And you're saying those haven't been used in Iraq?

I'm not confusing them with depleted Uranium shells...

4/11/2006 1:31:48 PM

no, they haven't used nuclear weapons in iraq

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 1:36 PM. Reason : got a bit irate there]

4/11/2006 1:35:05 PM

^^

Are there a lot of people who think that we have?

"Bunker-busters", yes.

Nuclear "bunker-busters", or any nuclear weapon, no. (I actually hadn't heard of those, but it seems realistic). They can't even use tear-gas over there without the international community getting up in arms over chemical weapons.

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 1:40 PM. Reason : .]

4/11/2006 1:38:48 PM

nuclear weapons involve a significant change of scale of destructive power

think of a very large conventional "bomb", the largest is the T-12 (howstuffworks said so)

thats a about a 43 ton bomb, a RIDICULOUSLY large conventional weapons (normal ones are 500 pounds)

a primative fission device (Little Boy) have yield on the order of 20kt (20,000 tons)

a fusion device, or thermonuclear bomb, have yield on the order of 1MT (1,000,000 tons)

even a sophisicated mini-nuke will still have on the order of 1kt (1000 ton) yield

they're just in different classes all together

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 1:46 PM. Reason : .]

4/11/2006 1:44:55 PM

Quote :

" No, I mean similar to the nuclear-tipped bunker busters they're talking about using in Iran. Not full-scale nuclear weapons a la Hiroshima. Seems like I read an article a while back about their use, or it might've been that the Pentagon was discussing using them."

No, they're working on developing such weapons, but we certainly haven't used them yet. Even if we used small nuclear weapons for this type of task, there is no way we would be able to hide their use (whether due to the seismic readings or the radioactive material it would kick up).

4/11/2006 1:46:14 PM

we have those weapons

they're out of the development stage man

4/11/2006 1:47:00 PM

^^^^ I'm not sure if there are a lot of people who think we have. I recall reading that the Pentagon was requesting a budget for nuclear-tipped bunker busters for use in Iraq, and presumed that we'd used them by now.

Found a copy of the article, not from the original source, though:

http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa083102a.htm

^^^ What's the difference in scale between a conventional bunker buster and a nuclear-tipped bunker buster?

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 1:51 PM. Reason : ...]

4/11/2006 1:47:02 PM

google is awesome

Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28)
BLU-113 Penetrator
The Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28) is a special weapon developed for penetrating hardened Iraqi command centers located deep underground. The GBU-28 is a 5,000-pound laser-guided conventional munition that uses a 4,400-pound penetrating warhead. The bombs are modified Army artillery tubes, weigh 4,637 pounds, and contain 630 pounds of high explosives. They are fitted with GBU-27 LGB kits, 14.5 inches in diameter and almost 19 feet long. The operator illuminates a target with a laser designator and then the munition guides to a spot of laser energy reflected from the target.

so 4,400 pounds

2.2 tons

more than likely a sophisticated nuclear bunker buster will have between 0.3 kt and 340 kt yield

so 300 tons to 340000 tons

totally different weapons

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 1:53 PM. Reason : .]

4/11/2006 1:49:13 PM

It was just a question. No need to wheeze over your retainer about it...

4/11/2006 1:52:52 PM

i know you're not talking to me like that

i'm not the one who thought we might of already of used nuclear weapons in iraq

seriously

4/11/2006 1:54:52 PM

Nuclear-tipped bunker busters.

You make it sound like I thought we'd dropped nukes on them Nagasaki-style.

I even said "Correct me if I'm wrong, but..."

Doesn't sound like a statement of fact to me.

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 2:02 PM. Reason : 4,400 lbs = 4 tons]

4/11/2006 2:01:41 PM

Quote :

" They can't even use tear-gas over there without the international community getting up in arms over chemical weapons."

yeah, CS and the like are actually totally ok by international law, but we tend to shy away from using them.

Quote :

"think of a very large conventional "bomb", the largest is the T-12 (howstuffworks said so) thats a about a 43 ton bomb, a RIDICULOUSLY large conventional weapons (normal ones are 500 pounds)"

yeah, that's HUGE. i've never heard of anything like that. put up a link for where you found that, if you don't mind.

and the garden-variety Mk-8x series bombs are from 500-2000 lbs (although i've heard they're bringing back the 250-lb Mk-81 in precision guided trim for instances when the Mk-82 would give too much collateral damage.) those weights are also just kind of a "class". the bombs weigh something different from that (usually more). that is also the weight for the bomb--not how much explosive it's actually filled with.

4/11/2006 2:25:42 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T12

yeah it's weight is 44,000 lbs, which makes it 22 tons, got that a little wrong

4/11/2006 5:19:27 PM

that's still really big, but it doesn't sound like we have those anymore.

4/11/2006 6:32:13 PM

nah, we don't have those anymore

the biggest now, i think, is the MOAB

4/11/2006 6:35:21 PM