Devices designed to create extremely large explosions by exploiting nuclear processes within atoms. Fission devices use energy released by slitting large nuclei; fusion devices use the energy released by merging small nuclei. Many devices use fission to trigger fusion.
Questions tagged [nuclear-weapons]
56 questions
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Is this tweet about classes one month after the Hiroshima bombing, and the 2011 tsunami accurate?
https://twitter.com/TheKnowledge/status/593936133358276609
Japan. Top: One Month After Hiroshima, 1945. Bottom: One Month After
The Earthquake and Tsunami, 2011. Incredible.
Are the images genuine, and stemming from the events mentioned?
Andrew Grimm
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Did Khamenei issue a fatwa banning development of nuclear weapons?
According to Obama:
Iran’s Supreme Leader has issued a fatwa against the development of nuclear weapons.
However, according to a Middle East Media Research Institute report entitled Renewed Iran-West Nuclear Talks – Part II: Tehran Attempts to…
ike
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Could Iran produce a nuclear weapon in under a year if they wanted to?
For over 30 years, politicians from Israel and the US have said that "Iran will
have a nuclear weapon in less than a year". [Christian Science Monitor timeline of these warnings]
Some more examples:
For: USA Today, Sep 2008
For: Wall Street…
Alex Mor
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Were the Dene people unaware they had mined ore for the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki until the 1990s?
From a web project called The Forbidden Rock Prophecy (elsewhere it claims the atomic bombs were prophesied):
Nor did they know what the materials they carried would be used for.
So in addition to the physical and environmental consequences of
…
Andrew Grimm
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What do we know about red mercury?
My friend, known as a liar, came to me two days ago and told stories about red mercury, something I never heard about. Could do magic, the pharaohs used it. 1 kg worth 30 million dollars, used in weapons something like that.
I never believe him,…
Lynob
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Is the silence of BBC Radio a key test for UK (submarine) nuclear response?
A comment under a WorldBuilding.SE answer to the question What's the quickest way to tell if most of the people on Earth have disappeared? refers to the BBC Newsbeat article Trident: What are the letters of last resort? describing the instructions…
user22865
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Are nuclear warheads sold on the black market?
VICE news has published a video where they claim to be following up on a story of a French journalist who set up an arms deal: supposedly he bought (or at least set everything in place so that he could have bought) a nuclear warhead of an old soviet…
fgysin
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Were the nuclear capabilities of the F-35 decisive in the decision to have it replace the Dutch F-16s?
The Dutch F-16s have been due for replacement for some time. The discussion about which plane should replace it took its course for over a decade and several different Dutch administrations, from the first comparison of the options in 2001 to the…
SQB
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Has China stated that their no-first-use policy for nuclear weapons doesn't apply to countries that possess territories that China claims as its own?
According to an Indian journalist:
China had asserted before that its NFU would not apply against countries that are in possession of the Chinese territory. That means that China’s NFU does not apply to India as it asserts claims to Indian…
Fizz
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Did Ahmadinejad say that enriching Uranium to 20% made no economic sense?
A Foreign Policy "argument" article from January 2012 contains this part
What has raised the world’s suspicions is that Iran continues to produce 20 percent enriched uranium despite the fact that this exceeds its civilian needs and, as President…
Fizz
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Is this an image of Kim Jong-un with a nuclear warhead?
In April 2016, the BBC News web-site published North Korea nuclear tests: what did they achieve?, which evaluated a March 2016 announcement that had made a nuclear warhead that would fit in a missile.
It included this photo and caption:
North…
Anthony X
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Was the tsar bomb ten times more powerful than all of the explosives used in WWII combined?
This segment from the Discovery Channel makes this bold claim:
[The tsar bomb] contained the equivalent of 58 million tons of TNT, or all the explosives used in World War II, multiplied by 10.
Even ignoring that the powder in bullets could be…
rootmeanclaire
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Would the approach of destroying an asteroid in the film "Armageddon" prevent a global catastrophe?
In the 1998 film Armageddon a group of oil rig workers lead by Bruce Willis are tasked with preventing a large asteroid from colliding with the Earth and wiping out civilization. They succeed by drilling into the centre of the asteroid and…
Adamski
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Did Robert Brownlee express a belief that a manhole cover was launched into space by a nuclear test?
According to Snopes:
the above-mentioned Brownlee doesn't believe the metal cap launched into space.
However Business Insider states:
Robert Brownlee, an astrophysicist who designed the nuclear test in question, told Insider the unbelievable…
DavePhD
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Did India plan to get Pakistan's nuclear facility destroyed by Israel in the mid-'80s?
A 2010 article by Shahid R. Siddiqi in Dawn (a major Pakistani English newspaper) states:
After successfully destroying the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981,
Israelis planned a similar attack on Pakistan’s nuclear facilities at
Kahuta in collusion…
user366312
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