Deterrence

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drnayar
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Re: Deterrence

Post by drnayar »

vera_k wrote:Looks like a window of testing will open up when Japan starts to test. Question is if other countries in Asia (ex India) would be looking for help to test as a hedge against China at the same time. Potentially all those looking to import Brahmos missiles may desire to have their own deterrent against China.

Henry Kissinger Surveys the World as He Turns 100
He foresees that Japan, in response, “will develop its own weapons of mass destruction.” He offers a time frame of “three, or five, or seven years” for that to happen.
dont think uncle would be happy with japan "breaking free" ., making them less dependent on them .. and a threat !!
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Re: Deterrence

Post by williams »

IMHO, India has two simple decisions to make regarding testing if and when she determines that deterrence posture has deteriorated.

1. Do a full test and validate that her TN weapons are not dud
2. Continue to improve and refine an existing design through sub-critical tests

The question is, when should we do it? And what are the consequences? Right now, the question is, do we see 2 of the 21/2 enemies being deterred by our nuclear weapons? They are not prevented from going for minor localized skirmishes, including Kargil and Galwan-type incidents but are not ready for a full-fledged war. India has done much work to improve delivery capabilities but has not publicly conducted even sub-critical tests. No one would know if sub-critical tests were conducted unless we announced it. The moment China goes rogue by doing something more than Galwan, ie use real kinetic weapons; I think all bets are off. Hopefully, the Chinese are not that crazy.

So until then, India can keep improving its existing weapons through sub-critical tests if needed. Build real MIC and continue to focus on the economy.
Amber G.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Amber G. »

Saw in interesting quote from Robert Oppenheimer:
"When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.
" -
drnayar
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Re: Deterrence

Post by drnayar »

What would stop India from doing sub critical nuclear weapons tests ? Quite likely this would have been ongoing with refinements in weapons design

https://www.nonproliferation.org/wp-con ... 103raj.pdf

Sub-Critical Nuclear Tests:
An Option for India?

https://www.lasg.org/archive/1998/subcritical.htm

India's plutonium reprocessing facilities are all outside safeguards as well as military/weapons reactors
ramana
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ramana »

How China got the bomb.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=


ramana
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ramana »

AmberG or other knowledgable folks please see the China video and make a table comparing where was India along this path.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by VKumar »

Dr. Homi Bhabha under PM Lal Bahadur Shastri was preparing a N bomb. Both were assassinated. This was in 1966.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by disha »

Amber G. wrote: I have met AK, so knew he is quite soft spoken. modest and brilliant. As the interview said a few times, India is quite lucky to have such people.
AK is a cool, calm person. It is Pallav Bagla, the interviewer who jumped around decades and topics in the interview. Pallav Bagla did it second time. First time he chimed in too early and good technical discussion of RLV was sidetracked into mundane. Same here with AK's interview. Pallav Bagla at one point was a premier science & tech reporter. Not sure what is happening with him nowadays.

If you get a chance, please do read Raj Chengappa's Weapons of Peace.
- Not surprising (to those who knew about calibre of Indian science) the attention to details, scientific methods, and getting all needed data was done almost to perfection. The *all* designs worked as expected, getting all necessary data.
Kumbhakarn was dug to 600 ft deep in 1984 itself. The S2 where the weaponized fission to 15 Kt was also dug in 1984. There was a swarajyamag article published in 2020 https://swarajyamag.com/defence/a-pheno ... ft-sinking that goes into details.
- - Interview also underlines the point - why that much touted 'seismic argument that it was a fizzle' was scientifically nonsense. (A point I pointed out Brf decades ago).
37 Kt. Based on analysis of open source data and the circumference. My post, decades ago.

So calling it out as "fizzle" on siesmic argument is like understanding science from looney tunes.
I am *not* commenting on many bizzare narratives, posted here by some. (eg ' TN was fizzle') . IMO these are as silly as believing in Flat Earth or jihnn thermodynamics.
Vehemently Agree. At the same time there are several nuances that need to peeled apart. All we can do is learn, discuss & educate and learn. With an open mind.
Last edited by disha on 01 Jun 2023 05:25, edited 1 time in total.
disha
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Re: Deterrence

Post by disha »


Do a full test and validate that her TN weapons are not dud
What is 'dud'? I mean what actually one means when TN weapons are dud?

In case of TN weapons, let me draw a parable. Here dud is replaced with the word Pappu. And the opposite of Pappu is Modi. Then there is Yogi.
A couple has been asked to produce a baby.

The selected couple is healthy on all parameters. And of course the couple has to develop the right chemistry to conceive one. And it is several stages of several things coming together and the couple doing all the right things to come to a point when the baby is delivered.

The couple is asked to deliver a baby a 54 cm baby, the couple delivers 46 cm baby. The baby's target weight is 3.25 kg. The couple delivers 3.12 Kg baby.

The baby is tested by the pediatrician for all qualities. Baby is perfectly normal & healthy & kicking happily around.

Is the baby declared a Pappu? Or the baby a Modi?

Here is the unwritten ask for the baby. The baby is required for the nations' destiny. The parameters for the baby's success are simple.

