Nuclear Bunker Buster!! HOOAAAA!

Originally posted by LeftBehind
You may be right about that Starwars, but would the same soldiers want small nuclear bombs used instead?

Would the dead soldiers be happier if we never went to Iraq?

IMO, if countries such as Iraq or NK knew we had the capability to destroy everthing they considered valuable - without needing to resort to invasion or turning their country into a radioactive wasteland - they would probably behave in a way that did not require action in the first place.

Soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines are well aware of what they are getting themselves into when they sign up for service. The majority are very proud of what they are doing in Iraq and would (and do) volunteer for additional assignments there. Of course there are exceptions, and somebody would like to interview each and every one of them, but that is the truth. I cannot tell you what those who have given their life think (or thought), but if you believe in some sort of afterlife, I hope they see that the good that came out of their sacrifices.

I am reminded of a quote ....
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." - George Orwell.
This goes for Iraqi's as well.

Anyway, this was not the intent of this thread - You can either believe that having effective nuclear weapons increases the likelyhood of their use and are therefore bad, or you can believe that they are good because the percieved likelyhood of their use makes them less likely to be used. Thankfully, the experiences of the cold war point towards the latter being more correct. That does not mean that the preceding statement is incorrect. Time will tell.....

The Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator weapons are not safe and do not accomplish their 'Bunker Busting' goal.

feinstein.senate.gov
The depth of penetration of the robust nuclear earth penetrator is limited by the strength of the missile casing. The deepest our current earth penetrator can burrow is 20 to 35 feet of dry earth.

Casing made of even the strongest material cannot withstand the physical force of burrowing through 100 feet of granite to reach a hard or deeply buried target -- much less the 800 feet needed to contain the nuclear blast.

So if a nuclear bunker buster were able to burrow into the earth to reach its maximum feasible penetration depth of 35 feet, it would not be able to be deep enough to contain even a bomb with an explosive yield of only 0.2 kilotons, let alone a 100-kiloton bomb like the robust nuclear earth penetrator.

So given the insurmountable physics problems associated with burrowing a warhead deep into the earth, destroying a target hidden beneath 1,000 feet into rock will require a nuclear weapon of at least 100 kilotons. So anything short of 800 feet will not contain a fallout. A fireball will break through the surface, scattering enormous amounts of radioactive debris -- 1.5 million tons for a 100-kiloton bomb -- into the atmosphere. Is that what we want to be doing as a Nation?

The 1962 Sedan nuclear test at the Nevada Test Site illustrates the enormous destructive effects of a 100-kiloton nuclear blast detonated 635 feet below the surface of the Earth -- far deeper than any robust nuclear earth penetrator can be engineered to go. The radioactive cloud it produced continued to rise as debris settled back to Earth, and the base surge of the explosion rolled over the desert. Even at 635 feet below the ground, the blast could not be contained.

Originally posted by AceOfBase
The Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator weapons are not safe and do not accomplish their 'Bunker Busting' goal.

[url=http://feinstein.senate.gov/04Speeches/bunkerbuster.htm]

This is a purely political stance from one of the most anti-nuclear people in the senate. As quoted in Physics Today by a reputable scientist (arguably with signifigantly mroe expertise on the subjuct than Senator Feinstein) a depth of 50 meters reduces fallout considerably.

This is like saying because Martin Sheen protested ballistic missile defense it must not work and must be unsafe.

We need to back away from the nuclear Barbie, before throw another kind of bomb on. Let us consider using just such a device near a here to for undiscovered earthquake fault or worse yet an emerging volcano. What was intended as bunker buster now has become a weapon of mass distruction. Here another possiblity several vent shafts, unknown to us, shoot out tons of irradiated dust into the atmosphere. Where civilian commnities that have no beef with US get all kinds of lovely cancers for years to come.
America must present another kind of image, we can't on one had develop new nuclear weapons and scowl, Iran, the rest of the world for their pursuit of the bomb. We must present image that nuclear weapon aren't legitmate weapons of war.

Originally posted by Harry12
We must present image that nuclear weapon aren't legitmate weapons of war.

