@@ Virtual nukes @@
Arash
December 11, 2004
Virtual Nukes
Dr. James Gordon Prather
Nuclear weapons physicist
David Sanger's recent interview with Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of
the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has resulted in a New York
Times article about "virtual nukes."
What is a "virtual" nuke?
Well, apparently, it's a nuke that doesn't yet exist, but conceivably could,
soon.
Sanger claims that if a state can convince the world that it quickly "could
screw together a workable, deliverable nuclear weapon" then a potential
invader will be as deterred from invading as if that state already had
nukes.
Quoth Sanger, "In an age when centrifuge components and bomb designs are on
the black market, and when technology has made bomb-building much less
expensive and time-consuming, it doesn't take much for the world to take you
seriously."
Sanger must have gotten this hopelessly naïve idea from the neocons.
The neocons would have you believe that having a nuclear power plant - even
one whose operation is subject to IAEA Safeguards, like Iran's - is
tantamount to having a plutonium-239 implosion nuke.
Or that having a uranium-enrichment facility - even one whose operation is
subject to IAEA Safeguards, like Iran's - is tantamount to having a
uranium-235 gun-type nuke.
Now, in the 1980s, before signing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,
South Africa did develop indigenous technology for increasing the
uranium-235 concentration in uranium ore - from 3/10ths of a percent to 3
percent - for use as nuclear power plant fuel. And did "divert" some of the
3 percent enriched uranium to a nearby secret facility for further
enrichment to 90 percent uranium-235.
Over a period of years, they produced about 750 pounds of 90-percent
uranium-235 from which they constructed six "gun-type" nukes - the kind we
dropped on Hiroshima. Each nuke weighed about a thousand pounds and was,
therefore, not deemed deliverable by South African aircraft or missiles.
However, South Africa decided to sign the NPT, so they secretly obliterated
their nuke facility, dismantled the 6 gun-type nukes they had fabricated,
and blended the recovered 90-percent uranium-235 back down to 3 percent.
Meanwhile, Iraq was also secretly attempting to produce 90-percent
uranium-235. They failed to even produce significant quantities of 3-percent
uranium-235. So making hundreds of pounds of 90-percent uranium-235 is not a
"slam-dunk."
Now, almost anyone having 120 pounds of uranium-235 can construct a gun-type
nuke. But you can't make a gun-type nuke with any amount of plutonium-239.
You have to make an implosion-type nuke and that means you have to develop a
high-explosive implosion system. And that certainly is no "slam-dunk."
So, the 6-10 sub-critical pieces of plutonium-239 the North Koreans have is
not tantamount to having real or "virtual" nukes.
Nevertheless, the neocons realize that China would never allow Bush to
launch a preemptive strike against North Korea's "nuclear" facilities. So,
they've adopted a new approach to effecting 'regime change' in North Korea.
The official Korean Central News Agency rather well characterized their new
approach in this editorial of Nov. 27, 2004.
"A far-fetched assertion is a main leverage employed by the U.S. to
implement its strategy to dominate the world and it, therefore, used to
launch aggression and war on its basis.
"It is the U.S. brigandish logic and mode of action to rob others of their
properties and charge their owner demanding their return with theft and
pressurize themIt is an irrefutable and stark fact that the U.S. invaded
Iraq last year on the basis of the sheer lie and far-fetched assertion that
it possesses 'weapons of mass destruction.'
"The U.S. deliberately assesses and finds faults with the human rights
performances in other countries by its own human rights standards and
interferes in their internal affairs, another manifestation of its
brigandish method.
"The U.S. has abused the name of the UN and unlawfully kept South Korea
under its occupation for more than half a century while committing all sorts
of crimes.
"This is a clear proof of the unreasonable and criminal nature of the
far-fetched method employed by it.
"However, it is now busy with the false propaganda aimed to stifle the DPRK
by force of arms and realize its ambition to dominate the whole of Korea.
"The U.S. does not hide its intention to use the human rights issue, missile
issue, the issue of reduction of conventional armed forces and the religious
issue as pretexts for stifling the DPRK even after the settlement of the
nuclear issue.
"This clearly proves how frantic the U.S. has become in its moves to provoke
the second Korean War. The U.S. far-fetched assertions will get it nowhere."
* Physicist James Gordon Prather has served as a policy implementing
official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal
Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the
Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the
Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for
national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. -- ranking
member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy
Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a
nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in
California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico.
http://www.antiwar.com/prather
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/archives.asp?AUTHOR_ID=35