A Modi performance will be equivalent of a 2 Mt yield and if fully unleashed will be the Tsar Bomba (50 Mt) equivalent.

A Pappu performance will be equivalent to a 50 kt yield. And cannot be scaled up.

So now the baby is born, the next day the debate starts, is the baby a Pappu or a Modi? How will you know unless baby demonstrates its full capability?
So if the ask is how will one know for sure that the baby is going to be a Pappu or a Modi? T

hen IMVHO, that is a fair ask. Given the current way the baby is behaving (based on simulated tests and the answers the baby is giving), the gurus have ordained that it will be a Yogi (200 kt). But again the question remains how will one know that the currently alive, kicking, bright & bonny baby will become a Yogi (200 kt).

The answer is you will never know unless the baby is put through a real test. Hence the statement by late Hon. PM Vajpayee, that we have capability of making a Modi.

PS: The US TN W88 was designed and developed in 1976 itself. That is the science behind the TN is not new and definitely not beyond the capability of Indian scientists.

So to lay doubts on the *design* of the Indian TN will be without basis.

Given that, there is always some tongue wagging since the Indian TN has not been demonstrated to full yield. At the same time, given the science, the demonstration of S1 is also ample to show that Indian TN can be scaled up to 200+ Kt.

The question then shifts, is 200-300 Kt enough to qualify as deterrent? Particularly if the other person is Mao? The answer is yes. Since for deterrent to work, there should be second strike capability and we have that.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by RoyG »

disha wrote:

Do a full test and validate that her TN weapons are not dud
What is 'dud'? I mean what actually one means when TN weapons are dud?

In case of TN weapons, let me draw a parable. Here dud is replaced with the word Pappu. And the opposite of Pappu is Modi. Then there is Yogi.
A couple has been asked to produce a baby.

The selected couple is healthy on all parameters. And of course the couple has to develop the right chemistry to conceive one. And it is several stages of several things coming together and the couple doing all the right things to come to a point when the baby is delivered.

The couple is asked to deliver a baby a 54 cm baby, the couple delivers 46 cm baby. The baby's target weight is 3.25 kg. The couple delivers 3.12 Kg baby.

The baby is tested by the pediatrician for all qualities. Baby is perfectly normal & healthy & kicking happily around.

Is the baby declared a Pappu? Or the baby a Modi?

Here is the unwritten ask for the baby. The baby is required for the nations' destiny. The parameters for the baby's success are simple.

A Modi performance will be equivalent of a 2 Mt yield and if fully unleashed will be the Tsar Bomba (50 Mt) equivalent.

A Pappu performance will be equivalent to a 50 kt yield. And cannot be scaled up.

So now the baby is born, the next day the debate starts, is the baby a Pappu or a Modi? How will you know unless baby demonstrates its full capability?
So if the ask is how will one know for sure that the baby is going to be a Pappu or a Modi? T

hen IMVHO, that is a fair ask. Given the current way the baby is behaving (based on simulated tests and the answers the baby is giving), the gurus have ordained that it will be a Yogi (200 kt). But again the question remains how will one know that the currently alive, kicking, bright & bonny baby will become a Yogi (200 kt).

The answer is you will never know unless the baby is put through a real test. Hence the statement by late Hon. PM Vajpayee, that we have capability of making a Modi.

PS: The US TN W88 was designed and developed in 1976 itself. That is the science behind the TN is not new and definitely not beyond the capability of Indian scientists.

So to lay doubts on the *design* of the Indian TN will be without basis.

Given that, there is always some tongue wagging since the Indian TN has not been demonstrated to full yield. At the same time, given the science, the demonstration of S1 is also ample to show that Indian TN can be scaled up to 200+ Kt.

The question then shifts, is 200-300 Kt enough to qualify as deterrent? Particularly if the other person is Mao? The answer is yes. Since for deterrent to work, there should be second strike capability and we have that.
We have a reliable TN deterrent.

If it’s being fielded, it has to be reliable. No country on Earth will risk.

The TN test failed but it was debugged and through ICF and other means validated.

The Shakti VI test was aborted for a reason. Not to “conserve” material but to spare us further embarrassment. It’s fine. We learned from it and moved on.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

This jarnail is not saying anything new that I did not know. I had written an article "Cratering Phenomenology and Yield Estimation" in 2002 for the old Bharat Rakshak Monitor. Using scaling laws and work of Nordyke and pictures of the retarc in Chengappa's book I had explicitly said the shaft was 200m long for the TN device. Unfortunately the old BRM articles are not available anymore online except very few of them. The article I wrote was sent to BARC for review I am told and landed up with Sikka the design team leader of the TN device. He wrote to me and asked me to lecture on the article at NIAS, Raja Ramanna's think tank in the IISc campus when I was visiting the Tata Institute for Fundamental Research, whose Bangalore center was next to the NIAS in the old days. I politely declined as the article was there in public and everything I had to say was said. Nevertheless Sikka was really impressed that I could perform a scaling analysis and come to such a conclusion. If some of you know how to retrieve that article great. Here is the link:

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/archives/ ... index.html

https://www.bharat-rakshak.com/archives ... crater.pdf

The work of Toman and Nordyke is fundamental to understand cratering processes and determining yields and there are two articles they have written in IAEA proceedings that one has to understand carefully. There is also a paper by Burton on computer simulation of cratering processes by nuclear detonations. All these are referenced in my article and also I point out many other things besides the suspected shaft depth. There is also a table I have there with a list of cratering experiments done by US government using nuclear and chemical underground explosions and I explain that the cratering process is very different for both and different scaling laws apply.