I disagree. War is only an option as long as the costs are reasonable (both human and monetary costs). Nuclear weapons make war too costly for all involved.

Can you name a direct shooting war between two nuclear armed countries? Go ahead, think about it for a while. Nope, sure can't. Look at the improvement in the Indian-Pakistani situation since they both acquired nuclear weapons.

Of course no one wants to be the one to use nuclear weapons, but it is very difficult to argue that the world would be a better place without them.

Originally posted by Starwars51
I disagree. War is only an option as long as the costs are reasonable (both human and monetary costs). Nuclear weapons make war too costly for all involved.

So do you support nuclear armament for nations like Iran?

Originally posted by AceOfBase

So do you support nuclear armament for nations like Iran?

I don't know enough about Iran and how stable and rational their government is or whether they could provide adequate control. The problems with some countries (.... NK ... ) is that their government does not provide their citizens with an even remotely accurate description of the world they live in, which makes it more likely that they would not be opposed to the use of such weapons.

I am not opposed to countries like Pakistan, India or China having them even though I don't neccisarily agree with their beliefs, etc.

I don't see the need for these either.

A version of "soft" nuclear attacks makes the bigger ones a little more acceptable. In years we may begin to consider using battlefield nukes on troops again.

Nuclear Bunker Busters arn't just for the little Rouge States, they were designed with the big Rogue States in mind, Russia and China!

'DEEP DIGGER' concept for destruction of undergroud targets

Originally posted by Rotwang
Well, well... Project Deep Digger,

It's good to see that someone else has stumbled onto this massive project. From my perspective, Deep Digger makes the Manhattan Project look like a High School Science Fair. The implications of Deep Digger are mind boggling, to say the least. If anyone can't see the forest for the trees, just go to Google and type in the words-- tactical unattended ground sensors seismic -- and you will begin to get a feel for the enormity of this project. Here are a few choice examples:
SPIE
Analysis of Unattended Ground Sensors in Theater Missile Defense
AN/SYQ-23 Joint Service Imagery Processing System (JSIPS-N)
Geophysics ? Tactical Unattended Ground Sensors
SEG/EAEG 3D Modeling Committee

As a weapons analyst I can assure you that the end technologies discussed above have marginal, yet effective Tactical applications like bunker busting. If the people designing these 3D seismic imaging and targeting technologies have not realized their potential as a first-strike nuclear weapons system for neutralizing Command and Control, C4I facilities of the Russian Rocket Forces, than they are full blown morons!

They have also tested these 3D seismic honing technologies from space-born platforms at White Sands Missle Test Range with the aid of the Orbital Access Corporation no less than three times. They used Pershing II re-entry vehicles with a redesigned B-61 mod 10 warhead, (Without the Plutonium) to pierce underground bunkers. Humm.... from space.

The Wright Labs Armament Directorate has also been testing and designing Unattended Ground Sensors that can be deployed from orbit. They work!

Well, since we've come this far, let's do some basic math... we have 3D Seismic honing sensor arrays which can be deployed from orbit and we've proven that we can deploy earth-penetrating nuclear warheads from orbit...
humm..... 1+1=

Originally posted by Starwars51

Originally posted by rogue1
A nuclear bunker buster would cause a massive release of radiation. All the material sucked up in the explosion becomes iradiated, causing a radioctive cloud.
Needless to say if this cloud floated over China, Russian, Japan or S Korea - there would be a major problem for the US.
The new technology of nano energetics looks far more promosing. The MOP ( MAssive Ordnance Penetrator ) filled with nanoenergetic fill would on paper seem very effective and clean.

Not true. While a lightly buried weapon does create more fallout, after you penetrate about 200 feet or so (depending on the substance) the amount of radiation released into the atmosphere decreases dramatically. This is why new weapons are needed, current delivery systems are not capable of withstanding the forces needed to tunnel themselves this far.

www.physicstoday.org...

It also depends greatly on the size of the warhead. A 1 kt warhead has to penetrate to a depth of 90m for it to be fully contained. Most of the info on the RNEP calls for a device yield of 10kt, which would throw up a massive cloud of irradited debrees.

