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Fascinating Thread. Thanks to all the SMEs contributing to this.
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More fun reading!
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Originally Posted By high_order1: They appear to have had several ideas. The B91 gravity system, too. I think it was two things, not so much the fall of russia, I think the communist-led environmentalists and liberals broke it off in All Things Nuclear. Throw in a couple of subject matter experts wringing their hands, and I think it was the death knell. (I have no background here, policy is way out of my wheelhouse, but I think war should be short, meaningful, and so immediately painful to the other side they give up. No rebuilding, no pacification or police action bullshit. So, if it means making some glassy parking lots instead of sending more of my neighbors' kids overseas, I guess they shouldn't have asked for it. I'm not the least worried about counterforce or nuclear winter). There is more on that topic, but it is in Mandarin and... uh, cyrillic? lol Linear can mean a rod or tube of active material. It could also mean a truncated cone, like one of those old paper cups. Then there is the whole 'nonspherical implosion'. All are predicated on making the active material relatively non-critical until time of boom. You can actually put more than a single critical mass into a pit if you spread it out enough, and a tube geometry would absolutely allow for that. The issue is 'efficient'. Most small-volume designs are inefficient. (The most wasteful remain gun assembled devices). That's because, I think, they prioritize a shape or volume over compression. There is a TON to compression, and ways to keep the mass assembled for slightly longer. None of these fit into small volumes. I believe efficient designs rely on ultrapure thin levitated shells, graded compression, focused neutron drive, boosting, and ample energetics. Insensitive High Explosives are relatively safer, but at a penalty of less drive for the same volume of material. (there are legit weaponeers, EOD and Production Technicians on here that could correct me... but they won't. o well) ERW is generally poorly understood. My limited understanding is that once they pretty much got the idea of fission and fusion for defense applications down, they realized they could modulate and prefer certain outputs at the expense of others. This came from the so-called 'clean' vs 'dirty' systems, and I suspect, culminated in using tiny nuc systems to pump LASERS or other devices for... reasons. lol There are a lot of routes to creating neutrons. But there are also ways to make a system more opaque to other energies at the expense of losing neutrons. (Neutrons are the secret sauce to nuc systems. Just a handful of them are what kick off the reaction. Adding a handful more... I THINK increases efficiency logarithmically. (Don't quote me, I am math dumb). As far as the chemical high explosion portion of the physics package, they have been doing additive since the late 50's. Without having any of my reference material in front of me, I could make a case that they essentially invented it. Using layering technology they were able to adjust the refractive index of explosives, causing chapman-jouguet wave shaping, which started with multi-piece lens casting techniques, where they did have a terrible time with voids, but learned a great deal about non-destructive testing in order to make things better. Although, sitting with a 40 pound piece of explosive in your lap, and using a dentists' drill to bore a hole in live HE to fill a void doesn't sound like something you'd really want to be doing... but they did it. Figuring out how to layer different products during the pour I think is where 3d printing started, honestly. I'm probably wrong, but I know for a fact they did it, and I know that them figuring it out reduced the CHE burden from hundreds of pounds to under a hundred pounds, and in some cases, much less. Also, it's not just in active materials and conventional explosives. They also invented foamed metals. Imagine a sponge, but of actual metal. And, they made it into something called graded impactors, where it starts out almost squishy, but as you progress through it, it gets harder and stiffer. Doping this metal with various items gives... other benefits as well. The control of density may not have been invented at the Labs, but it is where it is now because of them, in my opinion. Funny story. I was not there for this, but I (as well as others) put this together independently before NNSA fessed up to it. There is a component in certain systems, that does a certain function. It was a pain in the balls to make from several standpoints, and eventually, they stopped making it because... they assumed something better was coming? Who knows. They tried to restart production of this product, and failed. Not really failed, but they didn't have as-built and batch data, and some other things were lost to the sands of time. What they made was absolutely pure and perfect in the lens of modern materials science. Then (I think, they never said) they did some underground low-yield testing with it, and... it did not behave like the legacy material. Turns out, they had to re-introduce certain impurities, and alter the process in a less-optimized way in order to maintain the legacy, benchmarked material. ... well, I think it's funny. Like, Nile Red trying to bake a cookie in his lab using ochem techniques funny. anyway Guarantee it. Submarines are quiet, and people run faster due to it. Totally agree. And, apparently, they've had a lot of pushback over the years. It's like you have a 1981 car, but you can't change the tires on it because, is that a new weapons system? That's a treaty violation. Ok, so we leave the frame alone, but we put electronic ignition in it and power door locks. Same motor, so has to be same weapon. Right? Maybe. Well, let's replace the cylindrical transmission with a spherical one. Well, now it goes faster in the same lift weight and cone volume, so treaty violation, right? Nope, we used that transmission on a truck before, so it's not new. (I suspect this is where the ATF got some of their policymaking guidance.) I agree completely. What is the point of leaving a pristine countryside if it's going to be taken by Godless commies? I think a point came where they knew the jig was up, but by then there were so many contractors trying to squeeze the last pennies out of the programs that they could have started doing better and remediating, but they said fuck it and kicked that can down the road, which I believe was wrong, and yet another nail in defense production work. Plus, they had the advantage of testing. To this day, the computer models are not super accurate. They have to adjust them to fit the actual test data, and they still don't seem to know why. My favorite, the 54, needed a few shots before they got it dialed in, but that was during the Fun Era of weaponeering. Plenty of material, plenty of talent, what magic can we squeeze out of the atom next? I don't either, and no one has ever told me. I do know there is a component inside codeword TONY, that was a problem. Eventually one of them came up with an elegant as fuck solution to it, and it's something that amazes them all to this day. I wish to know what it was. The Russians know. The Chinese know. Taiwan knows. A ton of contractors, servicemen, scientists, printers, secretaries, and others know. (shrugs) There has been a TON of speculation in the few places I've ever wormed my way into. The craziest part is that when you look at a 79 shell, most of that isn't the physics package, at all. (There are cutaway pics on the net). I think the 79 is thinner than the 54. The 54 is spherical with a hemispherical hemishell, and a so-called "shaped hemishell". The 54 was fission only. The 79 was a true TN system, and I've never read why besides military characteristics planning why they arrived at the yields they chose. As far as volumetric space, .... mmmm not too certain. You can take an orange-sized lump of clay and squish it into a hollow football shape. Same amount of material, but now you can adjust the volume to be more amenable to a cone, or a sphere-cone, or even a cylinder. Adding fusion can come in two routes. The soviets are known to have layered fusion materials around a fission system. Another speculative version has a fusion fuel at the end of a fission primary. The fanciest version uses container geometry and a delayed, filtering barrier to briefly focus fission energies onto a co-located fusion fuel system. These can be linked like sausages, creating fission>fusion>fission chains. Dunno, a lot of that got declassified because people wanted badly for fusion power generation and the power and defense versions apparently have great overlap. I never really dug into it that much. But, I know the 79 has a secondary. And gold the thickness of a beer can, and somehow ultra-pure carbon fashioned into sheets that can withstand tens of thousands of revolutions per second at a ton of G forces, and somehow the whole thing maintains geometry and distances internally. Again, fascinating. I wish to know more. (I don't really want to kill anybody; I also enjoy watching shows on the clever ways they run assembly lines, especially foods. I just am a huge fan of engineering, and there is a ton of it in ordnance. Also, I hate not being in on a secret.Even if it is a dumb secret). As far as US systems, design released ones I don't know of one. AEC/ERDA test item? No telling. Threat nations, I've seen an image they told me was a russian one, but it wasn't a briefcase. It was much larger. Having said that, and knowing that most US systems were designed in 2d and not 3d, if they had a way to flatten a football, the 54 would have fit in a briefcase. The smallest gun assembled device would have gone in a fat briefcase or potentially a doctor's satchel, if it didn't have to withstand being shot out of a cannon. (Shrugs) dunno View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By high_order1: Originally Posted By TheAvatar9265ft: Seems like the state of the art was there for the 82 to eclipse the 79 if the wall hadn't come down? Throw in a couple of subject matter experts wringing their hands, and I think it was the death knell. (I have no background here, policy is way out of my wheelhouse, but I think war should be short, meaningful, and so immediately painful to the other side they give up. No rebuilding, no pacification or police action bullshit. So, if it means making some glassy parking lots instead of sending more of my neighbors' kids overseas, I guess they shouldn't have asked for it. I'm not the least worried about counterforce or nuclear winter). Originally Posted By Wineraner: Pu-linear implosion sounds like it'd be smaller (at least in one dimension) than Pu-spherical. Agree that CFD breakthroughs could likely lead to some amazing efficiencies. There is more on that topic, but it is in Mandarin and... uh, cyrillic? lol Linear can mean a rod or tube of active material. It could also mean a truncated cone, like one of those old paper cups. Then there is the whole 'nonspherical implosion'. All are predicated on making the active material relatively non-critical until time of boom. You can actually put more than a single critical mass into a pit if you spread it out enough, and a tube geometry would