The Big Bang: The weapon that changed the world
‘I am become death, the destroyer
of worlds’
– J. Robert Oppenheimer (creator
of the Atomic Bomb)
Few things
can legitimately claim to have changed the course of world history. The events
of July 16th, 1945 are one of them. The world’s largest explosion was detonated
in the New Mexico desert. Windows were blown out in homes up to 100 miles away,
the flash could be seen at double that distance. The official story told even
the 120,000 employees who worked on the experiment of an enormous explosion at
an ammunition dump. In reality, only a handful of people – including President
Truman and Prime Minister Winston Churchill – knew that this was the result of
a six year experiment to move the goalposts of modern warfare, a project to
build, test and unleash the most powerful weapon in the history of mankind. This
massive explosion, the culmination of the greatest search for an instrument of
death ever undertaken, reportedly prompted only two words from its chief
creator: ‘It worked’.
In the
first part of this article, Political Sticks looks at the history and the
future of Nuclear weapons around the world:
Today: What are they? How powerful are
they? Who invented them? Who has them?
Next week: Who wants them? Who’s used them?
Arguments for and arguments against.
What is a nuclear bomb?
Explosions
from ‘normal’ bombs use only the energy from the rapid burning of chemical
compounds and energy is released from the outermost particles leaving the atoms
intact. Nuclear bombs, on the other hand, fire highly radioactive and unstable
enriched uranium and plutonium atoms towards each other and splitting them in a
process known as fission. The colossal amount of energy released in a chain
reaction results in the most powerful explosion possible.
How powerful are they?
Unimaginably
powerful. The atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945 killed around 75,000
people instantly. Thirteen square kilometres of the city was completely
obliterated and the temperature in heart of the explosion reached several
million degrees centigrade.
That
bomb was a 15 kilotonne device. Today, Russia has developed the ‘Tsar Bomba’ - a
100 megatonne (or 100,000 kilotonne) bomb.
Below is
an example taken from the wonderfully named ‘Nukemap’ website showing the
effects of a Tsar Bomba dropped on central London. (You too can plot your own
Armageddon scenario and unleash a nuclear weapon on your home town by visiting www.nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap).
Source:
nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/
Who invented them?
J.
Robert Oppenheimer, an American scientist, is the man widely regarded as being
the inventor of the atomic bomb in 1945.
The
British Government knew by 1941 that they had the knowledge to build an atomic
bomb, but were aware also that they simply did not have the capacity to do so
whilst engaged in a full scale war with Germany. So Prime Minister Winston
Churchill turned to President Roosevelt, instigating a British-American-Canadian
atomic bomb project with the signing of the Quebec Agreement in 1942.
The
Agreement merged the British-Canadian ‘Tube Alloys’ nuclear research programme
with the American ‘Manhattan Project’. The new look Manhattan Project
eventually employed over 120,000 people and cost in the region of $26billion.
Oppenheimer
was selected to lead the Manhattan Project’s secret weapons laboratory and
three years later watched tensely as his calculations and theories took centre
stage in the New Mexico desert.
Who has them?
At the
beginning of 2013, eight states are known to have nuclear capability: USA,
Russia, United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan and North Korea.
Israel is
widely believed to have nuclear weapons but maintains a policy of strategic
ambiguity, although there is extensive evidence to suggest the existence of
nuclear weapons or a near-ready nuclear weapons capability, and President Jimmy
Carter stated in 2008 that Israel ‘has 150 or more’ nuclear weapons.
Five
states - Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and Turkey - have access to
nuclear weapons controlled by the USA under the NATO nuclear weapons sharing
agreement, and four states are known to have formerly possessed them: Belarus,
Kazakhstan and Ukraine being former Soviet Union states that returned their
weapons to Russia in the mid-1990s. South Africa is the only state to have
developed its own nuclear weapons and voluntarily dismantled them later.
The
majority of states in the world have signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (commonly known as the
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty – or NPT). Signatories of the NPT agree to the 3-pillars
of the Treaty:
Non-proliferation:
A nuclear state will not help, encourage or assist any non-nuclear state in the acquirement of nuclear capabilities
Disarmament:
The treaty describes a vague obligation to the signatories to move in the general direction of total disarmament.
Sharing of nuclear technology for peaceful use:
Nuclear states agree to share the benefits of peaceful nuclear technology provided non-nuclear states adhere to the first pillar.
Information
on nuclear capacity is notoriously difficult to present with any real guarantee
of accuracy. That notwithstanding, below is what is believed to be the best and
most recent reflection:
World Nuclear Forces – end of 2012
|
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Nuclear weapon states
recognized by the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970
|
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Country:
|
Total Inventory:1
|
Year of first
test:
|
|
United States
|
7,700
|
1945
|
|
Russia
|
8,500
|
1949
|
|
United Kingdom
|
225
|
1952
|
|
France
|
300
|
1960
|
|
China
|
240
|
1964
|
|
Nuclear weapon states that did
not sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970
|
|||
Country:
|
Total Inventory: 1
|
Year of first
test:
|
|
India
|
80-100
|
1974
|
|
Pakistan
|
90-110
|
1998
|
|
North Korea
|
<10
|
2006
|
|
Undeclared nuclear powers
|
|||
Country:
|
Total Inventory:1
|
Year of first
test:
|
|
Israel
|
80
|
Undeclared (possibly
1979)
|
|
NATO Nuclear weapons sharing
states
|
|||
Country:
|
Total Inventory:[2]
|
The U.S. has provided 160-250 nuclear
weapons for storage and deployment under NATO weapons sharing. U.S. nuclear
weapons were also deployed in Canada until 1984, and in Greece until 2001 for
nuclear sharing purposes.
|
|
Belgium
|
10-20
|
||
Germany
|
20-40
|
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Netherlands
|
10-20
|
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Italy
|
70-90
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Turkey
|
50-90
|
||
States formerly possessing
nuclear weapons
|
|||
Belarus
|
The fall of the Soviet Union left
these former Soviet republics in possession of nuclear weapons. All weapons
were transferred to Russia by 1996.
|
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Kazakhstan
|
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Ukraine
|
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South Africa
|
The only state to develop and later
dismantle its nuclear weapons.
|
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North Korea:
The
current and unceasing military posturing by the Democratic People's Republic of
Korea is causing fear and instability not only in the region but also across
the Western world.
Little
is known about the state, but it is considered to have recently made the
advancement from crude nuclear deterrent capability to a fully-fledged nuclear
power boasting an arsenal quite likely to contain a substantial amount of
chemical weapons. Even less is known about the qualities, state of mind and
agenda of the leader of this state.
What we
do know is that North Korea withdrew from the NPT in 2003 and continues to
develop and test nuclear weapons – at least three, possibly five, nuclear tests
have been conducted since 2006, the latest of which came in February of 2013
and prompted sanctions to be imposed on the country by the US. Leader Kim
Jong-Un’s response was to threaten a nuclear attack on the US, missile strikes
on US bases and all-out war with South Korea.
Whether
this threat was genuine or merely the aggressive rhetoric of a young leader
pounding his chest is almost immaterial. It forced the US to bolster forces in
the region thereby escalating the situation with Secretary of State John Kerry
citing Washington’s distaste for reckless and irrational provocation.
The US wants
to stop Kim Jong-Un picking a fight that escalates beyond words, but even the Americans
aren’t sure what Kim’s agenda is. The question remains: where does this
situation end? The answer, unfortunately, is that no-one really knows.
NEXT WEEK: Check back next week for the second part of the article including the use of nuclear weapons, the immediate proliferation concerns, and common arguments for and against nuclear proliferation.
Click on the links below to read previous content from Political Sticks:
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