North Korea threatening to turn D.C. into a sea of fire.

[Wade]

North Korea vows nuclear attack on US, saying Washington will be 'engulfed in a sea of fire' | Fox News

this sea of fire thing can't be good for the planetary warming we are undergoing. Given enough time our capitol will apparently be under a different sea altogether, as it is it's pretty foggy there now...I'll go away now.

 

[Gene Steinberg]

Yes, there is that problem of giving children dangerous weapons.

 

[TerranceQuestion]

With NKs resources they might "nuke" us by pointing all their microwaves towards California and turning them on high with forks and pans in the box.

 

[Bob Watson]

Let's say they launch a nuke we would have 40 min max.I am sure that if they launch 1 or 2 we can shoot them down more than say 4 we would have dificultys. I am sure NK can't field more than 6. What then? Simply put north korea would cease to exist.

 

[TerranceQuestion]

Most likely. The big threat may be from Russia or Washington. China has too much economic power at stake to allow a world war but Russia has nothing at all to lose but mouths to feed. As for Washington, well they do say FDR let Pearl Harbor happen and history does repeat itself.

 

[mike]

For obvious reasons a missile is not likely to suceed.
If they were serious they might smuggle the device in and simply drive it to its ground zero in the back of a truck.

Last year, Gen. Alexander Lebed, Russia's former National Security Advisor, claimed more than 100 suitcase-sized nuclear weapons had 'disappeared.' Another senior Russian security official, Alexei Yablokov, backed Lebed's allegations.

If one such weapon, hidden in the back of a delivery van, were detonated outside the Pentagon, America's military leadership would be decapitated.
The GRU colonel explained the mini-nukes were to be smuggled into the US the same way drugs were -- by speedboat, light aircraft, or landed on the coast by Soviet subs. Soviet special force 'Spetsnaz' units would retrieve the weapons and conceal them close to their intended targets. One key hiding place was Northern Virginia's beautiful Shenandoah Valley, located a short drive from Washington.
The colonel also revealed that during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, the Soviets stockpiled suitcase nuclear weapons in Cuba without the knowledge of Castro, ready for use by special forces troops.

Thats the real threat, these portable ones, NK knows if it launched a missile, they would be turned to radioactive glass.

But if they can smuggle in a portable device you would never know who did it

There are forensics that can be done to determine the source materiel

S&TR | January/February 2007: Identifying the Source of Nuclear Materials

But knowing this, it wouldnt be hard to get around that, NK only need get its hands on one russian device.......

 

[pixelsmith]

North Korea vows nuclear attack on US, saying Washington will be 'engulfed in a sea of fire' | Fox News

this sea of fire thing can't be good for the planetary warming we are undergoing. Given enough time our capital will apparently be under a different sea altogether, as it is it's pretty foggy there now...I'll go away now.

spookymulder, it has not warmed in 16 years now. I wish it would tho.

 

[Wade]

spookymulder, it has not warmed in 16 years now. I wish it would tho.

Well pixel you can't deny there has been a stationary mass of hot air over the beltway for some time now.

 

[Bob Watson]

Well pixel you can't deny there has been a stationary mass of hot air over the beltway for some time now.

lol true story!!!

 

[SlightlyAbovePar]

It's worth mentioning there is very little reality with "suitcase" nukes. These rumors have been floating around for some time. It's true we have developed artillery shells that were nuclear (search YouTube), but there were practical realities involved: namely the artillery piece didn't shoot the shell far enough not to endanger the crew that would potentially shoot it, as well as the portability of the actual artillery piece.

Experts close the lid on 'suitcase nukes' - USATODAY.com

 

[mike]

Suitcase nuke - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Special Atomic Demolition Munition (SADM) was a family of man-portable nuclear weapons fielded by the US military in the 1960s, but never used in actual combat. The US Army planned to use the weapons in Europe in the event of a Soviet invasion. US Army Engineers would use the weapon to irradiate, destroy, and deny key routes of communication through limited terrain such as the Fulda Gap. Troops were trained to parachute into Soviet occupied western Europe with the SADM and destroy power plants, bridges, and dams.

The project, which involved a small nuclear weapon, was designed to allow one person to parachute from any type of aircraft carrying the weapon package and place it in a harbor or other strategic location that could be accessed from the sea. Another parachutist without a weapon package would follow the first to provide support as needed.

Special Atomic Demolition Munition - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


W54 Special Atomic Demolition Munition - SADM

 

[SlightlyAbovePar]

Right. Require batteries that would have long expired. Hence, in 2013, there is very little truth to the fear of suitcase nukes. If any had fallen into the wrong hands, they haven't had the maintenance to keep them functional, and don't have the batteries to work in the first place.

 

[SlightlyAbovePar]

Oh no it's the W54 baby nuke

For a little more accurate size relationship.

 

[TerranceQuestion]

It makes sense to me that China is actually supporting and encouraging NK to act up. At some point theyre banking on the US to fight, sweep em out and maybe go overboard where some bad pr will come out, real or faked, where China and Russia will be able to justify UN action on us, call the debt theyve purchased and bankrupt us. Russia has already said it expects the US to break into satellite nations if the economy were to suffer enough.

 

[Wade]

That's a very interesting analysis. I have absolutely no doubt that china takes no small amount of glee that the us would be getting its feathers ruffled but I do think they wish it would come from elsewhere.