absolutely allow for that. The issue is 'efficient'. Most small-volume designs are inefficient. (The most wasteful remain gun assembled devices). That's because, I think, they prioritize a shape or volume over compression. There is a TON to compression, and ways to keep the mass assembled for slightly longer. None of these fit into small volumes. I believe efficient designs rely on ultrapure thin levitated shells, graded compression, focused neutron drive, boosting, and ample energetics. Insensitive High Explosives are relatively safer, but at a penalty of less drive for the same volume of material. (there are legit weaponeers, EOD and Production Technicians on here that could correct me... but they won't. o well) The thing that surprised me about the W79 and 82 is that there were enhanced radiation mods. I.e, neutron bombs. I'd thought those were strictly a product of fast fusion neutrons, and that there wouldn't be appreciable fusion yield in a device that small. TIL.... ERW is generally poorly understood. My limited understanding is that once they pretty much got the idea of fission and fusion for defense applications down, they realized they could modulate and prefer certain outputs at the expense of others. This came from the so-called 'clean' vs 'dirty' systems, and I suspect, culminated in using tiny nuc systems to pump LASERS or other devices for... reasons. lol There are a lot of routes to creating neutrons. But there are also ways to make a system more opaque to other energies at the expense of losing neutrons. (Neutrons are the secret sauce to nuc systems. Just a handful of them are what kick off the reaction. Adding a handful more... I THINK increases efficiency logarithmically. (Don't quote me, I am math dumb). Originally Posted By Meche_03: I don't foresee 3d printing or additive manufacturing helping build a better nuclear weapon anytime soon. It introduces too many impurities and physical voids to the nuclear fuel chain. The uncontrolled density changes that occur at the current technology level would be detrimental to controlled HE driven implosion. As far as the chemical high explosion portion of the physics package, they have been doing additive since the late 50's. Without having any of my reference material in front of me, I could make a case that they essentially invented it. Using layering technology they were able to adjust the refractive index of explosives, causing chapman-jouguet wave shaping, which started with multi-piece lens casting techniques, where they did have a terrible time with voids, but learned a great deal about non-destructive testing in order to make things better. Although, sitting with a 40 pound piece of explosive in your lap, and using a dentists' drill to bore a hole in live HE to fill a void doesn't sound like something you'd really want to be doing... but they did it. Figuring out how to layer different products during the pour I think is where 3d printing started, honestly. I'm probably wrong, but I know for a fact they did it, and I know that them figuring it out reduced the CHE burden from hundreds of pounds to under a hundred pounds, and in some cases, much less. Also, it's not just in active materials and conventional explosives. They also invented foamed metals. Imagine a sponge, but of actual metal. And, they made it into something called graded impactors, where it starts out almost squishy, but as you progress through it, it gets harder and stiffer. Doping this metal with various items gives... other benefits as well. The control of density may not have been invented at the Labs, but it is where it is now because of them, in my opinion. The impurities also introduce a significant quantity of elements that could lead to increased chemical interactions within the sealed subassembly. Funny story. I was not there for this, but I (as well as others) put this together independently before NNSA fessed up to it. There is a component in certain systems, that does a certain function. It was a pain in the balls to make from several standpoints, and eventually, they stopped making it because... they assumed something better was coming? Who knows. They tried to restart production of this product, and failed. Not really failed, but they didn't have as-built and batch data, and some other things were lost to the sands of time. What they made was absolutely pure and perfect in the lens of modern materials science. Then (I think, they never said) they did some underground low-yield testing with it, and... it did not behave like the legacy material. Turns out, they had to re-introduce certain impurities, and alter the process in a less-optimized way in order to maintain the legacy, benchmarked material. ... well, I think it's funny. Like, Nile Red trying to bake a cookie in his lab using ochem techniques funny. anyway Is there possibilities to create new materials that help control shockwaves to mitigate attenuation/reflections while possibly adding fusion fuel? Probably. Guarantee it. Submarines are quiet, and people run faster due to it. Better materials and manufacturing methods for the delivery system to help manipulate the mass, strength, cg....to allow more nuclear material better safety and firing controls within the same defined outer envelope of the delivery system....yes, a big yes. The new materials, elements and modern computers can help a lot. Totally agree. And, apparently, they've had a lot of pushback over the years. It's like you have a 1981 car, but you can't change the tires on it because, is that a new weapons system? That's a treaty violation. Ok, so we leave the frame alone, but we put electronic ignition in it and power door locks. Same motor, so has to be same weapon. Right? Maybe. Well, let's replace the cylindrical transmission with a spherical one. Well, now it goes faster in the same lift weight and cone volume, so treaty violation, right? Nope, we used that transmission on a truck before, so it's not new. (I suspect this is where the ATF got some of their policymaking guidance.) But, in the 60s-80s, the weapons complex did not have to work with in the current limitations of the EPA, OSHA, understanding of long term effects and consequences of exposure to radiation, and a plethora of now banned materials and chemicals. A lot was done based on the pure physics and science needed for a design to work. I agree completely. What is the point of leaving a pristine countryside if it's going to be taken by Godless commies? I think a point came where they knew the jig was up, but by then there were so many contractors trying to squeeze the last pennies out of the programs that they could have started doing better and remediating, but they said fuck it and kicked that can down the road, which I believe was wrong, and yet another nail in defense production work. Plus, they had the advantage of testing. To this day, the computer models are not super accurate. They have to adjust them to fit the actual test data, and they still don't seem to know why. My favorite, the 54, needed a few shots before they got it dialed in, but that was during the Fun Era of weaponeering. Plenty of material, plenty of talent, what magic can we squeeze out of the atom next? I don't know what the primary of the w79 looks like. I don't either, and no one has ever told me. I do know there is a component inside codeword TONY, that was a problem. Eventually one of them came up with an elegant as fuck solution to it, and it's something that amazes them all to this day. I wish to know what it was. The Russians know. The Chinese know. Taiwan knows. A ton of contractors, servicemen, scientists, printers, secretaries, and others know. (shrugs) The w79 appears to be roughly the same size canned assembly as the 54 based on having the same delivery systems, but the w79 could have a maximum output slightly higher than the 54 and the 79 is reported to have had a enhanced neutron option....so a small fision 2ndary? Lots of websites state the 79 had a linear PU implosion primary....what ever that means....so assuming it went from spherical implosion to a different method requiring less volumetric space. So again pointing to the possibility of a small secondary. There has been a TON of speculation in the few places I've ever wormed my way into. The craziest part is that when you look at a 79 shell, most of that isn't the physics package, at all. (There are cutaway pics on the net). I think the 79 is thinner than the 54. The 54 is spherical with a hemispherical hemishell, and a so-called "shaped hemishell". The 54 was fission only. The 79 was a true TN system, and I've never read why besides military characteristics planning why they arrived at the yields they chose. As far as volumetric space, .... mmmm not too certain. You can take an orange-sized lump of clay and squish it into a hollow football shape. Same amount of material, but now you can adjust the volume to be more amenable to a cone, or a sphere-cone, or even a cylinder. Adding fusion can come in two routes. The soviets are known to have layered fusion materials around a fission system. Another speculative version has a fusion fuel at the end of a fission primary. The fanciest version uses container geometry and a delayed, filtering barrier to briefly focus fission energies onto a co-located fusion fuel system. These can be linked like sausages, creating fission>fusion>fission chains. Dunno, a lot of that got declassified because people wanted badly for fusion power generation and the power and defense versions apparently have great overlap. I never really dug into it that much. But, I know the 79 has a secondary. And gold the thickness of a beer can, and somehow ultra-pure carbon fashioned into sheets that can withstand tens of thousands of revolutions per second at a ton of G forces, and somehow the whole thing maintains geometry and distances internally. Again, fascinating. I wish to know more. (I don't really want to kill anybody; I also enjoy watching shows on the clever ways they run assembly lines, especially foods. I just am a huge fan of engineering, and there is a ton of it in ordnance. Also, I hate not being in on a secret.Even if it is a dumb secret). I don't believe a briefcase nuke ever existed based on a pit needs to be baseball to softball size before any HE, detonators, firing controls, or shielding. If you told me it was the size of a modern carryon luggage case and weighed #50+ I'd believe you. As far as US systems, design released ones I don't know of one. AEC/ERDA test item? No telling. Threat nations, I've seen an image they told me was a russian one, but it wasn't a briefcase. It was much larger. Having said that, and knowing that most US systems were designed in 2d and not 3d, if they had a way to flatten a football, the 54 would have fit in a briefcase. The smallest gun assembled device would have gone in a fat briefcase or potentially a doctor's satchel, if it didn't have to withstand being shot out of a cannon. (Shrugs) dunno For posteriority, the lost material was fogbank and a silica style aerogel utilized for xray channeling via conversion to plasma. How that devil magik works, no idea. Just wanted to let the lurkers know the 100,000 foot view is declassified and covered in a bunch of details on the usual suspects. It also cost them something retarded like 400 million to figure out. |
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FYI, this epic thread is now tagged to not be archived. Thanks for the fantastic contributions.
