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China’s strategy in its nuclear weapons buildup

China’s Nuclear Gambit

Don’t be distracted by the aerial incursions and naval build-ups – the real action is China’s nuclear build-up, in the hopes of deterring any U.S. intervention in a regional conflict. The Diplomat, By Valerie Niquet, November 06, 2021

 ”……………………………….. Anxious not to suffer the fate of the Soviet Union, China has always refused to be dragged into an unwinnable arms race with the United States. A guaranteed second-strike nuclear capability is enough to achieve China’s objectives. But that objective is threatened by U.S. conventional precision strike capabilities, superiority in next-generation ISR, and ballistic missile defense developments at the regional level. This last aspect threatens the deterrent effect of China’s nuclear-capable middle-range ballistic missiles, which can target U.S. bases in Asia as well as the United States’ closest allies in the region.

China’s nuclear doctrine and objectives have not changed fundamentally. Credible nuclear capabilities have always been part of China’s strategy of deterrence and anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) against the United States. By reinforcing the credibility and certainty of its second-strike capability, China expects to deter the United States from intervening in a regional conflict, for example, Taiwan’s “reunification” by force or grey zone tactics. China wants to assert its capacity in order to make use of a set of pressure tactics, using public opinion in the United States as well as among U.S. allies such as Japan. In the event of a conflict in the Taiwan Strait, Japan would be very nearly on the frontline. However, Japan is also extremely risk-averse and vulnerable to threats of missile strikes from China.

To win in a regional conflict, China must maintain pressure to dissuade the United States from intervention by using the threat of escalation, to make the  idea of intervention impossible to fathom. China is playing on reticence among the U.S. public to engage in asymmetric wars, where one side projects a high level of will when the other seems to be less involved. China is betting on a “Munich moment,” relying on its nuclear capabilities to keep any future conflict local or even under the threshold of war, thereby winning without fighting.

The acceleration of silo construction and the testing of new “game-changing” arms are all part of a nuclear signaling game in times of peace that serve to demonstrate China’s determination and impress the adversary. By increasing these capacities, China is testing the sole guarantor of strategic stability in Asia, the United States, and the will of the U.S. to intervene…..  https://thediplomat.com/2021/11/chinas-nuclear-gambit/

November 6, 2021 Posted by | China, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Why the Pentagon Is Equipping the F-35 With a Thermonuclear Bomb

Why the Pentagon Is Equipping the F-35 With a Thermonuclear Bomb, Popular Mechanics,  A man with a bomb can do things a missile with a bomb can’t. BY KYLE MIZOKAMINOV 5, 2021  

November 6, 2021 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Moving to peace and security – by ratifying the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty

Ratifying the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty is the way to ensure peace  The Hill BY IVANA NIKOLIĆ HUGHES AND HART RAPAPORT, — 11/04/21  The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) — the international agreement governing use of nuclear weapons — turned 25 in September. The anniversary, ordinarily a time to celebrate the careful diplomacy that led to such an achievement, was tempered by the continued refusal of the U.S. government to accede to a document that it negotiated. The resulting void created by this lack of leadership threatens to overturn a decades-long period of relative nuclear peace. There is only one option to hem in the dangerous proliferation of nuclear weapons that has led nations such as Iran and North Korea to the precipice of nuclear power: Ratify the CTBT and ensure it enters into force……………

 ratification would allow the newly-empowered CTBT and its accompanying oversight organization to benefit from the consent of the world’s most powerful government in creating an international norm against nuclear testing. Currently, nations such as Russia — which is party to the CTBT — face little substantial backlash for their detonations. After all, they can easily point to the United States’s refusal to accede to the treaty as proof of the validity of their own actions. These excuses would lose their power after ratification, with future actions against those nations’ international commitments subject to pushback through the full power of the nearly 200 CTBT signatories marshaled by the United States.

To fully enter force, the CTBT also must be signed by seven nations — China, Egypt, India, Iran, Israel, North Korea and Pakistan — aside from the United States. Achieving this would be a difficult diplomatic effort, but it is possible. These nations’ refusals to sign are largely based on a geopolitical rival’s — India with Pakistan, and vice versa, for example — failure to sign and ratify the document. This presents an opportunity for American foreign policy to work at its best by bringing these pairs of nations to the bargaining table concurrently to hash out any testing-related difficulties. It may be unreasonable to assume that all of the states are willing to do so, but the reduction in geopolitical tensions and chance of nuclear mishaps from even a single additional state pledging not to test nuclear weapons would be substantial. Of course, this can only happen after the United States ratifies the document and commits to support its tenets in the international arena.

During a time of increased partisan polarization in Congress, a domestic and international priority such as the CTBT provides a gateway for politicians from both parties to focus on what matters to the American people: ensuring that nuclear threats do not dominate the 21st century like they did in the latter half of the 20th century. It would send a strong signal to the rest of the world that our political elite can still collaborate to ensure that America remains a defining member of the international community after years of disengagement. If nothing else, it would ensure that time and money can be spent on today’s true priorities — among them, cybersecurity, climate change and infrastructure development — rather than those of the past.


Ivana Nikolić Hughes is a senior lecturer in chemistry at Columbia University and the director of Columbia’s Center for Nuclear Studies.

