- U.S. administration spokesmen have said they have no
evidence that Iraq has produced or acquired nuclear warheads. Implicit
in their statements is the assumption that any such warheads would have
to be fission warheads containing uranium or plutonium. This is the traditional
path to nuclear warheads that the United States and other nations have
taken.
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- However, what U.S. officials assiduously avoid is a whole
different category of weapons: pure-fusion warheads or "devices."
These devices have been the focus of intense investigations over the decades
by several nations: the United States, Russia, China, France, and perhaps
others. They contain no fissionable nuclear material. Instead, they rely
upon heavy hydrogen - deuterium and tritium isotopes - as their "fuel."
When sufficiently compressed and heated, these two isotopes of hydrogen
fuse, releasing high-energy neutrons that shoot out hundreds of yards,
killing living matter in their path.
-
- Background
-
- In 1979, Pope Paul VI conferred on one of the authors
(Sam Cohen) a peace medal for his invention, the neutron bomb. This was
a small nuclear weapon designed to do its work, killing enemy military
forces, without destroying a country's infrastructure. The idea was to
design a fission-fusion bomb in which the number of high-energy neutrons
released, the dominant killing mechanism, was maximized while the physical
damage-producing mechanism, the fission component, was minimized. Only
that minimal amount of plutonium, the fission component, needed to ignite
or "burn" a capsule containing a deuterium-tritium mixture, would
be used. This deuterium-tritium mixture produced the killing mechanism,
a sudden burst of high-energy neutrons, while the fission blast was minimized.
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- The invention achieved the objective - to make a nuclear
weapon that was tactically useful in the sense of not destroying the country
in the process. But, it was quickly squelched by the various interests
that concluded that such a device would only make nuclear war more likely.
The neutron bomb was, in effect, banned because it destroyed the sharp
distinction between conventional and nuclear weapons by minimizing the
fission blast and radiation by-products.
-
- Life was breathed back into the concept in the 1970s
in an effort to improve NATO defenses by producing a weapon that directly
challenged the immense Soviet strength - its tanks and armies. But, it
did so without the massive physical damage usually associated with a nuclear
weapon. Several hundred of the neutron bomb warheads were actually produced
and stockpiled during the Reagan Administration. This new lease on life,
however, soon came to an end. Following the first Persian Gulf War, President
Bush at General Powell's recommendation directed that all the tactical
weapons be destroyed.
-
- As the problems associated with attacking Saddam Hussein
have become evident in recent months, so also have the advantages of small
discriminant nuclear weapons. However, none are left in the U.S. stockpile.
This explains the sudden bust of interest in forming two design teams,
one at Los Alamos and one at Livermore National Laboratories, to examine
possibilities for a new low-yield nuclear device. It has been termed a
"device" because low-yield "warheads" were made illegal
by Congress in response to pressures from the nuclear fire break lobby.
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- Pure Fusion Warheads
-
- The small tactical battlefield neutron bomb is the closest
kin to a >pure-fusion device. The principle difference is that in a
pure-fusion device, the plutonium fission component is entirely eliminated.
The pure-fusion device relies on the same deuterium-tritium mixture to
create its burst of high-energy neutrons, but is designed to accomplish
this "burn" without the use of any fissionable material. Thus,
while still packing a neutron wallop, its explosive yield - the part that
does the most physical damage - is much smaller because it lacks the fission
component. What little explosive yield remains can be as little as one
hundredth the size of the small tactical battlefield neutron bomb.
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- While the physical explosion accompanying the detonation
of a pure-fusion warhead is tiny, compared with the yield of a tactical
neutron bomb, its lethal radius due to high-energy neutrons is not tiny.
It would cause casualties several hundred yards from the burst point, roughly
half the lethal radius of the neutron bomb.
-
- The comparison of a pure-fusion warhead with a normal
fission warhead is even more stark. The lethal area to military troops
of a 10 ton (high explosive equivalent yield) pure-fusion device would
be approximately the same as the lethal area of a fission warhead several
hundred times larger; that is, one in the kiloton range!
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- The cost of a pure-fusion warhead is also reduced. In
terms of the precious nuclear material that is required, namely, tritium
and deuterium, pure-fusion devices are extremely cheap. Because the pure-fusion
warhead does not need active nuclear material, such as plutonium, to "trigger"
the deuterium-tritium burn, they can be made for a fraction of the cost
of one fission-fusion neutron bomb of the 1980s.
