nuclear bomb?

Question

how hard would it be for a terorist organization to employ a full fledged nuclear bomb inside of the U.S.... one that would have the same effect as hiroshima or worse?????

Answer 1

suitcase nukes are in the range of 3-5 kilotons (five times less than the Hiroshima nuke).

Above 15-20k, nuclear detectors would be expected to play key roles. In one scenario, either a threat is made or intelligence is gathered that suggests there is a nuclear weapon hidden in a major city, such as New York. Being prepared to deal with such a situation is the job, in the US, of the Nuclear Emergency Search Team (NEST), who are equipped with the most advanced nuclear detectors available. Nevertheless, if the only information available was that the bomb was somewhere in a particular city, there would be very little hope of finding it—the area to be searched is simply too great, and the range at which the bomb could be detected too short.

If, however, additional information was available—e.g., the bomb is probably in one of these three blocks of Manhattan—the probability of finding it would be greatly increased. If such a weapon were found, NEST is equipped with a variety of techniques to disable the bomb, designed to attempt to do so fast enough to get it disabled before any booby-trap could set it off – but given that no one would know what such a bomb's design looked like ahead of time, there would always be some risk in such an effort.

In a second scenario, the goal is to prevent nuclear weapons or the materials to make them from being smuggled across borders into the US. In this case, detectors exist that will reasonably reliably detect unshielded plutonium or HEU in a car going through a border crossing, in a suitcase at an airport, and the like—in particular vehicle and pedestrian "portal monitors."

It is easier to detect material that some one on foot is carrying than material in a car, especially if the car is moving at a significant speed. Tests on one typical brand of portal monitors determined that in the absence of any shielding, the pedestrian monitors could detect 10 grams of weapon-grade HEU or a third of a gram of weapon-grade plutonium, while vehicle monitors allowing the vehicles to proceed through at 8 kilometers per hour could detect 1 kilogram of HEU or as little as 10 grams of plutonium.

In the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, substantial research is being directed toward the development of better detectors that will be more sensitive, smaller, cheaper, and provide more detailed assessment of the material at hand

any dense material used for shielding the radiation from a nuclear bomb or nuclear material would be detected, and would then be subject to more detailed inspection.

Answer 2

Well, considering that the Hiroshima bomb was one of the first two ever dropped on an opposing country, it's nothing compared to today's bombs. However, there are two most likely possible ways for terrorists to get their hands on a bomb. They could: A-steal spent nuclear reactor fuel/waste and make a "dirty bomb" or B-steal enriched Uranium or Plutonium. After the collapse of the USSR, Russia had/has a hard time keeping track of all their nuclear weapons/compnents. Someone once called it the Wal-Mart for Nuclear Weapons. Comforting eh? The hardest part would be for the organization to sneak it into the country.

That would only be possible however if the organization has enough resources(cash) to buy the knowledge of how to build one. But then again, some unemployed scientists of the former USSR are willing to sell that information.

Answer 3

The hard part would be getting the bomb. As someone pointed out there are many 'unaccounted for' weapons from the former Soviet Union - however, it may be that many of those weapons never existed, just being part of Cold War misinformation by the Soviets (rather like the way Saddams Luitenants believed they'd be issued chemical weapons when the Americans reached Bahgdad). Making a bomb, yourself, is very difficult, North Korea probably doesn't have a dependable, portable one, and, if Pakistan were going to pass a bomb to terrorists, they'd likely have long since done so.

But, once you got it, it would not be that difficult to ship it to America and set it off somewhere - esepcially if you didn't mind going up with it.

Answer 4

Hiroshima was actually a very small nuke by today's standards.

Yes, there are nukes unaccounted for. But I tend to think if it was possible it would have been done by now. We hear about disaffected ex-Soviet scientists with their hands on old nukes, ready to peddle them to the highest bidder. But the terrorists have no problem with funding. Whoever did 9/11 obviously had plenty of money and patience. If they had been able to buy a nuke they would have done that instead.

Most of what we hear in the US these days about terrorism is bullshit. It's become a political football, mostly something for politicians to threaten us with so they can protect us from it. Like most things they do this with, it's a chimerical threat.

Bush spent billions on airport security, because that's the most visible kind of security, so it looks the most like he's actually doing something. But we have literally HUNDREDS of international seaports in the US, some of them right smack-dab in the middle of our biggest cities, and we have done -nothing- to make these safer. If you had a nuke it would be the easiest thing in the world to put it on a ship and pull it into NY or Long Beach or Seattle. You wouldn't have to go through customs or anything, just blow the ship up in the harbor. Am I the only one who's thought of this? Probably not. I tend to think if it was possible someone would have done it by now.

Answer 5

even nevertheless nuclear bombs are particularly useful , a single bomb say dropped on birmingham might in simple terms wreck the centre of birmingham with the preliminary blast, and then the increasing ask your self wave and finished out would desire to reason better injury out into the suburbs, with a limiting blast area of various sq. miles. even nevertheless if a hydrogen bomb have been for use the the blast area may well be various circumstances larger nonetheless . I look to recollect examining a militia evaluation of in simple terms what number nuclear bombs it would take to utterly wreck the full uk,, it became out the the russians theory that a mix of fifty hydrogen bombs and hassle-free nuclear bombs may well be better than adequate to coach the full uk in to a burning cinder.

Answer 6

Not very hard at all. There are thousands of unaccounted for nuclear bombs from when the Soviet Union fell. Also Iran may have already created nuclear weapons, as well as Iraq. So they certainly have access to them. As for getting them into the country, well, let's just say we don't see everything and we can't patrol everywhere, so it's certainly possible.

Answer 7

well nukes this days make hiroshima look like a rat but it aint that hard this days to get one today mostly all the countries are concerns with russia nukes

Answer 8

Getting it across the border would be difficult. Once it's in, though...I don't imagine that it'd be too difficult to move around.

Answer 9

why do u want to encourage the bad&discourage the US.citizens? give hope to the US citizens instead of creatin panic

Answer 10

yes - a small suit case nuke or dirty bomb is more likely