Hart Rapaport is a research assistant at Columbia’s Center for Nuclear Studies. https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/579506-ratifying-the-comprehensive-nuclear-test-ban-treaty-is-the-way-to

November 6, 2021 Posted by | politics international, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Biden faces Pentagon hawks in his effort to curb nuclear weapons spending

Nuclear arms hawks give bureaucratic mauling to Biden vow to curb arsenal, Guardian,  Julian Borger in Washington, Wed 3 Nov 2021 Defence budget and nuclear posture review are battlegrounds as Republicans seek to block limits on US use of weapons,

A battle is being fought in Washington over the Biden administration’s nuclear weapons policy, amid fears by arms control advocates that the president will renege on campaign promises to rein in the US arsenal.

The battlegrounds are a nuclear posture review (NPR) due early next year and a defence budget expected about the same time. At stake is a chance to put the brakes on an arms race between the US, Russia and China – or the risk of that race accelerating.

Despite Biden’s pledge during the campaign – and in his interim national security guidance issued in March – that his administration would reduce “our reliance and excessive expenditure on nuclear weapons”, hawks at the Pentagon have won the early skirmishes.

Biden is also under pressure from some allies, nervous about Biden’s past support for limiting the use of nuclear weapons to the “sole purpose” of deterring, and retaliating against, a nuclear attack on the US or its allies.

The current US posture is broader, leaving open a nuclear response to “significant non-nuclear strategic attacks”. Britain and France also retain a certain amount of ambiguity about when they would use their weapons, and are concerned a US change to “sole purpose” would oblige them ultimately to narrow their options. Paris has taken the lead in conveying those anxieties, and Emmanuel Macron raised nuclear posture issues with Biden when the two met in Rome on Friday.

The big struggle, however, is on the home front, where arms control advocates are on the defensive.

The administration’s first defence budget in February included $43bn for an array of nuclear modernisation schemes, including controversial programmes introduced by Donald Trump, like a new sea-launched cruise missile. The total cost of modernisation could be over $1.5tn.

In September, one of Biden’s political appointees at the Pentagon, Leonor Tomero, who questioned the need for such a vast and growing nuclear weapons budget, was forced out in a bureaucratic power struggle after just nine months in the post. Her job had been to oversee the drafting of the NPR, which sets out what nuclear weapons the US should have and under what conditions they could be used…………..

Senator Edward Markey, a Democrat, has written to Biden demanding to know why Tomero had been removed in the midst of drafting the NPR, demanding to know if “ideology played any role”.

………..Nickolas Roth, the director of the nuclear security programme at the Stimson Center thinktank, said: “I am concerned that the removal of Leonor from her position will have a chilling effect throughout the Biden administration, on those who might be willing to propose anything other than the status quo for US nuclear weapons policy.”

………….  China’s nuclear weapons development, including the recent reported testing of a nuclear-capable hypersonic glider launched from orbit, has increased the political pressure on Biden to abandon his arms control pledges, although the Chinese arsenal is still dwarfed by the US total of 3,750 warheads.

Emma Belcher, the president of the Ploughshares Fund, an arms control advocacy organisation, argued that China’s rise as a nuclear weapons power only underlines the urgency of arms control.

“The best way to control the situation and head off an arms race with China is through diplomacy and restraint,” Belcher said. “We’ve seen this movie before. It’s expensive and dangerous. So what we’re hoping we’ll see from the NPR is for diplomacy to be put first, and an off ramp from a new kind of cold war.” https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/03/nuclear-arms-joe-biden-pentagon-hawks

November 4, 2021 Posted by | politics, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

China increasing its nuclear arsenal, but still far smaller than USA’s


China increasing nuclear arsenal much faster than was thought, Pentagon says .  Guardian, China is expanding its nuclear force much faster than US officials predicted just a year ago, highlighting a broad and accelerating buildup of military muscle designed to enable Beijing to match or surpass US global power by mid-century, according to a new Pentagon report.

The number of Chinese nuclear warheads could increase to 700 within six years, the report said, and may top 1,000 by 2030. The report released on Wednesday did not say how many weapons China has today, but a year ago the Pentagon said the number was in the “low 200s” and was likely to double by the end of this decade.

The numbers would still be significantly smaller than the current US nuclear stockpile of about 3,750 nuclear weapons. The Biden administration is undertaking a comprehensive review of its nuclear policy and has not said how that might be influenced by its China concerns………… https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/03/china-increasing-nuclear-arsenal-much-faster-than-was-thought-pentagon-says

November 4, 2021 Posted by | China, weapons and war | Leave a comment

U.S. Discloses Nuclear Weapons Stockpile Numbers


U.S. Discloses Nuclear Stockpile Numbers, November 2021, By Shannon Bugos, Arms Control Association

The Biden administration has publicly released the total number of nuclear weapons in the U.S. stockpile, a sharp reversal of the previous administration’s refusal to do so for the past three years…………

The U.S. stockpile of nuclear warheads was at 3,750 as of September 2020, according to the administration document. This number captures active and inactive warheads, but not the roughly 2,000 retired warheads awaiting dismantlement. The document lists stockpile numbers going back to 1962, including the warhead numbers from the years when the Trump administration refused to declassify the information.