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- The inherent consequences of a pure-fusion device go
far beyond low cost and greatly reduced explosive yield. Most significant,
pure-fusion warheads, in contrast to warheads that use fissionable material,
are not covered by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Any country
can, in terms of international law, legally possess and even sell such
weapons and not be in violation of the NPT. Also, deuterium-tritium fuel
can be purchased openly on the international market. The spirit of the
NPT may be in violation, but not the letter.
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- Still further, because there is no fissionable component
and because the explosive yield is so small, full operational tests of
a pure-fusion device could be conducted in any country and not be detected
by systems set up to monitor nuclear weapons tests. If tests were conducted
underground at a moderate depth, say 50 to 100 meters, even the local inhabitants
would suspect nothing.
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- These consequences drive a stake through the heart of
U.S. non-proliferation policies. These policies are based on preventing
those who want to "go nuclear" from having access to the active
nuclear material. A warhead or "device" that does not use active
nuclear material (uranium or plutonium) is not prohibited. To make matters
worse, in no sense can they be termed weapons of "mass destruction."
Indeed, the pure-fusion devices are even more discriminant than the neutron
bomb because there is, in comparison, negligible physical damage and a
total absence of fission by-products and related contaminating fallout.
-
- Because of this, the pure-fusion device represents the
worst fear of those whose personal crusade is to stop the spread of nuclear
weapons and preserve the fire break in a hope that this will prevent a
nuclear war. The pure-fusion device is less destructive than most conventional
bombs, is reasonably cheap, and can be tested with impunity. It produces
no fission radioactive by-products or fallout of serious concern.
-
- That is, the pure-fusion device renders the unthinkable
thinkable. This is why officials do not want to discuss the possibility
of pure-fusion warheads and, as will be seen, will do their best to deny
their possible existence.
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- Russia's Pure-Fusion Device
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- In the early 1990s, information coming out of Russia
in articles and statements by high ranking military and civilian officials
(including >the Chairman of the Russian Atomic Energy Commission) indicated
that a pure-fusion device as small as a baseball and weighing around 10
pounds could be developed. The amount of deuterium-tritium fuel needed
on the order of a gram. This device was made possible by their use of an
exotic new material capable of producing enormous pressures and temperatures
- great enough to produce a mini pure-fusion explosive. In other words,
no longer was a fission component needed to trigger the deuterium-tritium
fusion.
-
- This new material was dramatically different in nature
and concept of use from the conventional high explosives used in fission
weapons. When ignited, the new material did not actually explode but instead
stayed intact long enough to produce the enormous temperatures and pressures
sufficient to enable the deuterium-tritium fusion.
-
- The new material is known as a "ballotechnic"
explosive, even though it does not actually explode in the conventional
sense of the word. It was developed in Russia and became popularly known
as "red mercury." When President Boris Yeltsin took over the
helm of the new Russia, in a secret directive he authorized the sale of
red mercury on the international market. Sometimes the price was very high.
Sometimes fake versions of it were offered to gullible buyers. The United
States may have been one of these.
-
- One very interested country which had a long history
of purchasing Russia weaponry was Iraq. Russia helped Iraq develop chemical
and biological weapons and Russian advisors were in Baghdad advising Saddam
at the time of the first Gulf War. Only recently the two countries signed
a multi-billion dollar oil field development contract.
-
- Just after the Persian Gulf War, the head of the UN inspection
Team sent into Iraq for the Agency for International Atomic Energy reported
that in one Baghdad facility he found boxes full of offers to sell and
develop red mercury. This discovery should have caused a huge furor. But,
in the real world of nuclear politics it never even surfaced on any significant
level. Apparently no one wanted to admit its existence or significance
because of its implications respecting arms control and the NPT.
-
- Past U.S. efforts to achieve a pure-fusion burn tried
to mimic the fission-fusion approach. In it, the conditions needed to achieve
a deuterium-tritium burn are achieved by imploding a conventional high
explosive that would create the compression needed to initiate the burn.
This is very hard to do using conventional explosives because of the precise
control over the imploding shock wave that is needed. In the case of red
mercury pure-fusion, it is the burn of the red mercury, not a shock wave,
that creates the needed temperature and pressure. This obviates the very
difficult timing and shock wave control required in a conventional approach.
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- Efforts to Discredit
-
- As stories of black market red mercury trafficking began
spreading, Western nations began a broad disinformation campaign to debunk
the stories, ridiculing them and their authors. Leading this effort was
the United States, via the Los Alamos nuclear weapons laboratory. They
put out the word that red mercury was "one half-baked scam."
