Say Anything Blog

Also, with advanced engineering, a nuke of about 1 kt can be constructed with about 1 kg of plutonium, and about 3 kg is needed for about 20 kt. Russian sources estimated that the yield of the bomb to be from 5-15 kt. This could be done with about 3 kg of plutonium which fits with the estimates of upto 8 warheads.

Carrick:  How do we know how much plutonium they have?  Is that just a limit on how much they could get from the reactor over that time.

I suppose they could also be working on uranium.  It seems to me that I read that it takes more uranium to build a bomb.

Wasn’t the Hiroshima bomb uranium and the Nagasaki bomb plutonium?

AVNAE:  While we count count on it, I would think that NK isn’t ready to yet to build a high-tech weapon.  What’s interesting is that they would need to duplicate 60 year old technology.

What’s going to happen to US industry when the global warming extremists like John McCain double the price of electricity?  I would think all these factories will close and set up in countries where they aren’t scared of technology.

AV:  The 5-15 kt number isn’t credible It’s not based. All other estimates put it somewhere around 0.3-0.5 kt.

Also, you can get nuclear weapons with under 1kT with advanced engineering, but North Korea obviously isn’t there yet (nor does constructing a tactical weapon as their first test make any sense).

AV:  I truncated my response.. the Russian number isn’t based on data as far as I can tell (they haven’t revealed how they got the number… it may have been the range expected from the test).  The range I gave you was based on the available seismic data, including CTBTO numbers.

TW:

Carrick:  How do we know how much plutonium they have?  Is that just a limit on how much they could get from the reactor over that time.

Based on how much they removed from the reactor they shut down in 1989.

They can use the LW reactors that Clinton gave them to build U235 bombs.  On the good side it takes several tons of processed uranium to make one 15-kg bomb.  The old HW reactor could have easily cranked out enough plutonium between 1989 and now for 100 bombs....

And yes, Hiroshima was a gun-type uranium bomb (it would have taken a year to make another), and the Nagasaki bomb was plutonium (implosion design).

Gang, I am short on minutes so here is an excellent source on this debate. And yes, I am still leaning towards a faked shot. Later, y’all!

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They can use the LW reactors that Clinton gave them to build U235 bombs.

Those reactors were never completed.BBC in 2002:

They [the reactors] were originally expected to have been completed next year, but now construction is not expected to even begin until August.

Thanks for making my point for me! Reactor components AND fuel rods were delivered, the fuel rods are being used in technical weapons research and bomb making, the components are of dual use and are integrated into their bomb program. You really are not especially intelligent, are you?

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Oh, and lest we forget. If they built no reactors how did they get 2 of them? And how are they producing power? If they never built any plants? They used the equipment given to them under the Carter/Clinton Agreed Framework to step their bomb program forward, while telling the world they were not working on the bomb. Who set up and administered the Agreed Framework? Who gave them all the needed components and materials to move forward with their non-exsitent bomb program? Where did the millions of tons of fuel oil,construction equipment and materials, and computers that have sustained DPRK’s Nuclear Weapons Program since ‘97 come from? Now cut&paste something that makes all that cease to exist.

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Will is correct & I was mistaken about this.  The LW reactors never got built.  See the timeline for details.

I know the Light Water Reactors never got built. The Norks never intended to construct them. They wanted the equipment for its dual use applications. This is why DIA and Army Intell. opposed the AF treaty from the start.

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