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Originally Posted By NotTheUsual: For posteriority, the lost material was fogbank and a silica style aerogel utilized for xray channeling via conversion to plasma. How that devil magik works, no idea. Just wanted to let the lurkers know the 100,000 foot view is declassified and covered in a bunch of details on the usual suspects. It also cost them something retarded like 400 million to figure out. View Quote Those things strongly suggest what you say is true as far as the doped aerogel. The mechanism is still hotly debated. It could be solid, it could be canalized, others say there are plugs of material that fail first, allowing tailored shaping of the energy that illuminates the secondary in time. It is possible that the doping follows contours instead of being homogeneous. It may even be lensatic, or as simple as a hole filler in a dense material allowing for protection of the secondary. (Shrugs) Since it continues to live (thank you sir), here are a couple of real photos. Attached File Attached File That's how close many of the above-ground shots were to populated areas. When people start telling you about 'EMP' and 'nuclear winter' and 'uninhabitable for eternity' and 'death' and giant ants... Well, they may have one of them right. Fuck ants. |
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If we could do that way back then... other countries can do it now. Unrelated. I wonder how all those military age chinamen crossing the souther us border are doing. |
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What have the Romans ever done for us?
TN, USA
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for those who've never seen it.
Excellent hour of your time, Shatner narrates. I post as some of the "shot" footage shown is related. Failed To Load Title |
Panem et Circenses
I have also learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances. |
Free at last, thank god I am free at last
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This is a great thread. Thanks to everyone who has contributed.
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I know I'll never go home.
So set fire to your ships, and past regrets, and be free. |
Originally Posted By high_order1: They've never declassified what the product consisted of, or what its use was for. But they did release an environmental impact statement on the 'purification facility', and some discussion on how easily they forgot it, and what it took to match legacy batches. Those things strongly suggest what you say is true as far as the doped aerogel. The mechanism is still hotly debated. It could be solid, it could be canalized, others say there are plugs of material that fail first, allowing tailored shaping of the energy that illuminates the secondary in time. It is possible that the doping follows contours instead of being homogeneous. It may even be lensatic, or as simple as a hole filler in a dense material allowing for protection of the secondary. (Shrugs) Since it continues to live (thank you sir), here are a couple of real photos. https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/97kco6suggu91_jpg-2843429.JPG https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/djgtx5suggu91_jpg-2843430.JPG That's how close many of the above-ground shots were to populated areas. When people start telling you about 'EMP' and 'nuclear winter' and 'uninhabitable for eternity' and 'death' and giant ants... Well, they may have one of them right. Fuck ants. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By high_order1: Originally Posted By NotTheUsual: For posteriority, the lost material was fogbank and a silica style aerogel utilized for xray channeling via conversion to plasma. How that devil magik works, no idea. Just wanted to let the lurkers know the 100,000 foot view is declassified and covered in a bunch of details on the usual suspects. It also cost them something retarded like 400 million to figure out. Those things strongly suggest what you say is true as far as the doped aerogel. The mechanism is still hotly debated. It could be solid, it could be canalized, others say there are plugs of material that fail first, allowing tailored shaping of the energy that illuminates the secondary in time. It is possible that the doping follows contours instead of being homogeneous. It may even be lensatic, or as simple as a hole filler in a dense material allowing for protection of the secondary. (Shrugs) Since it continues to live (thank you sir), here are a couple of real photos. https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/97kco6suggu91_jpg-2843429.JPG https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/djgtx5suggu91_jpg-2843430.JPG That's how close many of the above-ground shots were to populated areas. When people start telling you about 'EMP' and 'nuclear winter' and 'uninhabitable for eternity' and 'death' and giant ants... Well, they may have one of them right. Fuck ants. This timelapse drives home how many nukes have been detonated in the world. Keep in mind they are distributed over a long time, and many are underground or underwater. But they are not the world-ending events we perceive. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auRQg7AaE-U |
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I know I'll never go home.
So set fire to your ships, and past regrets, and be free. |
I know I'll never go home.
So set fire to your ships, and past regrets, and be free. |
That art is clearly more modern than the concept. Probably lookee more like an alice pack, or worse, back then lol.
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Interesting timing for an article.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/special-forces-parachuted-with-nukes-strapped-to-them-during-the-cold-war |
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Originally Posted By feudist: The Green Light teams. Generally considered to be one way missions by the team members due to the fusing limitation. Man, the middle Cold War was really dire. Senior military and even a lot of politicians had the direct memory of WW2 and Korea. The USSR rolled up eastern Europe and brutally suppressed political movements in Hungary and Czechoslovakia by outright mass murder, and Comintern was running wild globally. Communist revolutions across Africa, Asia and the Americas. Europeans trying their damnedest to appease the USSR and play the US to pay for Socialism at the same time. Everyone watched the Soviets machine gun men, women and children trying to cross the wall to the West...no one had ever heard of trying to keep people in a political system from simply leaving before. They turned eastern Europe into a prison for a half century. Under the pressure, technology advanced so fast some people believed it had to be aliens. What a time. View Quote Yup, but those memories are dying with the generations that lived through that period. Sadly it will all be intentionally forgotten. I've had twenty-somethings tell me that it was all overblown and none of the above was true. None of them had been taught about the cold war and the actions of the USSR and communists globally when they were in school. They never learned about the horrors of the Soviet system, the gulags, or purges, or the starvation. They really think we're lying when we talk about life under the constant threat of nuclear war. If ever there was proof that the leftist takeover of education was intentional, there is no better example. |
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Originally Posted By Stillnothere: Interesting timing for an article. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/special-forces-parachuted-with-nukes-strapped-to-them-during-the-cold-war View Quote Not a bad wikipedia summary. There was no code. Split-knowledge combo dial. If you could get the cover off without killing yourself, move a component, turn a couple of dials... that's it. Dial could be recombinated from the inside, too, so if you could get it open eventually (not a limited try device)... MADM took some special knowledge. |
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@High_Order1,
Thanks for the book recommendation, just started reading it today. Very interesting! |
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Originally Posted By kested: https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/3686/FB_IMG_1684974636977-2827879.jpg View Quote I knew a guy with one of those backpacks. He was retired and living at Fort Leonard Wood. |
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I dont think this is a brains type of operation.
