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This is why Bill Clinton's presidency will always be a stain, he built NoK a light water nuclear reactors, and he allowed the transfer of technology to help China launch satellites into orbit, and eventually leading to them building ICBMs.
Well, that and Clinton's repealing of laws which lead to the financial meltdown in 2008
People like me do not just 'click' on links provided by some 'copy and paste' thread starter.
I do not understand people who feel the necessity to start a thread with their contribution being solely limited to providing a link to other people's thoughts, news, etc. We have several posters who engage in such tactics, and it is often obviously clear that said posters had not bother to read the linked article, but were drew to it by the headline.
Why not give readers a brief summary of what the linked article states? If one wishes to engage in conversation about the linked topic, then prove that you know what the linked article is about.
The idea that nations will want to use the benefits of nuclear science and technology is a good thing and the USA will make friends and influence less friendly nations goes back to the 1950s and the Administration of President Dwight D, Eisenhower. It is called the "Atoms for Peace Program". It was championed by Big Bussiness because participants had to buy US made nuclear equipment and technology, by our intelligence community because participants had to give US experts (Think CIA agents) access to nuclear facilities, and brought 10s of thousands of foreign nationals as students and graduate students to US universities for training and to get to know us and our nation (Universities took the money and banked it ) . Nations who took advantage of this program include Japan, South Korea, India, Pakistan, Israel, Iran before 1979 and the list goes on. Only the Communist block didn't sign up becuase I guess they saw through the US plot.
The major obstacle to building a fission bomb was eliminated in 1945 at the Trinity site in New Mexico. That obstacle was the disbelief that such a thing could be made.
I have no reason to doubt that NK scientist could work out the necessary equations and methods by themselves. Obtaining the materials, weapons grade U-235 and/or Plutonium 239, is the second greatest difficulty. U-235 requires separation and concentration from “normal” uranium that is mostly U-238. Plutonium is produced by irradiating U-238 in a specific Neutron flux for a specific time. Light water moderated fission reactors do not provide the proper environment for creating only Pu-239. These reactors also produce contaminating amounts of Pu-240 and Pu-241. These isotopes of Plutonium cannot be used in a bomb because they fission before a high enough density is obtained to result in an explosive chain reaction. The most effective way to produce Pu-239 is to irradiate U-238 in a special reactor for a specific time and then separate the metals chemically. This is a tricky procedure that we have fairly well perfected over the last 50+ years. I do not believe anyone "gave" the NK an atom bomb. They grew their own.
Incidentally we have not been told if the NK device is a Plutonium or a Uranium bomb. The former requires an explosive jacket to produce a shock wave that will increase the density of the Plutonium core quickly and sufficiently enough to start the chain reaction. The original “Fat Man” bomb was this type. The other type of bomb is the “Thin Man” device where two sub critical masses of U-235 are brought together fast enough that a rapid chain reaction is started. If the collision is not fast enough the fission reaction is heavily damped.
I hope people realize from the vastly simplified description that making fission bombs is really difficult but possible. I have no doubt that the NK scientist and engineers could make these types of bombs. Weather the bombs would function as designed is another and even more difficult topic. Fusion (Hydrogen) bombs are much more difficult.
If NK does launch and detonate a fission weapon I do not think we should respond in kind. I think a proper response would be the assignation of ALL the NK leaders with non-nuclear weapons. This would deliver a clear message that using nukes is intolerable without killing huge numbers of NK civilians that, as they are effectively enslaved by the NK government, had absolutely nothing to do with the actions of that government.
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Who gave NK nukes in the first place?
