An Iraqi nuclear trap?

In the early stages of the colition invasion of Iraq in 1991, troop peace was so scarce that the major generals thought that the Iraqis would lure the American and British troops into the the desert and detonate a nuke. What if they did? A really small nuke for 1991, 30 kiltons. But three divisions are trapped in the blast radius. How would the war go differently? What would national response be?
 
30 kt is peanuts, sorry. That's 1/3 more than Nagasaki one. Consdering it's ground burst effects would be samll. Not something you can shrug off but not soething that is catastrophic.
 
Probably not too bad - the Coalition forces were very armour-heavy and were buttoned up expecting a chemical weapons attack. You'll end up with a lot of mission or mobility-killed tanks, and probably quite a few cancers in later life, but not particularly large immediate casualties.

As for response, I would suggest that it would start with Saddam getting a nuclear weapon through his bedroom window and working up from there...
 
ASB. They didn't have any nukes.
Unlikely, but not ASB - Iraq was at the time well progressed with a nuclear weapons program, and it wasn't clear how far they'd made it. There were assessments postwar that they were as little as a year from their first test, and three from a deliverable weapon.

A slightly earlier start, and it's not impossible for the first Iraqi nuclear device to be ready for testing at the time of the war. A few poor decisions, and the prototype device is despatched to the vincinity of Kuwait and used as a nuclear landmine.

There will be absolutely no international criticism of the nuclear retaliation against Iraq or the subsequent United Nations-led occupation. Possibly no Al Qaeda, given the lessened Western presence in Saudi Arabia. With Arab nations on board with the occupation and de-Baathification of Iraq, that goes somewhat smoother than post-2003 IOTL, though some sort of pushback is likely.
 
A ground detonation against dispersed mechanized troops is not especially useful. Say that 100% of the troops within 1000 meters are killed (and that is a very high estimate) and 50% in the range 1000-2000 meter. Outside that I doubt any troops inside armored vehicles would be affected.

In 1991 the Coalition had a lot of space to manuver in, GPS guidance and total air control. They spread out, partly to avoid any WMDs.

So a battalion is killed outright. Let say another battalion suffers 50% losses. That would be somewhere between 1 000-1 500 men. The military effect would be very small, but the political would be far bigger. It also depends om which country is the target - US, Britain, France, Saudi Arabia or someone else.

My guess is that UN Security Council demands that Iraq is occupied, de-nuked and that Saddam is dragged to Hague. The Coalition would probably agree, and I see no problem in invading Iraq.

But now the butterfilies starts. Would the occupation be a success - Saddam had not prepared any guerilla warfare campaign in 1991 as he did 2003. What would happen with radical islamism when an arab muslim were the first to use nukes against muslims, not Israel, US or the Soviets?

A good source for nukes is http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/
 
US has always maintained that if WMDs are used against them, they'll respond in kind.

So, every Iraqi army base disappears under a mushroom cloud?

More likely, an Iraqi army base disappears under a mushroom cloud, and the US says 'unconditional surrender, bitches'.
 
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