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Originally Posted By high_order1: spockindeed.jpg Not a bad wikipedia summary. There was no code. Split-knowledge combo dial. If you could get the cover off without killing yourself, move a component, turn a couple of dials... that's it. Dial could be recombinated from the inside, too, so if you could get it open eventually (not a limited try device)... MADM took some special knowledge. View Quote Before release, the code in the dial was set by a PAL team and was split knowledge. Upon weapon release, the using unit had the complete unlock code. Unless the using unit had a recode key for the lock secure cover, they couldn't recode the lock nor was there any reason for them to do so. You are correct that it was not limited try, none of the physical lock systems were including 155mm or 8 inch. |
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Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Originally Posted By Usernames: If we could do that way back then... other countries can do it now. Unrelated. I wonder how all those military age chinamen crossing the souther us border are doing. View Quote It is a brave new world...... After the Documentary Dr. Strangelove you would think that the U.S. would have closed up the mineshaft gap. |
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Originally Posted By high_order1: Thats AWESOME! I've collected a ton of photos from that era. (Of them, I have like four where no beer bottles are visible, at any time or location lol) https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/Vicenza_103_jpg-2829702.JPG View Quote |
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“As long as none of us gets hurt, we’re making memories.” - one GA trooper to another after shooting HOSTAGE 9 times
Their SHAME has become their PRIDE |
Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Originally Posted By Brundoggie: Before release, the code in the dial was set by a PAL team and was split knowledge. Upon weapon release, the using unit had the complete unlock code. Unless the using unit had a recode key for the lock secure cover, they couldn't recode the lock nor was there any reason for them to do so. You are correct that it was not limited try, none of the physical lock systems were including 155mm or 8 inch. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By Brundoggie: Before release, the code in the dial was set by a PAL team and was split knowledge. Upon weapon release, the using unit had the complete unlock code. Unless the using unit had a recode key for the lock secure cover, they couldn't recode the lock nor was there any reason for them to do so. You are correct that it was not limited try, none of the physical lock systems were including 155mm or 8 inch. Others here may share, but I also understand that the split code went out the window when they got their warning order. Training with the systems, they realized if A landed here with the special, and all the B's landed in the trees... mission over. Same reason they didn't like the earlier ADM that came in pieces. Lose a man on insert or during actions on objective, lose a mission. Originally Posted By ENGCPT: I knew a guy with one of those backpacks. He was retired and living at Fort Leonard Wood. It is *amazing* the amount of nuc stuff that walked off over the years. I remember my first time, clearly. I was a wee civil air patrol cadet haunting a surplus store near Ft. Campbell in the mid-80's. Rifling through a giant pile of pubs, when I ran across a 55Golf training manual. I assumed it would be marked classified. Nope. Since then, I have found a lot of stuff. When you have a MC list, it starts getting easier. For instance, this cat: http://www.glennsmuseum.com/items/b61/ beat me out on eBay to buy this item. What is it? It is the part of a nuclear weapon that is still in the US arsenal responsible for telling the bomb what to do and giving it permission to do it! That item is viewable at several museums. The difference was, he was able to take a screwdriver to his, and learned a couple of things that probably gave a LOT of people severe heartburn when they realized what had happened. PAL? Coding? Nuclear weapon security? Should be classified, right? Click To View Spoiler https://nukecompendium.com/equipments-components/use-control/ Potentially, yes. I have for over thirty years called what I do 'patchwork quilting'. Now they call it OSINT. Everything on that page in the spoiler was inspected, found to be declassifiable, and... was. The issue is that where you put more than one mere fact together, you may have in fact created a classified piece of information. Is this page synthesized classified confidential restricted data? No comment, talk to your local facility security officer for guidance if you hold concerns. AND, if you are currently holding a clearance, or was read onto things, and promised you would not look at verified classified information you had neither the clearance or the need to know... don't click and risk getting your work computer removed and crushed. For the rest of you, this guy has done a pretty good job of putting most of it together. Those docs have been floating around for YEARS in the speculator circles, he just made it into something readable. The image of the SADM cover, for instance, that's what we all were working with for a long time. I did a sketch of what I thought the lid looked like about 20 years ago; another guy put it outside the circle as his own, and I still see it from time to time lol. When they finally put the museum pieces out, and some of the manuals were found, I was very pleased to be right. Originally Posted By Brundoggie: LOL, no, they are training chemical decon kits. Circle gets the square. I have a blue kit, and some all up kits; they are dark green, and the packets inside look like giant wet-naps in green foil that KFC used to give out. Buy your own! https://www.sarcoinc.com/u-s-army-chemical-decontamination-training-kit/ I know others will hopefully correct me, but on the subject of dosimetry: In the beginning, the gadget was a scientific laboratory apparatus, and they didn't know what they didn't know. As time moved along, the ability of the government to capture and record individual exposures grew. There were two types of exposure, routine and accidental. Routine data collection was not very robust for a very long time. Unfortunately, this was also the time where the most risk to being exposed occurred, because the earlier systems required technicians to get very way up in the guts of weapons. There are multiple books, and from talking with people, they literally held pits in their hands, or put them on little pronged stands, then took kimwipes and alcohol and wiped them down, looking for where pieces of the pit were actively flaking off, taking the plating with it. (The plating changed in composition over time, but could not stop the active material from popping off.) Then they took toilet brushes wrapped in more kimwipes, and thrust them deep into certain portions of the systems, doing the same thing. These soiled wipes were then inspected with the best counters of the day, and then burned. Results were recorded with the IRC that followed that particular weapon around. Current systems you rarely, if ever uncork for any reason. There are two videos, both taken by that particular service, one definitely was meant for release, the other I am not so sure, but it is posted by people who aught to know, that really show what goes into that particular procedure. For most of the legacy Army/Marine systems, the manuals on how to do those procedures are out in the wild (I've collected most of them). Do you want a link to the videos, or shall we continue to try and confine this to the SADM? Unless someone has some specific questions, I feel like I've pretty much beat that one to death. (Also, I know there are several on here that know more than I do. Encourage them to contact me and explain how the SADM neutron generator worked. That, how many points the system was detonated at, and the construction of the shaped hemishell are the only pieces I don't understand.) I know a ton more about the 8" and a few other systems. I know almost nothing about the 79, but would love to know more. Edit for clarity |
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Others here may share, but I also understand that the split code went out the window when they got their warning order. Training with the systems, they realized if A landed here with the special, and all the B's landed in the trees... View Quote Not exactly correct. The using unit would receive a release message authorizing the use of the weapon and the message would contain the PAL code in an encrypted format. The using unit would authenticate the validity of the message using the Sealed Authentication System (SAS) and decrypt the PAL code with a separate sealed decrypt card. Once the PAL code was decrypted, the using unit would have the entire code to unlock the cover. Depending on circumstances, a unique PAL code could be used for a specific weapon (by serial number), a group of weapons at a single location or theater wide. With electronic PAL systems found in weapons systems that could accept multiple codes (e.g., B61 series) the PAL coding could be quite complex. Please note this applies to tactical nuclear systems, strategic systems could be quite different. I was on the PACOM PMCT/PAL team in the late '80s so things may have changed since then. |
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Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Originally Posted By Stillnothere: Interesting timing for an article. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/special-forces-parachuted-with-nukes-strapped-to-them-during-the-cold-war View Quote I’d say they were following this thread closely |
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I love nuke stuff, as u can see from sn.
Some good reading on the stuff Nuclear Battlefields, Arkin Fieldhous Effects of Nuclear Weapons, DOD And Dr Peter Goetz amazing A Technical History Of America's Nuclear Weapons, volumes 1 and 2. These are incredibly detailed. |