-
- That the red mercury fusion device is not a scam has
been confirmed by responsible British investigators. One, Dr. Frank Barnaby,
a veteran nuclear weapon designer, secretly interviewed knowledgeable Russian
scientists. These scientists confirmed to him the existence of red mercury
and its great significance.
-
- The professed Los Alamos skepticism was hardly sincere
in view of an intensive investigation of such explosives mounted at Los
Alamos during the 1990s. The nature (and very high level of security classification)
of the investigation belied claims of its being only a half-baked scam.
The subject was so serious at Los Alamos that discussions of ballotechnics
were held in their highly secure Aztec SCIF (Special Compartmented Intelligence
Facility).
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- Selected Applications
-
- On the open field of battle these pure-fusion neutron
bombs, can be delivered by small rockets, mortars, artillery, etc. without
any concern for the high accuracies demanded by conventional warhead use
because the associated physical collateral damage was so low and lethal
radiation effects radius so large. They do not need to hit the center of
the target to devastate conventionally armed U.S. ground forces.
-
- For urban warfare, fighting through cities such as Baghdad
almost always entails having to physically destroy them. Having pure-fusion
weapons would allow Iraq to defend these areas without the Iraqi military
having to cause significant damage in the process.
-
- Because urban structures in general produce no serious
attenuation of the high-energy neutrons, buildings are not an effective
place to hide. The neutrons will find the soldiers while leaving the buildings
and infrastructure intact. In this sense, an Iraqi pure-fusion neutron
bomb defense of their built-up areas is more civilized when compared with
the use of destructive conventional means.
-
- In the air battle, fusion warhead effects would reach
out much further than at ground level. In that case, Iraqi antiaircraft
weapons could be vastly more effective than the currently used conventional
systems, which U.S. air defense countermeasures have rendered practically
worthless. With a pure-fusion warhead, the tables are quickly turned. The
lethal neutron effects of air burst pure-fusion warheads can reach out
many hundreds of yards, thus rendering the U.S. air defense countermeasures
practically worthless.
-
- Considering a terrorists potential interest, the horror
of such devices is self evident. The use of these devices by suicide bombers
presents a far more threatening situation than possible repetitions of
the 9-11 attacks. Because of their very small size and weight, they readily
could be moved into and around the United States with practically no chance
of detection.
-
- Bottom Line
-
- We can not stop proliferation any more than we can stop
the advancement of technology or put a lid on individual ingenuity. Nor
can we outlaw evil or dictate the way other people think.
-
- For forty years we have been fooling ourselves into thinking
arms control would solve the intractable problems of chemical, biological,
and nuclear weapons while turning a blind eye toward the impact of technology
and the different thoughts of different peoples. Treaties were negotiated
and signed notwithstanding the fact that they ignored the most serious
technologies. As the flaws became evident, officials were not only disinterested,
they wanted not to know.
-
- The arms control process has been like the drunk looking
for a quarter he lost where the light was best, rather than where he lost
it. The nuclear problem discussed in this article is not unique. There
are equally significant, equally frightening, and even more horrendous
blind spots in our policies concerning chemical warfare, biological warfare,
and related arms control treaties. As one top U.S. official told the Soviet
biological warfare expert, Col. Kanatjan Alibekov, Ph.D., who defected
to the United States in 1992, "Perhaps there are questionable activities
going on, but for the moment, diplomacy requires us to keep silent."
-
- When will the West drop the politically correct charade
and face the real world? Launching a massive invasion into Iraq will not
stop terrorism nor the spread of weapons of mass destruction. Attacking
the axis of evil will not rid the world of evil. When will we learn to
address the problem with the sincerity and seriousness it deserves?
-
- © 2003 Sam Cohen and Joe Douglass March 11, 2003
-
- Sam Cohen, a retired nuclear weapons analyst, worked
in France on low-yield, highly discriminate tactical nuclear weapons in
1979-80. His memoirs are SHAME: Confessions of the Father of the Neutron
Bomb (2000).
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- Joe Douglass, a national security analyst, is the author
of The Conflict Over Tactical Nuclear Weapons Policy in Europe (1968),
and Betrayed (2002).
-
- Both authors were members of the Los Alamos Tactical
Nuclear Weapons >Panel in the early 1970s.
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- http://www.financialsense.com/editorials/douglass/2003/0311.htm
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