material removed from a mine that only yields ounces of uranium. A pick and shovel every day for years could not produce anywhere near enough uranium for even one sophisticated bomb - let alone one crude bomb.

Notice the difference between fiction hype verses reality created by applying numbers. Just because someone owns a uranium mine means he can secretly mine enough uranium to build one bomb? Only when we don't apply numbers to that fiction.

The squash court in U of Chicago did not produce a 'bomb like' chain reaction. They were not using weapons grade U238 to make the world's first atomic reaction. However, one might speculate, based upon what was posted here, that even a bomb could have been constructed in a squash court in Chicago. Again, how to distort reality into a terrorism by not first learning the details. Missing details is why Saddam got all his Weapons of Mass Destruction. Too many only read the Daily News which means they are still not informed.

Somehow there is this 'informed' idea that all one need do is push the button to 'ignite' a nuclear weapon. Again, too much reasoning based upon a Tom Cruise or James Bond movies. One stolen weapon alone cannot be exploded. It is more complex.

Atomic bombs are difficult to build. Using 1940 technology - some of which still is not easily obtained in 2004 - means the bomb must be massively larger and therefore that much easier to detect. Thousands of people and massive amounts of energy worked years to build a few crude and therefore very large atom bombs. Suddenly anyone can build one in their own garage? Which fiction writer is writing this stuff? Again, this is the hype that George Jr would have us believe. Fear and loathing made so easy when conclusions fail to apply numbers and perspective.

The only way an atomic device will get triggered inside a city is with full cooperation of a organization so large as to be called a national government. Such governments can only exist if the US continues to alienate every nation in the world.

Again, an atom bomb fear belongs with the same mental midgets who have us spending $billions on an anti-ballistic missile system to protect us from bin Laden's ballistic missiles. Previously, I had posted a far more effective terrorist disaster using far less technology. The few who read it are invited to confirm how simple and destructive this attack could be - *without* any indication of what that attack is. The point is that while the 'powers that be' hype fear and loathing, terrorists are doing things simpler and obvious.

Those worried about an atomic terrorist weapon would be the same people who read a PDB warning of an immenent Al Qaeda attack; then say it was only historical information. We call those people naive, ill-informed, and extremists with a political agenda. Worry about real world type terrorist attacks; not atomic myths. Worry more about those who promote those mythical fears. Or as Tom Clancy describes them, "Because we elect idiots." (an exact quote on Charlie Rose).

Think. Bin Laden limited his attack to only four planes because even an attack involving only 30 people (when the US government was undermining all anti-terrorism actions) is still an extremely difficult task. Terrorism limited to only ten operatives is difficult to execute. A stolen atomic device would required hundreds of operatives handling an item that even advertises itself.

The point: if one fears big hype threats such as terrorists with a nuclear weapon or terrorists with ballistic missiles, then one spends too much time watching fiction movies, worshipping anti-ballistic missile systems, and listening to a mentally deficient president hyping fictional terrorist threats to get reelected. One should instead spend more time learning about reality.

Those who think a nuclear device by terrorists is a reasonable possibility may still 'hope' those aluminum tubes were for processing uranium. Yes there are still people with a George Jr myth on reality. (Those from the world of reality use a 'grip' instead of 'myth'.) A nuclear terrorist attack even involving a stolen weapon requires extensive, or special and exclusive resources of a large national government. This, of course, assumes the mental midget president does not completely alienate most of the world's nations. Without all those friends doing so such spying for us, the US would then be more vulnerable to a roque nation that no one suspected was a rogue nation.

As soon as I hear one spouting the premise from a James Bond Thunderball or Goldfinger movie, then I know this person spends too much time believing George Jr. There are many good and exposed targets for a terrorism list. A terrorist nuclear weapon does not even appear at the bottom of the last page. Can bin Landen do what then entire nation of Iran finds difficult? Yes if you also believe that terrorists will launch ballistic missiles. Give me a break. If a nuclear weapon could be stolen, Iran would steal it long before terrorists. Suddenly terrorists are cleaning the ducts in Hanford to collect enough plutonium to build a bomb? Which pulp fiction book was that?

Its called having dirt under your finger nails. A terrorist atom bomb exists only in fiction. Real world terrorists instead use readily available and innocent looking materials to reek more damage.

Originally Posted by lookout123

what are you saying? you want to get rid of me and SM?

Nah, we'd give you guys advance warning. It just always kind of impressed me with how much uranium is laying around out there with not a soul seeming to care. But maybe there's no need to.

[lookout123]

Originally Posted by tw

In short, it takes the full resources of a nation's government to make a bomb sufficient to be a terrorist weapon.

Clearly a nuclear bomb in the hands of terrorists is almost impossible.

hmm, if only there were a former super power who built incredible stock piles of nuclear weapons before collapsing... and after they collapsed couldn't afford to pay their top scientists and many military officers... and if only that former super power had borders like a sieve... and only if there was someone with large sums of money, but no nuclear weapon who was willing to pay former scientists and military officers for a nuclear weapon...

nah, you're right tw, its almost impossible. so sleep tight tonight. i know it takes a lot of energy to dig up the conspiracy theories you have. careful though, i think "george jr" is on to you.

Thank you for the explanation, TW. I see why the former miners of Naturita have been pretty much left to their own devises as they die of various forms of radiation induced cancer. I'd been wondering about that. George Jr. would probably love the plot line anyhow, though.

[tw]

Originally Posted by lookout123

nah, you're right tw, its almost impossible. so sleep tight tonight. i know it takes a lot of energy to dig up the conspiracy theories you have. careful though, i think "george jr" is on to you.

Please feel free to list all the missing and unaccounted nuclear weapons. Of course there is no accounting for every nuclear weapon as required by the Disarment Treaties. Clearly there are plenty of nuclear weapons just stilling around unaccounted for waiting to some terrorist to walk by and pickup. Clearly anyone could steal a nuclear device and no one would even know.

Or maybe you never learned how disarment among the cold war nations works. Nations routinely submit to an accounting of their nuclear weapons. Where is this one weapon that some rogue sicentist walks out the door with in his brief case? And how is it that this man also has the codes necessary to arm the weapon? Which Jame Bond book are you citing this time as proof that you are world saavy?

[lookout123]

tw - you pull out tons of irrefutable "research" to support whatever the topic is, write a dozen paragraphs on it so that most people won't even read the damn thing and then shut the book, like what you write is the damn bible. remember your bullshit theory on mutual funds? oh wait - when i provided hard fact you walked away and discontinued posting.

do you honestly believe that no nuclear materials, warheads, etc have gone or could go missing? you don't trust the goverment but you trust disarmament agreements and inspections 10-20 years down the road? you trust that everyone was on the level as far as the numbers of weapons that they disclosed?

we bought migs and tanks from the russians while the cold war was still in high gear, and they bought our weapons and research and materials during the same period. do you honestly believe that it is impossible for nuclear weapons to disappear if someone has the $$$ to motivate a low paid schlup with no future?