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Originally Posted By high_order1: They've never declassified what the product consisted of, or what its use was for. But they did release an environmental impact statement on the 'purification facility', and some discussion on how easily they forgot it, and what it took to match legacy batches. Those things strongly suggest what you say is true as far as the doped aerogel. The mechanism is still hotly debated. It could be solid, it could be canalized, others say there are plugs of material that fail first, allowing tailored shaping of the energy that illuminates the secondary in time. It is possible that the doping follows contours instead of being homogeneous. It may even be lensatic, or as simple as a hole filler in a dense material allowing for protection of the secondary. (Shrugs) Since it continues to live (thank you sir), here are a couple of real photos. https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/97kco6suggu91_jpg-2843429.JPG https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/djgtx5suggu91_jpg-2843430.JPG That's how close many of the above-ground shots were to populated areas. When people start telling you about 'EMP' and 'nuclear winter' and 'uninhabitable for eternity' and 'death' and giant ants... Well, they may have one of them right. Fuck ants. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By high_order1: Originally Posted By NotTheUsual: For posteriority, the lost material was fogbank and a silica style aerogel utilized for xray channeling via conversion to plasma. How that devil magik works, no idea. Just wanted to let the lurkers know the 100,000 foot view is declassified and covered in a bunch of details on the usual suspects. It also cost them something retarded like 400 million to figure out. Those things strongly suggest what you say is true as far as the doped aerogel. The mechanism is still hotly debated. It could be solid, it could be canalized, others say there are plugs of material that fail first, allowing tailored shaping of the energy that illuminates the secondary in time. It is possible that the doping follows contours instead of being homogeneous. It may even be lensatic, or as simple as a hole filler in a dense material allowing for protection of the secondary. (Shrugs) Since it continues to live (thank you sir), here are a couple of real photos. https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/97kco6suggu91_jpg-2843429.JPG https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/djgtx5suggu91_jpg-2843430.JPG That's how close many of the above-ground shots were to populated areas. When people start telling you about 'EMP' and 'nuclear winter' and 'uninhabitable for eternity' and 'death' and giant ants... Well, they may have one of them right. Fuck ants. Don't forget deathclaws. Cool pics btw! |
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Originally Posted By NotTheUsual: For posteriority, the lost material was fogbank and a silica style aerogel utilized for xray channeling via conversion to plasma. How that devil magik works, no idea. Just wanted to let the lurkers know the 100,000 foot view is declassified and covered in a bunch of details on the usual suspects. It also cost them something retarded like 400 million to figure out. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By NotTheUsual: Originally Posted By high_order1: Originally Posted By TheAvatar9265ft: Seems like the state of the art was there for the 82 to eclipse the 79 if the wall hadn't come down? Throw in a couple of subject matter experts wringing their hands, and I think it was the death knell. (I have no background here, policy is way out of my wheelhouse, but I think war should be short, meaningful, and so immediately painful to the other side they give up. No rebuilding, no pacification or police action bullshit. So, if it means making some glassy parking lots instead of sending more of my neighbors' kids overseas, I guess they shouldn't have asked for it. I'm not the least worried about counterforce or nuclear winter). Originally Posted By Wineraner: Pu-linear implosion sounds like it'd be smaller (at least in one dimension) than Pu-spherical. Agree that CFD breakthroughs could likely lead to some amazing efficiencies. There is more on that topic, but it is in Mandarin and... uh, cyrillic? lol Linear can mean a rod or tube of active material. It could also mean a truncated cone, like one of those old paper cups. Then there is the whole 'nonspherical implosion'. All are predicated on making the active material relatively non-critical until time of boom. You can actually put more than a single critical mass into a pit if you spread it out enough, and a tube geometry would absolutely allow for that. The issue is 'efficient'. Most small-volume designs are inefficient. (The most wasteful remain gun assembled devices). That's because, I think, they prioritize a shape or volume over compression. There is a TON to compression, and ways to keep the mass assembled for slightly longer. None of these fit into small volumes. I believe efficient designs rely on ultrapure thin levitated shells, graded compression, focused neutron drive, boosting, and ample energetics. Insensitive High Explosives are relatively safer, but at a penalty of less drive for the same volume of material. (there are legit weaponeers, EOD and Production Technicians on here that could correct me... but they won't. o well) The thing that surprised me about the W79 and 82 is that there were enhanced radiation mods. I.e, neutron bombs. I'd thought those were strictly a product of fast fusion neutrons, and that there wouldn't be appreciable fusion yield in a device that small. TIL.... ERW is generally poorly understood. My limited understanding is that once they pretty much got the idea of fission and fusion for defense applications down, they realized they could modulate and prefer certain outputs at the expense of others. This came from the so-called 'clean' vs 'dirty' systems, and I suspect, culminated in using tiny nuc systems to pump LASERS or other devices for... reasons. lol There are a lot of routes to creating neutrons. But there are also ways to make a system more opaque to other energies at the expense of losing neutrons. (Neutrons are the secret sauce to nuc systems. Just a handful of them are what kick off the reaction. Adding a handful more... I THINK increases efficiency logarithmically. (Don't quote me, I am math dumb). Originally Posted By Meche_03: I don't foresee 3d printing or additive manufacturing helping build a better nuclear weapon anytime soon. It introduces too many impurities and physical voids to the nuclear fuel chain. The uncontrolled density changes that occur at the current technology level would be detrimental to controlled HE driven implosion. As far as the chemical high explosion portion of the physics package, they have been doing additive since the late 50's. Without having any of my reference material in front of me, I could make a case that they essentially invented it. Using layering technology they were able to adjust the refractive index of explosives, causing chapman-jouguet wave shaping, which started with multi-piece lens casting techniques, where they did have a terrible time with voids, but learned a great deal about non-destructive testing in order to make things better. Although, sitting with a 40 pound piece of explosive in your lap, and using a dentists' drill to bore a hole in live HE to fill a void doesn't sound like something you'd really want to be doing... but they did it. Figuring out how to layer different products during the pour I think is where 3d printing started, honestly. I'm probably wrong, but I know for a fact they did it, and I know that them figuring it out reduced the CHE burden from hundreds of pounds to under a hundred pounds, and in some cases, much less. Also, it's not just in active materials and conventional explosives. They also invented foamed metals. Imagine a sponge, but of actual metal. And, they made it into something called graded impactors, where it starts out almost squishy, but as you progress through it, it gets harder and stiffer. Doping this metal with various items gives... other benefits as well. The control of density may not have been invented at the Labs, but it is where it is now because of them, in my opinion. The impurities also introduce a significant quantity of elements that could lead to increased chemical interactions within the sealed subassembly. Funny story. I was not there for this, but I (as well as others) put this together independently before NNSA fessed up to it. There is a component in certain systems, that does a certain function. It was a pain in the balls to make from several standpoints, and eventually, they stopped making it because... they assumed something better was coming? Who knows. They tried to restart production of this product, and failed. Not really failed, but they didn't have as-built and batch data, and some other things were lost to the sands of time. What they made was absolutely pure and perfect in the lens of modern materials science. Then (I think, they never said) they did some underground low-yield testing with it, and... it did not behave like the legacy material. Turns out, they had to re-introduce certain impurities, and alter the process in a less-optimized way in order to maintain the legacy, benchmarked material. ... well, I think it's funny. Like, Nile Red trying to bake a cookie in his lab using ochem techniques funny. anyway Is there possibilities to create new materials that help control shockwaves to mitigate attenuation/reflections while possibly adding fusion fuel? Probably. Guarantee it. Submarines are quiet, and people run faster due to it. Better materials and manufacturing methods for the delivery system to help manipulate the mass, strength, cg....to allow more nuclear material better safety and firing controls within the same defined outer envelope of the delivery system....yes, a big yes. The new materials, elements and modern computers can help a lot. Totally agree. And, apparently, they've had a lot of pushback over the years. It's like you have a 1981 car, but you can't change the tires on it because, is that a new weapons system? That's a treaty violation. Ok, so we leave the frame alone, but we put electronic ignition in it and power door locks. Same motor, so has to be same weapon. Right? Maybe. Well, let's replace the cylindrical transmission with a spherical one. Well, now it goes faster in the same lift weight and cone volume, so treaty violation, right? Nope, we used that transmission on a truck before, so it's not new. (I suspect this is where the ATF got some of their policymaking guidance.) But, in the 60s-80s, the weapons complex did not have to work with in the current limitations of the EPA, OSHA, understanding of long term effects and consequences of exposure to radiation, and a plethora of now banned materials and chemicals. A lot was done based on the pure physics and science needed for a design to work. I agree completely. What is the point of leaving a pristine countryside if it's going to be taken by Godless commies? I think a point came where they knew the jig was up, but by then there were so many contractors trying to squeeze the last pennies out of the programs that they could have started doing better and remediating, but they said fuck it and kicked that can down the road, which I believe was wrong, and yet another nail in defense production work. Plus, they had the advantage of testing. To this day, the computer models are not super accurate. They have to adjust them to fit the actual test data, and they still don't seem to know why. My favorite, the 54, needed a few shots before they got it dialed in, but that was during the Fun Era of weaponeering. Plenty of material, plenty of talent, what magic can we squeeze out of the atom next? I don't know what the primary of the w79 looks like. I don't either, and no one has ever told me. I do know there is a component inside codeword TONY, that was a problem. Eventually one of them came up with an elegant as fuck