This number represents an approximate 88 percent reduction in the stockpile from its maximum (31,255) at the end of fiscal year 1967, and an approximate 83 percent reduction from its level (22,217) when the Berlin Wall fell in late 1989,” the document said.

Despite a significant overall reduction, the updated figures show the scale of reductions to the stockpile has diminished in recent years and even reflect a 20 warhead increase between September 2018 and September 2019 under the Trump administration.

The Biden administration also disclosed how many nuclear warheads the Energy Department has dismantled each year since 1994, for a total of 11,683. The Obama administration decided in 2010, for the first time, to release the entire history of the size of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile. The Trump administration declassified the stockpile data for 2017, but did not do so again for the following years…………  https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2021-11/news/us-discloses-nuclear-stockpile-numbers

November 2, 2021 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Mohamed bin Zayed Receives Nazarbayev Prize for a Nuclear-Weapon-Free World and Global Security


BY ASSEL SATUBALDINA in INTERNATIONAL on 1 NOVEMBER 2021

NUR-SULTAN – Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces Mohamed bin Zayed received the Nazarbayev Prize for a Nuclear-Weapon-Free World and Global Security on Oct. 28 for his contribution to peace, regional stability, and sustainable economic development during the meeting with Former Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev, reports the press service of First President.

The award was established in 2016 with a goal to urge international actors to pursue more vigorous efforts to rid the world of nuclear weapons. King Abdullah II of Jordan was the first person to receive the prestigious award back in 2017 during his visit to Kazakhstan. ……….. https://astanatimes.com/2021/11/mohamed-bin-zayed-receives-nazarbayev-prize-for-a-nuclear-weapon-free-world-and-global-security/

November 2, 2021 Posted by | Kazakhstan, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Hidden agenda: Will COP26 let nuclear power in the door and, if so, why?

Hidden agenda — Beyond Nuclear International  October 31, 2021    https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2021/10/31/hidden-agenda/

—  The unspoken argument for more nuclear power, By Linda Pentz Gunter

Not that the two things are unconnected. The civilian nuclear power industry is desperately scrambling to find a way into the COP climate solutions. It has rebranded itself as “zero-carbon”, which is a lie. And this lie goes unchallenged by our willing politicians who blithely repeat it. Are they really that lazy and stupid? Possibly not. Read on.

Nuclear power isn’t a climate solution of course. It can make no plausible financial case, compared with renewables and energy efficiency, nor can it deliver nearly enough electricity in time to stay the inexorable onrush of climate catastrophe. It is too slow, too expensive, too dangerous, hasn’t solved its lethal waste problem and presents a potentially disastrous security and proliferation risk. 

New, small, fast reactors will make plutonium, essential to the nuclear weapons industry as Henry Sokolski and Victor Gilinsky of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center continue to point out. Some of these so-called micro-reactors would be used to power the military battlefield. The Tennessee Valley Authority is already using two of its civilian nuclear reactors to produce tritium, another key “ingredient” for nuclear weapons and a dangerous blurring of the military and civil nuclear lines.

So here we are again at another COP (Conference of the Parties). Well, some of us are in Glasgow, Scotland at the COP itself, and some of us, this writer included, are sitting at a distance, trying to feel hopeful.

But this is COP 26. That means there have already been 25 tries at dealing with the once impending and now upon us climate crisis. Twenty five rounds of “blah, blah, blah” as youth climate activist, Greta Thunberg, so aptly put it. 

So if some of us do not feel the blush of optimism on our cheeks, we can be forgiven. I mean, even the Queen of England has had enough of the all-talk-and-no-action of our world leaders, who have been, by and large, thoroughly useless. Even, this time, absent. Some of them have been worse than that.  

Not doing anything radical on climate at this stage is fundamentally a crime against humanity. And everything else living on Earth. It should be grounds for an appearance at the International Criminal Court. In the dock.

But what are the world’s greatest greenhouse gas emitters consumed with right now? Upgrading and expanding their nuclear weapons arsenals. Another crime against humanity. It’s as if they haven’t even noticed that our planet is already going quite rapidly to hell in a handbasket. They’d just like to hasten things along a bit by inflicting a nuclear armageddon on us as well.

Not that the two things are unconnected. The civilian nuclear power industry is desperately scrambling to find a way into the COP climate solutions. It has rebranded itself as “zero-carbon”, which is a lie. And this lie goes unchallenged by our willing politicians who blithely repeat it. Are they really that lazy and stupid? Possibly not. Read on.

Nuclear power isn’t a climate solution of course. It can make no plausible financial case, compared with renewables and energy efficiency, nor can it deliver nearly enough electricity in time to stay the inexorable onrush of climate catastrophe. It is too slow, too expensive, too dangerous, hasn’t solved its lethal waste problem and presents a potentially disastrous security and proliferation risk. 

Nuclear power is so slow and expensive that it doesn’t even matter whether or not it is ‘low-carbon’ (let alone ‘zero-carbon’). As the economist, Amory Lovins, says, “ Being carbon-free does not establish climate-effectiveness.” If an energy source is too slow and too costly, it will “reduce and retard achievable climate protection,” no matter how ‘low-carbon’ it is.

