25 MT Hydrogen Bomb Accident

I assume CalBear is right.

It won't be long before President Kennedy hears about it. What sort of contact will he have with the Soviet leadership? Will any of the Air Force generals be willing to tell him that it's possible for a device to have accidentally detonated? Will the generals even believe that it's possible?

Even if it went off, wouldn't the cooler heads in office prevail?
After all, not a single Russian ICBM or bomber has been spotted.

When would the American government know it was an American bomb?
Would they know within a day?
I'm assuming there are slight differences in material and amount of radiation between Soviet and American bombs which could be tested?
 
But it will provide the perfect opurtunity to make the soviets the scapegoat. Nobody in the military or in the goverment would like to admit that it was their mistake, and some would likely want to start WW3 rather than admit their mistake.
 
But it will provide the perfect opurtunity to make the soviets the scapegoat. Nobody in the military or in the goverment would like to admit that it was their mistake, and some would likely want to start WW3 rather than admit their mistake.
Nobody in the Government was stupid enough to start WW III over an accident cause by a plane crash. Most assuredly not JFK who was the only one who could have started this revenge scenario.
 
But he could be lied to too. Or the population manipulated into thinking it was the soviets. Also I consider this scenario to be verry unlikly both the accident and the reaction I propose.
 
I assume CalBear is right.



Even if it went off, wouldn't the cooler heads in office prevail?
After all, not a single Russian ICBM or bomber has been spotted.

When would the American government know it was an American bomb?
Would they know within a day?
I'm assuming there are slight differences in material and amount of radiation between Soviet and American bombs which could be tested?

They wouldnt need a bomber to deliver the bomb could of been shipped in with a few neutral country's as the go between. The usa wouldnt want to say it was one of their bombs and anyone that saw it dropped would be dead so they could say anything they wanted.
 
But he could be lied to too. Or the population manipulated into thinking it was the soviets. Also I consider this scenario to be verry unlikly both the accident and the reaction I propose.


Even though the SAC commander at that time, General LeMay, is well known to be a hardcore hawk, it is just utterly impossible for the US military to cover a nuclear accident by launching WWIII. US military was actually realizing the futileness of nuclear warfare and the then Joint Chief of Staff, General Maxwell Taylor, is promoting the implementation of the 'Gradual Escalation' doctrine, which calls for flexible use for all nuclear and tactical assets and very differenet from the prior 'massive retaliation' doctrine.

Besides, it'w would be difficult to frame the accident as a Soviet attack. The ground zero is not exactly military significant . Why the USSR would strike a middle sized city first? Also, the US already possessed a early warning system at that time. The President had so many way to by pass the high eschlon and ask the people on the ground the reality.
 
They wouldnt need a bomber to deliver the bomb could of been shipped in with a few neutral country's as the go between. The usa wouldnt want to say it was one of their bombs and anyone that saw it dropped would be dead so they could say anything they wanted.


First of all, there are ways to determine which country that the fission materials the bomb used come from.

Secondly, there is no way that the two superpower would let any of the nuclear weapon to leave the chain of custody and hand over to even friednly non- nuclear countries in the height of Cold War. All the tac nukes deployed overseas remained firmly in US control. Besides, we are talking a very large and heavy bomb here.
 
The best demonstration of the impossibility of this scenario is that it never happened. In fifty years of bombs being flown and trucked and carted about on planes, ships, subs, trucks, railway cars, and god knows what else IT NEVER HAPPENED. It didn't happen to the super cautious Brits, the slightly less cautious French, the overly cocky Americans, the often indifferent Soviets, any of the "new" nuclear powers (not even North Korea, who couldn't even get their TOWER SHOT to detonate), despite enough Broken Arrow accidents to give you nightmares for ten lifetimes.


There were a lot radiological accidents, but no single one nuclear accident. Even Cheryboyl didn't count as nuclear accident in the sense that the reactor didn't go critical and blow up....most civilian nuclear reactors, including the old USSR graphite core reactors, are just not capable of doing that.

Don't forget we are talking about weapons that are considered as nations' prestige and worth more than the same weight of gold. The recent hype of 'nuclear briefcase' has added much confusion.
 
While I don't see a nuke going off accidentally from a fall, there remains the, admittedly minute, possibiltiy of impact-induced mechanical compression triggering a chain reaction without the detonators being involved at all.
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
While I don't see a nuke going off accidentally from a fall, there remains the, admittedly minute, possibiltiy of impact-induced mechanical compression triggering a chain reaction without the detonators being involved at all.


Actually much less than minute. Much less than astronomical. The requirement is for complete implosion, not mere compression. If we were discussing a Uranium "gun-type" bomb (like Little Boy) a accidental compression detonation would be a vanishingly small, but finite possibility; that is why the U.S. never used them for regular deterrence or active patrol flights. (It also disassembled them as soon as possible once the Pu based implosion weapons were in inventory.) Implosion requires perfect timing of the detonation of all of the shaped explosive panels, if even a single HE panel fails to detonate on command (even if only be a fraction of a second) the bomb will fail to ignite. (And, yes, getting that timing right before transistors and fiber optics was a BITCH.)
 

burmafrd

Banned
With any modern nuclear weapon (from 1960 on) there really is NO chance of an accidental full fision/fusion event. As Cal pointed out, its incredible what has to happen to make it work for an implosion device.
No bomb or warhead dropped or shot or whatever is going to go off except as partial detonation of the conventional material. And as more and more insensitive explosive was invented, that possibility now is virtually non existent.

Now prior to fail safe and positive PAL devices, early 50's late 40's, an accidental detonation was more possible. BUT not from an accident like a plane crash, etc. Maybe if a cruder version was hit by lightning at just the right spot....while it was sitting out in the open under a tree in a thunderstorm, with the whole weapon outside of its casing.....
 
Where do you drop a 100MT bomb?!?!?!?!? That like crushing a cockroach with a semi truck!

Its totally impractical and a huge waste. But then again thats the point. Like why would anyone buy a $500,000 sports car that can barely fit 2 people and gets less than 5 MPG. :D

The mentality is the same its one huge dick waving exercise. :rolleyes:
 
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