solution to it, and it's something that amazes them all to this day. I wish to know what it was. The Russians know. The Chinese know. Taiwan knows. A ton of contractors, servicemen, scientists, printers, secretaries, and others know. (shrugs) The w79 appears to be roughly the same size canned assembly as the 54 based on having the same delivery systems, but the w79 could have a maximum output slightly higher than the 54 and the 79 is reported to have had a enhanced neutron option....so a small fision 2ndary? Lots of websites state the 79 had a linear PU implosion primary....what ever that means....so assuming it went from spherical implosion to a different method requiring less volumetric space. So again pointing to the possibility of a small secondary. There has been a TON of speculation in the few places I've ever wormed my way into. The craziest part is that when you look at a 79 shell, most of that isn't the physics package, at all. (There are cutaway pics on the net). I think the 79 is thinner than the 54. The 54 is spherical with a hemispherical hemishell, and a so-called "shaped hemishell". The 54 was fission only. The 79 was a true TN system, and I've never read why besides military characteristics planning why they arrived at the yields they chose. As far as volumetric space, .... mmmm not too certain. You can take an orange-sized lump of clay and squish it into a hollow football shape. Same amount of material, but now you can adjust the volume to be more amenable to a cone, or a sphere-cone, or even a cylinder. Adding fusion can come in two routes. The soviets are known to have layered fusion materials around a fission system. Another speculative version has a fusion fuel at the end of a fission primary. The fanciest version uses container geometry and a delayed, filtering barrier to briefly focus fission energies onto a co-located fusion fuel system. These can be linked like sausages, creating fission>fusion>fission chains. Dunno, a lot of that got declassified because people wanted badly for fusion power generation and the power and defense versions apparently have great overlap. I never really dug into it that much. But, I know the 79 has a secondary. And gold the thickness of a beer can, and somehow ultra-pure carbon fashioned into sheets that can withstand tens of thousands of revolutions per second at a ton of G forces, and somehow the whole thing maintains geometry and distances internally. Again, fascinating. I wish to know more. (I don't really want to kill anybody; I also enjoy watching shows on the clever ways they run assembly lines, especially foods. I just am a huge fan of engineering, and there is a ton of it in ordnance. Also, I hate not being in on a secret.Even if it is a dumb secret). I don't believe a briefcase nuke ever existed based on a pit needs to be baseball to softball size before any HE, detonators, firing controls, or shielding. If you told me it was the size of a modern carryon luggage case and weighed #50+ I'd believe you. As far as US systems, design released ones I don't know of one. AEC/ERDA test item? No telling. Threat nations, I've seen an image they told me was a russian one, but it wasn't a briefcase. It was much larger. Having said that, and knowing that most US systems were designed in 2d and not 3d, if they had a way to flatten a football, the 54 would have fit in a briefcase. The smallest gun assembled device would have gone in a fat briefcase or potentially a doctor's satchel, if it didn't have to withstand being shot out of a cannon. (Shrugs) dunno For posteriority, the lost material was fogbank and a silica style aerogel utilized for xray channeling via conversion to plasma. How that devil magik works, no idea. Just wanted to let the lurkers know the 100,000 foot view is declassified and covered in a bunch of details on the usual suspects. It also cost them something retarded like 400 million to figure out. Some variant of a foamed (and likely doped, too) 1,3-acetonitrile, if I'm remembering what I read correctly. A stone bitch to replicate, supposedly because the process environment is a lot cleaner now than in the 60s, but it was the impurities that gave the material its desired properties. |
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Originally Posted By high_order1: They've never declassified what the product consisted of, or what its use was for. But they did release an environmental impact statement on the 'purification facility', and some discussion on how easily they forgot it, and what it took to match legacy batches. Those things strongly suggest what you say is true as far as the doped aerogel. The mechanism is still hotly debated. It could be solid, it could be canalized, others say there are plugs of material that fail first, allowing tailored shaping of the energy that illuminates the secondary in time. It is possible that the doping follows contours instead of being homogeneous. It may even be lensatic, or as simple as a hole filler in a dense material allowing for protection of the secondary. (Shrugs) Since it continues to live (thank you sir), here are a couple of real photos. https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/97kco6suggu91_jpg-2843429.JPG https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/17550/djgtx5suggu91_jpg-2843430.JPG That's how close many of the above-ground shots were to populated areas. When people start telling you about 'EMP' and 'nuclear winter' and 'uninhabitable for eternity' and 'death' and giant ants... Well, they may have one of them right. Fuck ants. View Quote Thank goodness the prevailing winds were usually out of the West/Southwest. Bad news for the people of SW Utah and E. Nevada though... |
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Originally Posted By Brundoggie: Not exactly correct. The using unit would receive a release message authorizing the use of the weapon and the message would contain the PAL code in an encrypted format. The using unit would authenticate the validity of the message using the Sealed Authentication System (SAS) and decrypt the PAL code with a separate sealed decrypt card. Once the PAL code was decrypted, the using unit would have the entire code to unlock the cover. Depending on circumstances, a unique PAL code could be used for a specific weapon (by serial number), a group of weapons at a single location or theater wide. With electronic PAL systems found in weapons systems that could accept multiple codes (e.g., B61 series) the PAL coding could be quite complex. Please note this applies to tactical nuclear systems, strategic systems could be quite different. I was on the PACOM PMCT/PAL team in the late '80s so things may have changed since then. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By Brundoggie: Not exactly correct. The using unit would receive a release message authorizing the use of the weapon and the message would contain the PAL code in an encrypted format. The using unit would authenticate the validity of the message using the Sealed Authentication System (SAS) and decrypt the PAL code with a separate sealed decrypt card. Once the PAL code was decrypted, the using unit would have the entire code to unlock the cover. Depending on circumstances, a unique PAL code could be used for a specific weapon (by serial number), a group of weapons at a single location or theater wide. With electronic PAL systems found in weapons systems that could accept multiple codes (e.g., B61 series) the PAL coding could be quite complex. Please note this applies to tactical nuclear systems, strategic systems could be quite different. I was on the PACOM PMCT/PAL team in the late '80s so things may have changed since then. What I asked, and no one would ever say though, using the SAS system, from an outside perspective, kinda sorta seems like a dedicated and knowledgeable adversary could shoot the box open, and go through PAL cookies until they found the one that matched, say, all the 8 inch systems, or a 54. I realize they would then have to go through a lot of other steps to physically access a system, and that they would need a battle buddy... I get it. But seems like all the PAL codes were in that safe. Dunno, may be too close to the vulnerability fire on that one. Originally Posted By Teller_Ulam: I love nuke stuff, as u can see from sn. Some good reading on the stuff Nuclear Battlefields, Arkin Fieldhous Effects of Nuclear Weapons, DOD And Dr Peter Goetz amazing A Technical History Of America's Nuclear Weapons, volumes 1 and 2. These are incredibly detailed. on the Effects book, there are several versions. When Glasstone put the original one out, it held data they decided was classified, the wives' tale goes. Later revisions had less, and the last one didn't even have the calculator any more. Dr. Goetz' book is... rough. I think I understand he redid the series, so there's the original one, and then the revision two one and two? I can't recommend the one I got. Yogi Shan's meandering tome honestly has more value to speculators. Originally Posted By sierra-def: Don't forget deathclaws. Cool pics btw! I don't know what that is lol Originally Posted By Wineraner: Thank goodness the prevailing winds were usually out of the West/Southwest. Bad news for the people of SW Utah and E. Nevada though... Them people on the boat got the glowing dick some, too. And the cow the one bomb accidentally fell on, and those people that had one land near their house... The one in Tybee Island is probably not recoverable though. Originally Posted By Wineraner: Some variant of a foamed (and likely doped, too) 1,3-acetonitrile, if I'm remembering what I read correctly. A stone bitch to replicate, supposedly because the process environment is a lot cleaner now than in the 60s, but it was the impurities that gave the material its desired properties. Acetonitrile is used extensively in the process according to the EIS. I don't think it's the end product. I strongly believe it's doped. It makes sense depending on what version of inertial confinement fusion you bet is happening in the secondary. My guess is among other things, there's some ultrapure carbon and beryllium in there, but I don't think the channels are 100% polystyrene like a lot of parrots like to chant. Here's a great synopsis of how several people put it together from pieces: https://www.nuclearinfo.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Ainslie_notes_Fogbank_6_March_2008.pdf |