New, small, fast reactors will make plutonium, essential to the nuclear weapons industry as Henry Sokolski and Victor Gilinsky of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center continue to point out. Some of these so-called micro-reactors would be used to power the military battlefield. The Tennessee Valley Authority is already using two of its civilian nuclear reactors to produce tritium, another key “ingredient” for nuclear weapons and a dangerous blurring of the military and civil nuclear lines.

Keeping existing reactors going, and building new ones, maintains the lifeline of personnel and know-how needed by the nuclear weapons sector. Dire warnings are being sounded in the halls of power about the threat to national security should the civil nuclear sector fade away.

This is more than a hypothesis. It is all spelled out in numerous documents from bodies such as The Atlantic Council to The Energy Futures Initiative. It has been well researched by two stellar academics at the University of Sussex in the UK — Andy Stirling and Phil Johnstone. It’s just almost never talked about. Including by those of us in the anti-nuclear power movement, much to Stirling and Johnstone’s consternation.

But in a way it’s just glaringly obvious. As we in the anti-nuclear movement wrack our brains to understand why our perfectly empirical and compelling arguments against using nuclear power for climate fall perpetually on deaf ears, we are maybe missing the fact that the nuclear-is-essential-for-climate arguments we hear are just one big smokescreen.

At least, let’s hope so. Because the alternative means that our politicians really are that lazy and stupid, and also gullible, or in the pockets of the big polluters, whether nuclear or fossil fuel, or possibly all of the above. And if that’s the case, we must brace ourselves for more “blah, blah, blah” at COP 26 and a truly horrible outlook for present and future generations.

We are grateful, therefore, to our colleagues attending COP 26, who will be promoting— rather than tilting at —windmills as they make their case, one more time, that nuclear power has no place in, and in fact hinders, climate solutions. 

And I hope they will also point out that expensive and obsolete nuclear power should never be promoted — under the false guise of a climate solution — as an excuse to perpetuate the nuclear weapons industry.

Linda Pentz Gunter is the International specialist at Beyond Nuclear and writes for and edits Beyond Nuclear International.

November 1, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change, spinbuster, weapons and war | Leave a comment

The untold story of the world’s biggest nuclear bomb

The Tsar Bomba is dead; long live the Tsar Bomba. As the United States, Russia, and China seem to be engaged in new arms races in several domains, including unusual and new forms of nuclear delivery vehicles, the Tsar Bomba is a potent example of how nationalism, fear, and high-technology can combine in a fashion that is ultimately dangerous, wasteful, and pointless.

The untold story of the world’s biggest nuclear bomb,  Bulletin,  By Alex Wellerstein, October 29, 2021   n the early hours of October 30, 1961, a bomber took off from an airstrip in northern Russia and began its flight through cloudy skies over the frigid Arctic island of Novaya Zemlya. Slung below the plane’s belly was a nuclear bomb the size of a small school bus—the largest and most powerful bomb ever created.

At 11:32 a.m., the bombardier released the weapon. As the bomb fell, an enormous parachute unfurled to slow its descent, giving the pilot time to retreat to a safe distance. A minute or so later, the bomb detonated. A cameraman watching from the island recalled:

A fire-red ball of enormous size rose and grew. It grew larger and larger, and when it reached enormous size, it went up. Behind it, like a funnel, the whole earth seemed to be drawn in. The sight was fantastic, unreal, and the fireball looked like some other planet. It was an unearthly spectacle! [1]

The flash alone lasted more than a minute. The fireball expanded to nearly six miles in diameter—large enough to include the entire urban core of Washington or San Francisco, or all of midtown and downtown Manhattan. Over several minutes it rose and mushroomed into a massive cloud. Within ten minutes, it had reached a height of 42 miles and a diameter of some 60 miles. One civilian witness remarked that it was “as if the Earth was killed.” Decades later, the weapon would be given the name it is most commonly known by today: Tsar Bomba, meaning “emperor bomb.”

Designed to have a maximum explosive yield of 100 million tons (or 100 megatons) of TNT equivalent, the 60,000-pound monster bomb was detonated at only half its strength. Still, at 50 megatons, it was more than 3,300 times as powerful as the atomic bomb that killed at least 70,000 people in Hiroshima, and more than 40 times as powerful as the largest nuclear bomb in the US arsenal today. Its single test represents about one tenth of the total yield of all nuclear weapons ever tested by all nations.[2]

At the time of its detonation, the Tsar Bomba held the world’s attention, largely as an object of infamy, recklessness, and terror. Within two years, though, the Soviet Union and the United States would sign and ratify the Limited Test Ban Treaty, prohibiting atmospheric nuclear weapons testing, and the 50-megaton bomb would fall into relative obscurity.

From the very beginning, the United States sought to minimize the importance of the 50-megaton test, and it became fashionable in both the United States and the former Soviet Union to dismiss it as a political stunt with little technical or strategic importance. But recently declassified files from the Kennedy administration now indicate that the Tsar Bomba was taken far more seriously as a weapon, and possibly as something to emulate, than ever was indicated publicly.