I agree that they hate having that crackpot regime on their doorstep but I believe it when most people argue that china most of all wants stability and security, and they abhor the idea of hundreds of thousands of nk refugees streaming across their borders from any attack, also I don't think that the generals for one would accept for one second a us presence in their neck of the woods. As far as any possible us codemnation in the un, I don't think nk had many admirers there. Even china voted for sanctions ...if not to save face another chinese virtue...but at that same time I'm sure china will flout the sanctions and provide aid to prop up the country, more so than the actual regime because of the instability that had been allowed to fester. Nuclear bluster against the us aside, I think nk is just as much chinas problem as It is anyone elses

I'm not a chinese specialist by any means but generally they have always been a long view country, whether their recent rapid ascension is because of that or despite that I don't know, but i truly think china is hoping for containment on this issue

Having said all that there has always been a pretty big dichotomy between the chinese party and the chinese military and that gap may be closing now because of that farm boy from iowa. He's a smart bet for the next president and is seen as more military friendly in fact I believe he was named the head of some military cabinet not so long ago.

 

[TerranceQuestion]

For sure. China already had a standing policy to deport any North Koreans, sometimes after they apply for int'l amnesty as refugees and of course they want to communize the whole of SE Asia in order to assimilate or isolate Japan. I could only see China agreeing to a regime change in NK and would likely occupy it themselves during the transition. On the money aspect though both Koreas have horrible economies. SK may appear better off but only because all but the super rich live in crushing debt to credit companies. I believe I saw the average SKan has 125:1 debt to income ratio or something insane like that so politics aside there must be some sort of financial gain to be made in SE Asia, perhaps whatever nation controls that debt would technically have more people under their control.

 

[mike]

Right. Require batteries that would have long expired. Hence, in 2013, there is very little truth to the fear of suitcase nukes. If any had fallen into the wrong hands, they haven't had the maintenance to keep them functional, and don't have the batteries to work in the first place.

Sorry your argument seems to be not possible since the battery's are flat, or hard to fire one without getting caught in the blast.

Not withstanding new batteries and a timer are obvious solutions, the fact remains that it is possible to construct a small portable Nuke.

The NK's even make mention of this in the article

are now armed with lighter, smaller and diversified nuclear warheads

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/03/07/north-korea-vows-nuclear-attack-on-us-ahead-un-sanctions-vote/#ixzz2MzBc9UY6

Granted this is in reference to missile payloads, none the less it is possible to build a small light portable nuke, and the NK's have hinted that they are building lighter smaller devices......

The original claim that there is

very little reality with "suitcase" nukes

Is wrong, they are a reality

 

[TerranceQuestion]

But "warhead" denotes its ballistic in nature right? So not a suitcase? I take that as a bluff from
NK.

 

[mike]

No, As this article points out

The W-54 nuclear package is certainly light enough by itself to be used in a "suitcase bomb" but the closest equivalent to such a device that US has ever deployed was a man-carried version called the Mk-54 SADM (Small Atomic Demolition Munition). This used a version of the W-54, but the whole package was much larger and heavier. It was a cylinder 40 cm by 60 cm, and weighed 68 kg (the actual warhead portion weighed only 27 kg). Although the Mk-54 SADM has itself been called a "suitcase bomb" it is more like a "steamer trunk" bomb, especially considering its weight.

Are Suitcase Bombs Possible?

The W54 warhead used in the Davy Crockett had a minimum mass of about 23 kg, and had yields ranging from 10 tons up to 1 kt in various mods (probably achieved by varying the fissile content). The warhead was basically egg-shaped with the minor axis of 27.3 cm and a major axis of 40 cm. The W-54 probably represents a near minimum diameter for a spherical implosion device (the U.S. has conducted tests of a 25.4 cm implosion system however).
The test devices for this design fired in Hardtack Phase II (shots Hamilton and Humboldt on 15 October and 29 October 1958) weighed only 16 kg, impressively close to the minimum mass estimated above. These devices were 28 cm by 30 cm, Humboldt used PBX-9404 as the explosive.

The truth is portable atomic bombs are a reality, And given the NK's have tested their own bombs, its not beyond the realms of possibility they could reverse engineer a russian "suitcase" nuke.

Getting their hands on the dummy signature isnt impossible either

Loose nukes' - the loss, theft or sale of weapons-usable nuclear materials or nuclear weapons themselves from the former Soviet arsenal - is not a hypothetical threat; it is a brute fact. Since the disappearance of the Soviet Union, the number of reported, suspected and documented cases of diversion of weapons-usable nuclear material has been increasing steadily. Ominously, we have been able to document six cases in which weapons-grade material has been stolen and nearly 1,000 instances involving the theft of lower-grade material.

Russia's Loose Nukes a Serious Threat to US - Harvard - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs

The practical realities you cite are easily solved with a timer.

So NK reverse engineers a Russian portable nuke, gets its hands on some weapons-grade material from elsewhere so it cant be tracked back to them.
A sleeper/s rent apartments in Washington near the targets, the devices are imported as per the russian strategy like drugs via sub/zodiac, light plane , speedboat and transported in a washing machine carton to the apartment/s. Timers are set for 48 hours.
Agents then catch a plane to Mexico , Acapulco or Hawaii.


The suggestion that portable nuke aka suitcase bombs are just rumours

It's worth mentioning there is very little reality with "suitcase" nukes. These rumors have been floating around for some time

Is wrong

 

[mike]

If the terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center in New York or the Federal Office Building in Oklahoma City had used the same truck they drove, filled not with the explosives they used, but rather with a weapon that started with a softball-sized lump of uranium, what would have been the consequences? They could have created an explosion equal to 10,000 to 20,000 tons of TNT, which would demolish an area of about three square miles. Oklahoma City would have disappeared.

Russia's Loose Nukes a Serious Threat to US - Harvard - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs