what is a tactical nuke?

Answer 1

Guided missle.

Answer 2

Tactical Nuke

Answer 3

Ilyoto has the right idea. It has nothing to do with the nuke, but how it is used.
A tactical target is one that will directly effect the enemy's ability to wage war.
A strategic target effects the enemy's will, or desire, to wage war. It can also encompass indirectly the ability to wage war.

A ball bearing plant would be tactical, a oilfield would be strategic.
There are small nukes developed to be more tactically appropriate, (mobility is the primary target), however they have strategic uses as well.

Answer 4

A tactical nuke is for taking out small targets like a base without wiping out half the country. These weapons usually have warheads good for .5-1 kiloton worth of blast in them. That's between 50,000 and a 100,000 tons worth of TNT. Other nukes are worth 150 kilotons or more

Answer 5

A small nuke, too small to wipe out a city.

They're called 'tactical' because they were developed for use on a battlefield, where the Bomb would be used against enemy lines, blasting a huge hole that our forces could then exploit.

The Atomic Cannon fired tactical nukes.
http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/atomic/images/ustst11s.jpg

Answer 6

Strategic Nukes are fired from a fixed asset (ie strategic).. ICBMs fired from land-based missile silos that can reach all the way to China, Korea, Russia.. with just a push of a button while settin here in my lazy boy recliner..

Tactical Nukes can be used on the battlefield, they're mobile (ie tactical) can be man-portable, suit case size, launched from a tank, etc. like radation bombs, dirty bombs.. that can take out enemy convoys while leaving their vehicles intact.

Sub-launched Nukes are sorta in between.

But don't worry son.. we got 'em ALL!
..In order to protect America from all the evil empires out there with WMDs.

Remember to vote, speak your mind son.. you can make a difference in America.

Answer 7

The definition of “tactical,” or “substrategic,” nuclear weapons is somewhat tenuous and can include many criteria, such as range, yield, target, national ownership, delivery vehicle, and capability. For the most part, tactical nuclear weapons have smaller explosive power than strategic nuclear weapons and are generally intended for “battlefield” use against enemy forces, rather than against enemy cities or strategic nuclear forces. Tactical nuclear weapons include a broad array of devices, from so-called nuclear landmines and nuclear artillery shells to air-dropped or missile-launched nuclear warheads. Their yields can be relatively low (0.1 kiloton), equal to those of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (15-20 kilotons), or very large (1 megaton).
Tactical nuclear weapons were identified as a separate category of weapon during the Cold War to allow U.S. and Soviet arms control negotiators to concentrate on the larger weapons that they considered more threatening to stability. (In a sense, then, the definition of tactical nuclear weapons can be expanded to include all weapons not covered by the SALT and START agreements.)

Answer 8

Tactical weapons of any type are meant to take out a specific target rather than a cause general destruction. They are used for militarty and stratigic targets like power plants rather than to just destroy as much as possible.

Answer 9

A small yield nuclear weapon. There's a nuclear explosion but not nearly as big as the ones dropped during WWII. Used on smaller, hard targets like a military base, port, or missile site.

Answer 10

mainly it has to do with the yield of the weapon. They're mostly in the kiloton range rather than the megaton range of strategic weapons.