And memoirs from former Soviet weapons workers, only recently available outside Russia, make clear that the gigantic bomb’s place in the history of Soviet thermonuclear weapons may be far more important than has been appreciated. Sixty years after the detonation, it’s now finally possible to piece together a deeper understanding of the creation of the Tsar Bomba and its broader impacts.

The Tsar Bomba is not just a subject for history; some of the same dynamics exist today. It is not just the story of a single weapon that was detonated six decades ago, but a parable about political posturing and technical enablement that applies just as acutely today. In a new era of nuclear weapons and delivery competition, the Tsar Bomba is a potent example of how nationalism, fear, and high-technology can combine in a fashion that is ultimately dangerous, wasteful, and pointless.

From kilotons to megatons to gigatons

…………………….. By the spring of 1951, Edward Teller and Stanislaw Ulam at Los Alamos had developed their design for a workable hydrogen bomb

………………. Only a few months later, in July 1954, Teller made it clear he thought 15 megatons was child’s play. At a secret meeting of the General Advisory Committee of the Atomic Energy Commission, Teller broached, as he put it, “the possibility of much bigger bangs.” At his Livermore laboratory, he reported, they were working on two new weapon designs, dubbed Gnomon and Sundial. Gnomon would be 1,000 megatons and would be used like a “primary” to set off Sundial, which would be 10,000 megatons. Most of Teller’s testimony remains classified to this day, but other scientists at the meeting recorded, after Teller had left, that they were “shocked” by his proposal. “It would contaminate the Earth,” one suggested. Physicist I. I. Rabi, by then an experienced Teller skeptic, suggested it was probably just an “advertising stunt.”[4] But he was wrong; Livermore would for several years continue working on Gnomon, at least, and had even planned to test a prototype for the device in Operation Redwing in 1956 (but the test never took place).[5]

All of which is to say that the idea of making hydrogen bombs in the hundreds-of-megatons yield range was hardly unusual in the late 1950s. If anything, it was tame compared to the gigaton ambitions of one of the H-bomb’s inventors. It is hard to convey the damage of a gigaton bomb, because at such yields many traditional scaling laws do not work (the bomb blows a hole in the atmosphere, essentially). However, a study from 1963 suggested that, if detonated 28 miles (45 kilometers) above the surface of the Earth, a 10,000-megaton weapon could set fires over an area 500 miles (800 kilometers) in diameter. Which is to say, an area about the size of France.[6]………………………….

Planning for a 100-megaton bomb……………

Russian accounts by participants claim Arzamas-16 scientists had been inspired, in part, by speculations about gigantic, gigaton-range bombs in the foreign press in May 1960. The physicist and designer Victor Adamski said that Sakharov and others tried to immediately assess the plausibility of the news reports, and came up with the schema that was ultimately used for the Tsar Bomba…………………

Sakharov was already queasy about the long-term deaths from nuclear fallout, and he wanted to minimize the excess radioactivity produced by the test. In 1958, he had calculated that for every megaton of even “clean” nuclear weapons, there would be some 6,600 premature deaths over the next 8,000 years across the globe, owing to carbon atoms in the atmosphere that would become radioactive under the bomb’s neutron flux.[17………………….

An American Tsar Bomba?

…………………  Even after denouncing the Tsar Bomba as pointless terrorism, there were scientists and military planners working for the US government who were considering nuclear weapons with yields 20 times larger……………….

The Limited Test Ban Treaty

In 1963, the United States stood at a crossroads. Down one path was a new generation of “very high-yield” nuclear weapons with continued atmospheric nuclear testing. Down the other was the possibility of the Limited Test Ban Treaty, which would ban future atmospheric testing, effectively precluding the development of high-yield weapons.

……………….. even while the United States professed to not care about “very high-yield” weapons, it continued to study them well into the Johnson administration. 

…………. the Soviets never broke the Limited Test Ban Treaty, and smaller warheads became the norm. Warheads that could be mounted in multiples and independently targeted on a single missile, or put into submarines, became the core of the arsenal. Large, high-yield weapons would, eventually, be mostly phased out. The dismissal of the uselessness of the Tsar Bomba would become orthodoxy, as even the CIA (eventually) concluded that the Soviets were not going to field such a thing in numbers or try to put superbombs on missiles.

……………..  even if such weapons are now purely relegated to history, we should remember that the decision not to deploy them was not made because the Soviet Union and United States shied away from the shocking megatonnage. It was because massive bombs were harder to use, and something about them symbolized the ridiculousness of the arms race in a way that making thousands of “smaller” weapons (some as big as 20–30 megatons) did not.

The United States did not make 50- to 100-megaton bombs or gigaton bombs, but it made a gigaton arsenal……………. Today it is probably around 2,000 megatons—more than enough to devastate the planet in a full-scale nuclear war.

