NationStates Jolt Archive


Nuclear weapons construction

Ryanania
29-10-2003, 04:18
My nation has just finished designs for, and has succesfully tested, a 125 megaton ICBM, and a 50 megaton ICBM. Can anyone tell me how long it should take me to build these things, and how much money it should cost?
Belem
29-10-2003, 04:21
about 70 million for an ICBM is the average.
Ryanania
29-10-2003, 04:24
about 70 million for an ICBM is the average.What about construction lengths for one. This is with an industrially powerful nation like mine.
Ryanania
29-10-2003, 05:17
bump
Letila
29-10-2003, 05:22
Your nukes are nothing compared to hypermatter.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mliêstôlkakûmek(Love all as you love yourself)
Racism-the other stupid ideology
Peace, love, and girls with small waists and big butts!
Letilan moths! Yay!
http://images.google.com/images?q=tbn:TEA1WL6tIGQC:w1.150.telia.com/~u15008589
Adejaani
29-10-2003, 05:24
I think you should have maybe three RL days at "full tilt construction", but seven is a good average, otherwise you'll have millions of warheads.
29-10-2003, 05:27
I'm not sure if you're interested or not, but generally speaking, in terms of warhead payloads, the most efficient use is between 20-25/MT per warhead. A nuke this size will destroy any target, no matter how hardened, and in order to maximize surface area several smaller warheads are more effective than a single large one...
Adejaani
29-10-2003, 05:31
I'm not sure if you're interested or not, but generally speaking, in terms of warhead payloads, the most efficient use is between 20-25/MT per warhead. A nuke this size will destroy any target, no matter how hardened, and in order to maximize surface area several smaller warheads are more effective than a single large one...

That's true..... Because the release of energy dissipates over more distance. It's sort of like "an air battle of 4 to 1 is much the same as a battle of 3 to 1". The rest is wasted effort.

Instead of say, one 100 MT nuke dropped on a city to create a 20 kilometre crater (I don't know the conversion numbers, so don't critique the number), you're better off dropping say, ten 10 MT nukes which will not only bracket the city, destroy the same 20 km crater AND do more damage overall and spread more fallout and radiation around.
29-10-2003, 05:36
But 100MT just sounds cooler. 8)
29-10-2003, 05:43
100mt may be overkill for ground targets, but it's great for space(if you have good missle tech)
Crimmond
29-10-2003, 05:46
RL scientists found that anything over 12 megatons wasn't worth it, you get a little bit larger blast radius, but nothing that justifies the cost.

I belive the Russians built the largest warhead at about 13 megatons and said that it was about as effective as an 8 megaton warhead.

Bigger isn't always better.
Ryanania
29-10-2003, 06:07
RL scientists found that anything over 12 megatons wasn't worth it, you get a little bit larger blast radius, but nothing that justifies the cost.

I belive the Russians built the largest warhead at about 13 megatons and said that it was about as effective as an 8 megaton warhead.

Bigger isn't always better.The Tsara Bomba was around 100 megatons.
Ryanania
29-10-2003, 06:08
Thank you all for your advice, but I'm not planning on building thousands of these things. I'm going to develop tactical nukes as well.
29-10-2003, 06:11
The Tsara Bomba was around 100 megatons.

It was intended to be 100MT; the only one ever built and tested was roughly 67MT- after this test the project was canceled as it considered immensely impractical. (they actually had to specially modify a cargo plane to even carry the thing) At this point the Soviet nuclear science program focused on minutarization.