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I always thought you were EOD back in the Red Fender Days. Cool What I asked, and no one would ever say though, using the SAS system, from an outside perspective, kinda sorta seems like a dedicated and knowledgeable adversary could shoot the box open, and go through PAL cookies until they found the one that matched, say, all the 8 inch systems, or a 54. I realize they would then have to go through a lot of other steps to physically access a system, and that they would need a battle buddy... I get it. But seems like all the PAL codes were in that safe. Dunno, may be too close to the vulnerability fire on that one. View Quote I was an EOD officer back in the "red fender" days when you couldn't make a career out of it and ended up as a ammo supply company commander and later Nuclear Ops Officer at PACOM as part of the PMCT/PAL team. SAS and PAL are separate systems. SAS is used to authenticate that a message is valid and is used in messages that may not involve release of PAL codes. PAL cookies are different and are a decryption system (secret decoder ring) and don't have the PAL code "in the clear" so no, you can't just shoot the lock off and keep cracking cookies until you found one that worked. Basically, the system worked like this... The combatant commander would request release authority for some or all of the weapons under their control aka a "Request Message" submitted to JCS. JCS would approve, deny or modify the request and return a "Release Message" if release was authorized. Upon receipt of the release message, the NOT (Nuclear Operations Team) would construct the "Release Message" to be sent to the unit holding the nuclear asset (and intermediate commands such as PACAF). The PMCT was part of the NOT and would direct which "Unlock cookie" was to be used in the message based upon the situation. At this point the "Release Message" (a pre-formatted message) is drafted and the code contained in the unlock cookie would be transmitted with SAS as part of the message to ensure the using unit could validate it as genuine. The using unit would take the code from the message and decrypt it with the PAL cookie maintained at the using unit. Instructions on targeting, etc was in a separate message since unlock messages were a standard format. Our office had an exercise program where we would send exercise unlock messages to various using units and they would have to respond with whatever they decrypted the PAL code to be. Failure to respond or an incorrect response was......a bad thing. We also did frequent Finally, we also did the first total cycle tactical nuclear release exercise that went from a PACOM "Request Message" to a JCS "Release Message" to a PACOM "Release Message" via the PACOM Airborne Command Post to the using unit who decrypted the PAL code and used it to unlock test nuclear weapons and set them into a stockpile to target sequence. The test weapons were SADMs taken from stockpile, "de-pitted", and run around a tactical environment with timers set. One had the timer stopped and was returned to Sandia for disassembly and the other was allowed to count down to a detonation with the remains collected and sent to Sandia for inspection. I'm sharing this since everything changed in 1991 when deployed tactical weapons were pulled back to CONUS and taken out of the control of regional Combatant Commanders and PACOM disbanded the NOT and PMCT/PAL team. ETA: There are some significant details I am leaving out regarding how the systems worked for obvious reasons but the basics are already out there. |
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Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Originally Posted By BillofRights: Always been fascinated by those. They have the whole setup displayed at the Nuke museum in LAS. It was just a way to take out point targets, in the days before gps/Ins/laser guided munitions. Future nukes will be even smaller. View Quote I really liked that museum until the display on how much radiation aircrews get |
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Mach
Nobody is coming to save us. . |
Originally Posted By Brundoggie: I was an EOD officer back in the "red fender" days when you couldn't make a career out of it and ended up as a ammo supply company commander and later Nuclear Ops Officer at PACOM as part of the PMCT/PAL team. SAS and PAL are separate systems. SAS is used to authenticate that a message is valid and is used in messages that may not involve release of PAL codes. PAL cookies are different and are a decryption system (secret decoder ring) and don't have the PAL code "in the clear" so no, you can't just shoot the lock off and keep cracking cookies until you found one that worked. Basically, the system worked like this... The combatant commander would request release authority for some or all of the weapons under their control aka a "Request Message" submitted to JCS. JCS would approve, deny or modify the request and return a "Release Message" if release was authorized. Upon receipt of the release message, the NOT (Nuclear Operations Team) would construct the "Release Message" to be sent to the unit holding the nuclear asset (and intermediate commands such as PACAF). The PMCT was part of the NOT and would direct which "Unlock cookie" was to be used in the message based upon the situation. At this point the "Release Message" (a pre-formatted message) is drafted and the code contained in the unlock cookie would be transmitted with SAS as part of the message to ensure the using unit could validate it as genuine. The using unit would take the code from the message and decrypt it with the PAL cookie maintained at the using unit. Instructions on targeting, etc was in a separate message since unlock messages were a standard format. Our office had an exercise program where we would send exercise unlock messages to various using units and they would have to respond with whatever they decrypted the PAL code to be. Failure to respond or an incorrect response was......a bad thing. We also did frequent Finally, we also did the first total cycle tactical nuclear release exercise that went from a PACOM "Request Message" to a JCS "Release Message" to a PACOM "Release Message" via the PACOM Airborne Command Post to the using unit who decrypted the PAL code and used it to unlock test nuclear weapons and set them into a stockpile to target sequence. The test weapons were SADMs taken from stockpile, "de-pitted", and run around a tactical environment with timers set. One had the timer stopped and was returned to Sandia for disassembly and the other was allowed to count down to a detonation with the remains collected and sent to Sandia for inspection. I'm sharing this since everything changed in 1991 when deployed tactical weapons were pulled back to CONUS and taken out of the control of regional Combatant Commanders and PACOM disbanded the NOT and PMCT/PAL team. ETA: There are some significant details I am leaving out regarding how the systems worked for obvious reasons but the basics are already out there. View Quote I had been told that the... I'm blanking on the name, but the person assigned to the radio listening for these messages. Anyway, several of them assigned this duty said they practiced for this a *lot*. Watching the af launch trainer videos, I really thought it was simpler. I think I get what you might be suggesting with the unlock cookie. That makes way more sense than just having a pile of keys in a gsa container waiting for someone to get frisky. Thank you for sharing! Too bad you can't tell us more about your time Back Then, especially nuc phase. |
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Originally Posted By high_order1: on the Effects book, there are several versions. When Glasstone put the original one out, it held data they decided was classified, the wives' tale goes. Later revisions had less, and the last one didn't even have the calculator any more. View Quote I have 1950, 1957, 1962, and 1977 which was the last. The last 3 at least all had the circular slide rule bomb effects computer. The 1950 version was call "The effects of atomic weapons." They added info for sure... not sure what was left out? I certainly didn't follow closely enough to notice. |
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high_order1 a Deathclaw is fictional creature found across the irradiated wastelands of the USA in the Fallout video game series. They're big, ugly and not very friendly.
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Originally Posted By high_order1: Well... damn I had been told that the... I'm blanking on the name, but the person assigned to the radio listening for these messages. Anyway, several of them assigned this duty said they practiced for this a *lot*. Watching the af launch trainer videos, I really thought it was simpler. I think I get what you might be suggesting with the unlock cookie. That makes way more sense than just having a pile of keys in a gsa container waiting for someone to get frisky. Thank you for sharing! Too bad you can't tell us more about your time Back Then, especially nuc phase. View Quote The various messages were not voice, they were through the electronic system and had Flash priority with "Emergency Action Message" as part of the header. USAF launch procedures for strategic nukes was much different. |
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Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Originally Posted By TheAvatar9265ft: I have 1950, 1957, 1962, and 1977 which was the last. The last 3 at least all had the circular slide rule bomb effects computer. The 1950 version was call "The effects of atomic weapons." They added info for sure... not sure what was left out? I certainly didn't follow closely enough to notice. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By TheAvatar9265ft: I have 1950, 1957, 1962, and 1977 which was the last. The last 3 at least all had the circular slide rule bomb effects computer. The 1950 version was call "The effects of atomic weapons." They added info for sure... not sure what was left out? I certainly didn't follow closely enough to notice. Very cool collection though! Better than mine. Do you have an original Smyth report? Originally Posted By Stillnothere: high_order1 a Deathclaw is fictional creature found across the irradiated wastelands of the USA in the Fallout video game series. They're big, ugly and not very friendly. Ohhh. I have a HUGE knowledge gap there. Thanks! .... can you fuck or eat one? Originally Posted By Brundoggie: The various messages were not voice, they were through the electronic system and had Flash priority with "Emergency Action Message" as part of the header. USAF launch procedures for strategic nukes was much different. Oh! Thank you for correcting me. Now I have more things to research next time. ... No way you recall much about the RF firing system for ADM's, is there? I have some data, but there is a ton I'd like to know. Also, did you see my picture on page 4? Attached File Ever see one of those contraptions? lol Since people are still talking, here are a couple of adds to the book list: The History and Custody of US Nuclear Weapons (U) what was the point of livermore? Somebody help me out with the NEMO, and I'll put a link to a picture of a legit US pit on here. |
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My only work with MADM was the EOD procedures for disarming in various configurations. PACOM didn't have any allocated so I never worked on them.
I know what that is in the ceiling of the magazine but never encountered it in any of the storage areas I worked in. My understanding is that some storage locations also employed sticky foam as a protective measure but again I never personally encountered it. |
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Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.