The Tsar Bomba is dead; long live the Tsar Bomba. As the United States, Russia, and China seem to be engaged in new arms races in several domains, including unusual and new forms of nuclear delivery vehicles, the Tsar Bomba is a potent example of how nationalism, fear, and high-technology can combine in a fashion that is ultimately dangerous, wasteful, and pointless. “Very high-yield” nuclear weapons weren’t necessary for deterrence, and they were explored at the expense of not only other weapons systems, but also the multitude of other things that nations could spend their wealth and resources on. They didn’t bring safety or security. https://thebulletin.org/2021/10/the-untold-story-of-the-worlds-biggest-nuclear-bomb/

November 1, 2021 Posted by | Russia, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Time is running out for victims of the world’s first nuclear explosion

 By Joshua Miller, KYODO NEWS – 31 Oct 21, Albuquerque New Mexico.  Speak of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the significance is obvious. “Trinity Site?” Most people are still unaware that it was the location of the world’s first nuclear explosion and endures as one of the most consequential sites in human history.

Drifting packs of tourists take turns snapping photographs in front of a 3-meter obelisk where a plaque explains that Trinity is where the first nuclear device was ever exploded on July 16, 1945. Most seem indifferent to what many view as the stage for a dry run to the devastating atomic bombings of the two Japanese cities……

Aside from the plaque and some photographs depicting the site and explosion that occupy a nearby fence, little illustrates the magnitude of what happened there 76 years ago when the Manhattan Project’s secret test scattered radioactive ash over the residents, and flora and fauna, of nearby villages.

But at the entrance to the site, a small group of peaceful protestors display signs and hand out pamphlets to raise awareness for “the unknowing, unwilling, and uncompensated innocent victims” of the 1945 test. Public access at Trinity is only allowed twice a year.

The Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium is seeking compensation from the United States government for the generations of people in the region who have suffered from cancer, which the group blames on the downwind fallout.

The scientific and medical communities are divided on whether there is a definitive link between the Trinity test and the number of cancer-related illnesses in the region, including Tularosa, Alamogordo and Carrizozo, but the anecdotal evidence is undeniable.

“We bury our loved ones on a regular basis. Somebody dies and somebody else is diagnosed,” said Tina Cordova, a sixth-generation New Mexican and cancer survivor who co-founded the Tularosa Downwinders in 2005.

“This is the eighth year that we’ve come here to do this. When we heard that they take tour buses in there, we decided that we would start staging these peaceful demonstrations to make sure that, while they over-glorify the science and industry in there, they hear the history of the people, the actual people, who were subject to this without consent or knowledge.”

Cordova was instrumental in getting a bill introduced to Congress in September to amend and extend the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, which recognizes claims related to the nearly 200 atmospheric nuclear weapons development tests conducted by the United States between 1945 to 1962.

The fund, set to expire on July 11, 2022, has paid out nearly $2.5 billion in claims for people living or working downwind of the Nevada Test Site, as well as onsite participants, uranium miners, millers, and ore transporters, according to the Department of Justice. However, since its enactment in 1990, the RECA has never recognized New Mexico as a downwind state.

“This is the eighth year that we’ve come here to do this. When we heard that they take tour buses in there, we decided that we would start staging these peaceful demonstrations to make sure that, while they over-glorify the science and industry in there, they hear the history of the people, the actual people, who were subject to this without consent or knowledge.”

Cordova was instrumental in getting a bill introduced to Congress in September to amend and extend the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, which recognizes claims related to the nearly 200 atmospheric nuclear weapons development tests conducted by the United States between 1945 to 1962.

The fund, set to expire on July 11, 2022, has paid out nearly $2.5 billion in claims for people living or working downwind of the Nevada Test Site, as well as onsite participants, uranium miners, millers, and ore transporters, according to the Department of Justice. However, since its enactment in 1990, the RECA has never recognized New Mexico as a downwind state…………………..

By the time the dust had settled, the damage was done. According to the Tularosa Downwinders, the radioactive ash descended onto the thousands of families living within a 50-mile radius of the blast and contaminated the soil, water, crops and livestock vital to the region’s small farms and villages.

“A lot of people got cancer here, from all over the area in Tularosa, Carrizozo, Alamogordo, in El Paso even. All the way in Albuquerque,” Herrera said. “I’m convinced it’s because of the bomb.”

Herrera was diagnosed with a parotid tumor, a cancer affecting the salivary glands, in 1998. While touring Japan, he recalled the shock from his Navy buddies after telling them that a bomb similar to the ones that leveled Hiroshima and Nagasaki had exploded near his home. “They couldn’t believe it,” he said.

Although the magnitude of what happened at the Trinity Site appeared lost on many visitors, others, such as retired veteran Paul Goulding, 68, who lives in nearby Las Cruces, said, “It’s just the effects of a nuclear explosion. And there’s victims on both sides of the Pacific. And I think the American public needs to understand that their fellow citizens suffered unknowingly. And are still suffering.”

Cordova maintains that environmental racism and the government’s lack of accountability for their negligence in conducting such a wantonly dangerous experiment are the major roadblocks in getting New Mexicans reparations but is hopeful that the RECA will be expanded under the Biden administration.  https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2021/10/b47f81cc76fd-feature-time-is-running-out-for-victims-of-worlds-1st-nuclear-explosion.html

November 1, 2021 Posted by | health, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

N. Korea accuses U.S. of acquiescing in nuclear proliferation with double standards

N. Korea accuses U.S. of acquiescing in nuclear proliferation with ‘double standards‘All News  October 31, 2021 SEOUL, (Yonhap) –– North Korea’s foreign ministry on Sunday accused the United States of “acquiescing” in nuclear proliferation around the world based on “double standards,” taking issue with the U.S.’ recent submarine deal with Australia and other policy moves.

