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Nuclear Weapons
This category is for questions about weapons that use nuclear fission or fusion to gain explosive power.
3,869 Questions
What date did the arms race start?
The arms race did not have an exact starting date. It grew out of the fear and mistrust between the Russians and the rest of the Allies at the close of World War II.
There are other examples of arms races throughout history, but the one that followed WW II was arguably the most significant owing to the fact that nuclear weapons were in the mix.
However the first real official signs of the start of arms race were in response to the first Morrocan crisis of 1905 when Germany began to assert itself more fully in the affairs of other European countries.
The US and allies of the US can have nuclear weapons while other countries do not because of one golden rule:
-The best predictor of future behavior is by studying past behavior
While all countries have played their part in destruction and war over the centuries,
Countries such as Iraq and Saudi Arabia have been aggressors, broken treaties with other nations, and ignored basic international laws within the last 30 years.
If you are unable to trust a country, there is no way any nation in their right mind would approve and support the creation of something so powerful and potentially harmful.
BUT: If you look at the past behavior of United States, it is well known that US is the ONLY country to have used nuclear weapons during war, killing millions of civillians.
For that, US is the only county that SHOULD NOT have nuclear weapons since everybody is "unable to trust" that country (with good reason).
An explosive device that uses massive conventional explosives to split radioactive atoms and cause a MASSIVE release of energy by nuclear fission or fusion. A BIG BOOM!!!!
I am sorry, I do not understand your question. Please clarify "subatomic".
If you actually meant subcritical, it is when they make a test device that is deliberately designed to never become critical. Such a device cannot produce a nuclear yield, but they can still make measurements on it (e.g. neutron flux peak, x-ray flux) helpful in designing functional nuclear weapons.
How was the Nuclear Bomb used when it was first invented?
Atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan to end WWII.
What is mutual assured destruction?
The level of nuclear weapons required to completely destroy both sides in any war making use of such weapons.
Russia has the largest arsenal of Nuclear Weapons at 15 warheads Russia has arround 2 ICBM-Reentry vehicles The U.S. has over 9000! warheads And arround 1 ICBM-Reentry vehicles Source: The Bulliten of Atomic Scientists
Where was the first nuclear bomb tested?
Trinity was the first test of technology for an atomic weapon. It was conducted by the United States on July 16, 1945, at a location 35 miles (56 km) southeast of Socorro, New Mexico on the White Sands Proving Ground, headquartered near Alamogordo.
What does the nuclear bomb look like?
See the link below for images of the FIRST atomic (nuclear) bombs.
Where was the first nuclear bomb made?
Both the first fission bomb (the Gadget device exploded in Trinity test July 16, 1945 on a 100 foot tall steel tower in the Jornada del Muerto valley in what is now White Sands Missile Range) and the first fusion bomb (the Sausage device exploded in Ivy Mike test November 1, 1952 on the surface at Enewetak Atoll) were designed and made at Los Alamos in New Mexico.
How many people can a nuclear bomb kill?
It matters what type of bomb is used and where it is targeted at. China and India would produce the most causalities if hit with a nuclear attack. If a single modern American nuke were to hit the heaviest of populated areas even more so in India the death toll could reach in the hundreds of millions due to the radiation that would occur and spread after the initial blast.
What is the cost of plutonium?
Plutonium costs on average of $4,000 per gram, but there are severe restrictions on who can buy it, as you can imagine.
Which countries have nuclear weapons?
There are 9 countries that have nuclear weapons:
In order of Nuclear power
1.Russia 13,000
2.United States 9,400
3.United Kingdom 1,850
4.China 1,300
5.France 1,240
6.Pakistan 70-90
7.India 60-80
8.India 50-70 (British Controlled)
9.North Korea >10
Israel 80 (Unconfirmed)
How was the atomic bomb developed?
The story is too long to tell here. Read Richard Rhode's book: The Making of the Atomic Bomb.
When was the nuclear bomb invented?
H. G. Wells' novel The World Set Free published in 1914 was the first usage of the term atomic bomb. He reasonably correctly estimated their energy release (based on Einstein's special relativity) but could not imagine that the energy could be released faster than was possible in chemical bombs, so his atomic bomb explosions took days to weeks instead of microseconds.
Leo Szilard invented the neutron chain reaction, which makes both atomic bombs and nuclear reactors possible in 1933 while living in London. He patented it in 1934 and when the patent (GB630726) was granted in 1936 he sold it to the British Admiralty who classified it to keep the information from the Nazis. The only problem was that no material was known at that time that would support a neutron chain reaction.
In 1939 a joint German and Swedish team in repeating an experiment performed originally in 1938 by Enrico Fermi (who had mistakenly decided that when he bombarded uranium with neutrons that he had made transuranic elements) determined that neutrons split the uranium atom into two smaller intensely radioactive atoms plus several neutrons. It was not necessary to see Szilard's classified patent to realize that uranium was the material that would support a neutron chain reaction. It took a little more research to identify that only the rare uranium-235 isotope (0.7%) would support a neutron chain reaction, not the plentiful uranium-238 isotope (99.3%).
The British did not declassify Szilard's patent until 1949, after the Soviet atomic bomb test.
truman doctrine
Who was the leader of US during World War 2?
First, it was Franklin Delano Roosevelt but after he died in the midst of his third term, his vice president Harry S. Truman took over.
How many countries have nuclear missiles?
Maybe 7 countries. USA, Russia, UK, France, China , India and Pakistan. Note: I am very sure USA, Russia ,India and Pakistan has nuclear missile. The rest of them is what I think because they are nuclear power, they can do it. North Korea had a failed test during July 2006, hence it should not be considered as one of the country with nuclear missile. Israel wise is unconfirmed.
What type of nuclear weapons did the US use in the Vietnam War?
The U.S used no nuclear weapons whatsoever on Vietnam.
What year did the arms race start?
In 1939 when nuclear fission of uranium-235 was discovered and reported in the scientific journals Germany, England, France, and the USSR began a race to see who could produce an atomic bomb first. In 1940 Germany took over France and absorbed their atomic bomb project. In 1942 the US entered the war and England began moving their atomic bomb project to the US, fully merging it with the Manhattan Project in 1943. Germany's atomic bomb project was effectively shut down in 1943 with the remaining research limited to small heavy water moderated reactors that might be scaled up after Germany won the war to make power plant reactors. The USSR's atomic bomb project was severely resource limited and made no significant progress during the war (except to collect information on the British and US projects through spies).
However what is usually called the "nuclear arms race" actually started September 23, 1949 when president Truman announced to the world "We have evidence that within recent weeks an atomic explosion occurred in the U.S.S.R.". This test explosion was on August 29, 1949 at 7:00 AM local time.