The fact remains it is highly doubtful they can get more than 30 meters penetration with the technologies being investigated today and in the near future.

If they could somehow develop an ultra deep penetration warhead then a nanoenergetic explosive would have enough punch to do the job.

Originally posted by djohnsto77
Nuclear bunker-busters are necessary. Shep Smith on Fox News was on television visiting one of Saddam's underground bunkers that was built under a palace that was hit with like 30 missiles and bombs yet the underground bunker was untouched.

Thank European constructors for building em, back when Saddam was on US favor.

Originally posted by rogue1


The fact remains it is highly doubtful they can get more than 30 meters penetration with the technologies being investigated today and in the near future.

This is more a function of politcs than technology. The ICBM RV's in use today could probably penetrate at least 15-20 meters with no problem. However their warheads are in the 300kt range, so that is of little use in containing the detonation.

If the US was able (it's restricted by it's own laws) to investigate new RV designs and warheads rather than being forced to use existing warheads and only bomber deliverable systems (which can be used for conventional weapons and thus are legally/politcally more palatable) 90 meters and 1kt would be a pretty easy accomplishment.

Like I have said, this is much more of a political than a techinical discussion.

I disagree that the technical hurtles are easy to overcome. Best depth penetration, conventional, is 50-60 meter. As much of a pro-military, pro-Bush, pro-Iraqi invasion hawk as I am, I do not see the need for these weapons. The greatest amount of fallout, during a full scale nuclear war (projected by the DoD), was the fall out from ground & sub-ground burst against silos. An airburst does not produce the same amount of fallout as a G or SG burst. Depth of penetration cannot be attained with today's technology.

Here is an interesting article about Orbital Bombardment:
www.maxwell.af.mil...

Sections relevant to this topic can be found in Chapters 2 (pg:9) & 4 (pg:71). All page numbers are from the actual document. The page numbers from the .pdf are Ch 2 = 20; Ch 4 = 71.

A potential strategic problem with stating that we are going to build nuclear bunker busters (NBB) is the new build depths. As soon as we build our crop of NBB, bunkers will be build deeper. Best way, mentioned in the research paper (Ch. 4), is to have existing capabilities and hit entrances and exits. Invest monies into advanced metallurgy and develop compounds that can withstand the forces necessary to hit bunkers from low orbit…Oh and do it in secret this time.

I had hoped that those in power had realized that nuclear weapons were the bastard children of a war that ended long ago, and that they should never use such weapons again. Sadly, I was wrong (not that my cynical ass was expecting any less ). I used to be pro-war, pro-invasion earlier in my life, but now I'm very much anti... well... I'm anti-a lot of things.


Okay, bunker busters with nuclear material. Yeah, nuclear arms will blow apart just about anything you want them to. They'll make conventional weapons seem like peashooters. They'll be just as easy to deploy, too. And it's that little fact that makes me against them. They'll make war easier, make war quicker, and cause less deaths for your side. I don't like seeing war get easier. It just makes it an easier option that people will rely more upon. War shouldn't be easy. War should be difficult and a task that no one on earth would ever want to repeat.


Having these in American hands is bad enough. I'm already insulted that we and our allies can have all the illegal weaponry we want, but if any weaker nation getting ahold of them gets threatened to be bombed into oblivion. But if you get two or more opposing nations with these things, the results will not be pretty, and probably pave the way for larger nuclear weapons to be labelled 'okay'.


Using them as a weapon of fear... heh, yeah, you can have a certain kind of peace through fear if you're threatening a nation that can't defend against them. But that kind of peace is generally fleeting because once you get enough people pissed at you for flaunting power, you've got revolt on your hands. It's happened enough in the past.


As it is, conventional weapons will get our jobs done adequately well. I never liked having overly powerful weapons or technology. This just seems like far too much, and the consequences for using them seem too damn risky. Nuclear technology should be put to work for something else (space, power, things that don't involve blowing giant holes in a planet).









Go ahead and yell if you want. I'm used to it. XD