Robert A. Heinlein |
Originally Posted By Brundoggie: My only work with MADM was the EOD procedures for disarming in various configurations. PACOM didn't have any allocated so I never worked on them. I know what that is in the ceiling of the magazine but never encountered it in any of the storage areas I worked in. My understanding is that some storage locations also employed sticky foam as a protective measure but again I never personally encountered it. View Quote So the C-wire falls from the ceiling if someone tries to take the silver box at the back of the bunker....Indianna Jones boulder-style? Or is it just to stop tunneling through the ceiling? The 10yo in me wants it to fall on thieves if they move the shiny box |
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Originally Posted By towerofpower94: So the C-wire falls from the ceiling if someone tries to take the silver box at the back of the bunker....Indianna Jones boulder-style? Or is it just to stop tunneling through the ceiling? The 10yo in me wants it to fall on thieves if they move the shiny box View Quote All that is a delay to give a bunch of angry young Americans time to get in there and put the hurt on them. I've lurked a lot of vet sites for years, never heard about a single accidental trip. I'd hate to have had to clean that fucking mess up lol Other security features they apparently used over the years included some high tech shit, like putting an enormous, massive block in front of the door. Only one machine could lift it, and they kept it far away and disabled. You could use jacks, but you'd be there for a long time. That's just to get to the locked front door of the mag. (vets, care to comment?) The current hotness overseas is called a WS3. While there's a bunch about it online, I don't feel good about saying anything past it probably is adequate as long as the base hasn't been evacuated. Guess that's kind of hypocritical of me, but... sorry |
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Originally Posted By high_order1: ...The Other security features they apparently used over the years included some high tech shit, like putting an enormous, massive block in front of the door. Only one machine could lift it, and they kept it far away and disabled. You could use jacks, but you'd be there for a long time. That's just to get to the locked front door of the mag. (vets, care to comment?) The current hotness overseas is called a WS3. While there's a bunch about it online, I don't feel good about saying anything past it probably is adequate as long as the base hasn't been evacuated. Guess that's kind of hypocritical of me, but... sorry View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By high_order1: Originally Posted By towerofpower94: So the C-wire falls from the ceilinp://www.ar15.com/images/smilies/smiley_abused.gif[/img] Other security features they apparently used over the years included some high tech shit, like putting an enormous, massive block in front of the door. Only one machine could lift it, and they kept it far away and disabled. You could use jacks, but you'd be there for a long time. That's just to get to the locked front door of the mag. (vets, care to comment?) The current hotness overseas is called a WS3. While there's a bunch about it online, I don't feel good about saying anything past it probably is adequate as long as the base hasn't been evacuated. Guess that's kind of hypocritical of me, but... sorry The oxygen-removing system sounds like a Halon-flood firefighting system at first glance. As to the masses in front of the locked door, isn't that fairly standard at places like Pantex? Or other magazines where you don't need right away, whatever's in them? A bunch of stacked concrete blocks that lock together, and you need something very noisy and tedious to move them. The concertina wire of doom is an interesting touch. It looked like some sort of RF induction contraption when you first showed the picture. IIRC, we offered the Pakistanis our PAL technology, or at least a version of it, to assist in safeguarding their strategic deterrent. From what I read, they weren't interested. |
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Originally Posted By Wineraner: The oxygen-removing system sounds like a Halon-flood firefighting system at first glance. As to the masses in front of the locked door, isn't that fairly standard at places like Pantex? Or other magazines where you don't need right away, whatever's in them? A bunch of stacked concrete blocks that lock together, and you need something very noisy and tedious to move them. The concertina wire of doom is an interesting touch. It looked like some sort of RF induction contraption when you first showed the picture. IIRC, we offered the Pakistanis our PAL technology, or at least a version of it, to assist in safeguarding their strategic deterrent. From what I read, they weren't interested. View Quote I can't speak to what they are doing at current NNSA facilities. There aren't many pictures and I haven't flown over in googy earth in years. The last thing I really remember was an ancient program at px called 'stage right' where they used autonomous devices to move pit containers around. USG offered PAL type tech to several nations. Most interestingly was russia. Not only pal and access denial and secure transport tech, but they paid russian weaponeers not to build. After dumping a lot of money into this program, taking off with a bunch of their surplus active materials, one day russia said no more, and ejected all the Energy people. (allegedly). My ears perked up because, what country doesn't want free US funding?? I swear there has to be way, way more to that story, and maybe I am misremembering it, but I don't think I am. I hope we fucked them square in the pussy, and they have had to work very hard to patch their vulnerabilities, if possible at all. (Also, I'd like to rig a chatgpt with google translate, there is a lot of russian weapons data allegedly floating around out there. I know there's a BUNCH of chinese stuff in their academic circles, I just can't read it without too much hassle, and not enough images for me to recognize, say an air or ring lens or geometry that would let me prioritize papers, back when I was actively pursuing all of this. ) |
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Originally Posted By Neopo8: Actually, I'm much younger than that. Back in the old days it was much easier to lie about your age and get away with it. No one cared or checked. I dropped out of 10th grade at 16, picked up a phony birth certificate and joined up. Stuck around long enough to grab a commission and retired after 24 years. I'm 82 now and living proof that Nukes, unlike some women, won't kill you if you sleep with them. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By Neopo8: Originally Posted By whiskerz: Holy crap. My math says you are at least 85 years old Actually, I'm much younger than that. Back in the old days it was much easier to lie about your age and get away with it. No one cared or checked. I dropped out of 10th grade at 16, picked up a phony birth certificate and joined up. Stuck around long enough to grab a commission and retired after 24 years. I'm 82 now and living proof that Nukes, unlike some women, won't kill you if you sleep with them. You can hunt my deer stand any time, that's cooler than cool. |
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"Never underestimate the tenacity of folks without the distraction of internet pornography." -TxRabbitBane
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Originally Posted By whiskerz: It is true. He was doing B-52 ecm and was a crew chief on a regular nuke alert aircraft. His actual plane is the one Bud Holland crashed. He flew with Bud in the instructor pilot seat for the prior airshow practice and had rotated out of being the crew chief when Bud augered the plane into the ground . He has a radiation exposure letter in his medical records that is the same type of letter given to guys who were at above ground nuke test and exposed outdoors to live nuke detonations. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By whiskerz: Originally Posted By 30calTBLkid: I don't know if that was true back then, but these days it is not. Even guys who work in spaces near where they could xray aircraft structural components or welds wear dosimeters. Personnel who are part of any rad producing program are on med surveillance programs, dosimeters turned in and evaluated monthly if not more, and by God they are serious about it. It is true. He was doing B-52 ecm and was a crew chief on a regular nuke alert aircraft. His actual plane is the one Bud Holland crashed. He flew with Bud in the instructor pilot seat for the prior airshow practice and had rotated out of being the crew chief when Bud augered the plane into the ground . He has a radiation exposure letter in his medical records that is the same type of letter given to guys who were at above ground nuke test and exposed outdoors to live nuke detonations. I remember that event. Terrible. |
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"Never underestimate the tenacity of folks without the distraction of internet pornography." -TxRabbitBane
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Originally Posted By IL2windhawk: What are the chances that we have infiltrated key locations and buried devices like this with the capability for remote detonation. No time-of-flight like a missile. Literally just press a button somewhere in Washington and blow up a major military target with a 30 year old buried device. Could completely pre-empt any missile launches. Same could be said about Russian assets burying devices on our turf. Spooky. View Quote No |
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mene mene tekel upharsin
That others may think |
Originally Posted By Tuco22: Gotta be something else to willingly strap a nuke to your back. Now its got me wondering is there any sort of residual gamma coming off it or idle nukes in general or is that not really a thing? View Quote It's not really a thing. Submariners used to sleep inches away from the warheads. There was/is a different grade of active material ("supergrade") that's extra low external radiation used for some applications like the submarine-borne warheads, and probably these also to make them harder to detect. That said the radiation level from a regular warhead is very low and not a hazard. |
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This is...a clue - Pat_Rogers
I'm not adequately aluminumized for this thread. - gonzo_beyondo CO, MI, SC, OR - Please lobby your legislators to end discrimination against non-resident CCW permit holders |
Originally Posted By Brundoggie: My only work with MADM was the EOD procedures for disarming in various configurations. PACOM didn't have any allocated so I never worked on them. I know what that is in the ceiling of the magazine but never encountered it in any of the storage areas I worked in. My understanding is that some storage locations also employed sticky foam as a protective measure but again I never personally encountered it. View Quote Great Stuff! |
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mene mene tekel upharsin
That others may think |
Part of me is there and part of there is me
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Originally Posted By Bigger_Hammer: The Tactical Nuclear Warfare envisioned in the 50's & 60's had a lot of one way trips. Many of the TAC strike aircraft in Europe were tasked with nuclear destruction of various Airbases or SAM facilities (to help the SAC Bombers cross to their targets) Flying very fast & very low, they were to "Toss Bomb" (Lob a nuke in a loop or steep climb). https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Overtheshoulderbomb.jpg https://i.redd.it/ovrxgmyyefe01.jpg If they survived the delivery (and nuclear explosion), they then faced the problem that most of their targets were so deep in the Warsaw Pact that they didn't have enough fuel for a return to base. So "the plan" was they would eject and evade & escape across a nuclear fallout irradiated hostile country / countries that they had recently nuked to eventually make their way to "friendly territory". Basically a T.O.A.D. mission (Take Off And Die). The nuclear scenarios of the 50's & 60's were definitely a "special time". Bigger_Hammer View Quote They could actually lob a bomb many miles Cruise until IP and then accelerate until max speed at penetration altitude, zoom climb until release altitude/angle and then pull back over the top into an Immelman diving away asap. |
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If Michelle Obama weren't a man, she'd have a yatch.
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