The ministry made the accusations in an article, entitled “Is the U.S. really a guardian of the nuclear non-proliferation regime?,” claiming that the international community is paying attention to the U.S.’ “systematic” violation of the regime.

“The U.S. itself has ignored the principle of nuclear non-proliferation and allowed for double standards in line with their strategy for the domination of the world,” the ministry said in the writing.

The ministry stressed that the U.S. built and used nuclear arms for the first time in the world and took the first proliferation step by transferring technology for nuclear-powered submarines to Britain on the pretext of responding to threats from the then Soviet Union in the past.

The ministry also took note of the recent trilateral agreement among the U.S., Britain and Australia to equip Australia with “conventionally-armed” but nuclear-powered submarines. https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20211031004300325

November 1, 2021 Posted by | North Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

US should announce ‘no first use of nuclear weapons,’ with no strings attached

US should announce ‘no first use of nuclear weapons,’ with no strings attached:    https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202110/1237769.shtml Global Times editorial, Oct 31, 2021 The US plans to finalize the Nuclear Posture Review as soon as the end of this year. It is reported that the Biden administration is discussing whether it should put some limits on the use of nuclear weapons, such as the announcement of “no first use of nuclear weapons,” or a declaration of “sole purpose” that means nuclear weapons can be used under certain circumstances, including responding to a nuclear attack.

According to media reports, US allies, including the UK, Germany, France, Japan and Australia, have strongly opposed the US’ adjustment to its nuclear policies. They believe such a move will weaken the US’ protection of its allies. This possible adjustment also means the US would offer a courtesy to China and Russia.It has long been discussed whether the US should put limits on its use of nuclear weapons. The US was about to nail the adjustment during former president Barack Obama’s tenure. The Obama administration considered adopting a “no first use” pledge and laid out a vision for a world without nuclear weapons. Obama’s plan was soon abandoned after being rejected by US allies including Japan.

When Donald Trump was in the Oval Office, the US accelerated the modernization of its nuclear arsenal. The Trump administration’s fiscal 2018 budget included $60-90 billion for nuclear weapons programs. Now it’s the turn of the Democratic administration led by Biden to control the nuclear button, and it is completely possible that it thinks about reducing the nuclear risks in the world. If Biden can really take the step to announce “no first use” of nuclear weapons or take pragmatic measures to restrain US nuclear policies, the move will be widely welcomed across the globe.

However, Biden obviously continued with the strategy of enhancing major power competition adopted by the Trump administration. Great power relations nowadays are much tenser than during the Obama administration. Biden stresses coordinated action with its allies and fierce competition with China and Russia. It is highly doubtful whether Biden has the courage to take real steps in restricting the use of nuclear weapons.

The reactions from the US’ allies, as reported by the media, are pretty much disappointing. In particular, countries like Japan which once suffered from nuclear strikes oppose restricting the use of nuclear weapons. The anti-nuclear doctrine the US allies have advocated is entirely deceitful. On the contrary, what they pursue is unilateral nuclear security. They want to expand their own right to use nuclear power, but have tried every possible means to squeeze the right of the others to use nuclear power.

China has announced the “no first use” nuclear policy at a very early phase. It has adhered to this policy since the first day it owned nuclear weapons. US allies should think this way: If China walks away from this policy, how much pressure will it add to regional security? Similarly, if the US, as the world’s No.1 military power, announced restrictions on the use of nuclear weapons, it will without doubt create constructive opportunities to global security, with advantages outweighing disadvantages.

Nuclear posture is the thorniest security dilemma – particularly issues such as the number of nuclear warheads and anti-missiles. If the US can take the lead in restricting the use of nuclear weapons in this era, it is likely to expand the route undertaken by China in the past and push forward a new period of nuclear security. US allies such as Japan and Australia are falling into the trap of their own petty calculations, but they will not feel more secure if the US does not try to make the commitment of restricting the use of nuclear weapons.

A group of former US officials and experts, including former secretary of defense William Perry, wrote a letter to then Japanese prime minister Yoshihide Suga and other Japanese leaders of political parties, asking them not to oppose a “no first use” nuclear stance that may be announced by the US. Those former officials certainly did not make their appeals from the stance of China and Russia. Their considerations on nuclear security deserve comprehension from the Western world, rather than a fundamental rejection.

China has no way to influence whether the US will eventually head toward the direction of restricting the use of nuclear weapons. Even if the US does that, it will highly unlikely remain to be a unilateral decision. The US will likely require China, Russia and other countries to meet some of its demands. That being the case, it is possible that it will constitute new pressure on China.

A group of former US officials and experts, including former secretary of defense William Perry, wrote a letter to then Japanese prime minister Yoshihide Suga and other Japanese leaders of political parties, asking them not to oppose a “no first use” nuclear stance that may be announced by the US. Those former officials certainly did not make their appeals from the stance of China and Russia. Their considerations on nuclear security deserve comprehension from the Western world, rather than a fundamental rejection.

China has no way to influence whether the US will eventually head toward the direction of restricting the use of nuclear weapons. Even if the US does that, it will highly unlikely remain to be a unilateral decision. The US will likely require China, Russia and other countries to meet some of its demands. That being the case, it is possible that it will constitute new pressure on China. 

November 1, 2021 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Why India’s nuclear ICBM test is counterproductive for tactical and strategic stability

Why India’s nuclear ICBM test is counterproductive for tactical and strategic stability, CGTN, 
Hamzah Rifaat Hussain 31 Oct 21,  On the threat of nuclear weapons during conflict, the rule is that skirmishes, tensions and conventional conflicts between countries need to be resolved through confidence-building measures and dialogue to prevent it from descending into the nuclear domain, when conversely, adding nuclear dimensions to tensions would only exacerbate trust deficits and threaten nuclear nonproliferation.

Despite this, better sense has not prevailed in New Delhi either on the results of Corps Commander-level talks or the decision to establish credible deterrence, given its decision to test a nuclear capable intercontinental missile (ICBM) called “Agni-5” amid tensions with China with a range of 5,000 kilometers on October 27. 

The missile, which descended into the Bay of Bengal, is touted to have a high degree of accuracy, yet it belittles the significance of border talks with China, which was previously considered pivotal by Defense Minister Rajnath Singh.

Furthermore, India tackling China by strengthening its weapons systems will not resolve its numerous internal quagmires, which include a pandemic stricken economy and challenges to inclusivity. ………….  https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-10-31/Why-India-s-nuclear-ICBM-test-is-counterproductive-for-stability-14Oa6m7T9Xq/index.html

November 1, 2021 Posted by | India, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Likud MK: Israel must strike Iran by year’s end if there’s no new nuke deal

Likud MK: Israel must strike Iran by year’s end if there’s no new nuke deal, Times of Israel, 

Tzachi Hanegbi says opposition party will give full backing if government decides to attack Tehran’s nuclear program

By TOI STAFF   31 Oct 21, Likud MK Tzachi Hanegbi said Saturday that in the absence of a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, Israel should carry out a strike on the Islamic Republic by the end of the year, adding that the government would have the full backing of his party on the matter……….  https://www.timesofisrael.com/likud-mk-israel-must-strike-iran-by-years-end-if-theres-no-new-nuke-deal/

November 1, 2021 Posted by | Israel, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

The US nuclear aresenal is becoming more destructive and possibly more risky

THE US NUCLEAR ARSENAL IS BECOMING MORE DESTRUCTIVE AND POSSIBLY MORE RISKY,  Center for Public Integrity,  R. Jeffrey Smith 29 Oct 21, A little-noticed, new fuze that better controls a nuclear blast’s timing will enable the United States to more easily destroy protected targets in other countries. 
R. Jeffrey Smith  A sophisticated electronic sensor buried in hardened metal shells at the tip of a growing number of America’s ballistic missiles reflects a significant achievement in weapons engineering that experts say could help pave the way for reductions in the size of the country’s nuclear arsenal but also might create new security perils.

The wires, sensors, batteries, and computing gear now being quietly installed on hundreds of the most powerful U.S. warheads give them an enhanced ability to detonate with what the military considers exquisite timing over some of the world’s most challenging targets, substantially increasing the probability that in the event of a major conflict, those targets would be destroyed in a radioactive rain of fire, heat, and unearthly explosive pressures.

The new components — which determine and set the best height for a nuclear blast — are now being paired with other engineering enhancements that collectively increase what military planners refer to as the individual nuclear warheads’ “hard target kill capability.” This gives them an improved ability to destroy Russian and Chinese nuclear-tipped missiles and command posts in hardened silos or mountain sanctuaries, or to obliterate hardened military command and storage bunkers in North Korea, also considered a potential U.S. nuclear target.

The increased destructiveness of the new warheads means that in some cases fewer weapons could be needed to ensure that all the objectives in the nation’s nuclear targeting plans are fully met, opening a path to future shrinkage of the overall arsenal, current and former U.S. officials said in a series of interviews, in which some spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive technology……..

Georgetown University professor Keir Lieber, and Dartmouth University associate professor Daryl Press, a consultant to the Defense Department, have estimated that the fuzes have roughly doubled the destructive power of the U.S. submarine fleet alone. …………..

Georgetown University professor Keir Lieber, and Dartmouth University associate professor Daryl Press, a consultant to the Defense Department, have estimated that the fuzes have roughly doubled the destructive power of the U.S. submarine fleet alone. ………….

Hans Kristensen, who monitors such technological efforts for the Federation of American Scientists, a nonprofit group in Washington, says that the warhead improvements in total look uncomfortably like new designs. He says in some ways this is not surprising: As the U.S. arsenal has shrunk by roughly a third due to arms agreements struck in the past two decades, “the engineers and weaponeers began looking for ways to enhance the capabilities of the weapons that would be left.” And the results, he said, “are so far removed from the Obama era’s limitation that [they are] one step short of a new nuclear weapon.” ………… https://publicintegrity.org/national-security/future-of-warfare/nuclear-weapon-arsenal-more-destructive-risky/

October 30, 2021 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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