The seismic article Ramana, Thundyil and I wrote is still available and so is the frequency analysis article I wrote that was and is quoted by Chinese articles on the Shakti tests. Here is the article written joint with Ramana and Thundyil:

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/archives/ ... index.html

Bagla is a useless fellow with a madarsa education. He did his Botany BSc from some small time Kanpur college and later set himself up as a Science reporter. He was junior to me in school. He also stole ISRO pictures and tried to sell them. He has an oily brother Gunjan who writes his own wikipedia page and is based in California, ex IIT Kanpur.
Last edited by ramana on 02 Jun 2023 21:57, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Added the link to the pdf Ramana
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Lisa »

vsunder
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

^^^ Yes that one. One of the difficulties I remember from 20 years ago was that I had no idea what the geomorphology was under Pokharan. Toman-Nordyke due to the "Sulky" event had fixed a scaling law based on an overlay of granite and formation of a retarc(reversed crater, crater reversed is retarc). When the device is buried deep enough no crater will form but a mound a retarc, read my article. I looked at the data in all these papers and interpolated and assumed it was shale underneath. I realized scaling laws were derived empirically and not from any deep first principle. Y^1/3 etc is just cube root of the volume ( pretending that yield is tantamount to moving a large volume of earth) and so a linear measure, that seems to be the heart of the scaling principles used by Toman-Nordyke with empirical modifications. The jarnail has just verified my intuition that there was shale underneath, and my modification as I say and discuss in the article maybe I used 75 and not 60 as for the Sulky event. Whatever I have said in this paragraph I also say in the article. There was a lecture by Chidambaram at IISc that Shiv attended and he was kind enough to give me his jottings and notes at the lecture, that was a bit useful and you can see in the article how it was used by me.

I really had fun writing the article with Ramana too. I got Frank Press's book on Mathematical Seismology from the library and it was very easy to read. I had mastered it very quickly and I developed my own set of notes which I usually do when I want to master a topic. That is my viewpoint. I might have mailed Ramana a copy of my seismology notes written in long hand and full of detailed calculations of Rayleigh waves and Airy phase etc. So I had a very sound understanding of all the different type of seismic waves and how nuclear detonations produce a preponderance of one type of waves over another from natural events. I had a running battle with a man called Douglas from the UK nuclear seismic establishment from some crap university in UK Reading University. He was always condescending, low level scientist. Ramana remember him?? There was another article by a famous US based seismologist where he used Rayleigh or surface waves to estimate the yield of Shakti and his analysis was close to the announced yields. I had his paper but have lost it.
Last edited by vsunder on 01 Jun 2023 22:55, edited 1 time in total.
Lisa
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Lisa »

Lest the cache should disappear, with Mods consent.

Cratering Phenomenology and Yield EstimationEstimation of yield from crater diameters relies on several parameters. The mostimportant ones are (1) the depth of emplacement (2) The type of medium and the (3)type of explosive that is chemical high explosives (HE) or nuclear explosives (NE). Therelation between these various parameters was carried out by several people principally,M.D. Nordyke [1] and J. Toman [2] at Livermore Radiation Laboratory. These experimentswere carried out to evaluate possible use of nuclear explosives for peaceful purposes, orPNE’s. Let us summarize some of the conclusions of these authors.The Toman CurvesThe mechanism of crater formation in nuclear explosions(NE) and that caused byhigh explosives(HE) and various scaling laws has been studied in the fundamental papersby Nordyke [1] and Toman [2]. [1] contains an excellent review of the subject, while [2]discusses several technical aspects. Toman [2] introduces normalized parameters(scaledparameters) to study various types of explosions, HE and NE in different media. Weintroduce these parameters. First we have the scaled radius Rs defined as,Rs =RY 1/3.4(1)where R is the observed radius of the crater in meters or in feet, and Y the yield in kilotons.Next we have the scaled depth Ds,Ds =DY 1/3.4(2)where D is the depth of emplacement in metres or feet, and again Y the yield in kilotons.Toman plotted for various explosions (see [2] and also Nordyke [1] who reproduces Toman’scurves) the value of Ds along the x-axis and Rs along the y-axis. Toman [2] obtained thecurves presented in Fig. 1 in our article which is a reproduction of the plots on pg. 368 of[2].The following observations are immediate from the plots obtained by Toman.Effect of MediaIt is seen that the curves for hard, dry rock, are bounded above by the curve foralluvium. This is true for both HE and NE. That is for a given yield and same depth ofemplacement, the crater will be smaller for hard rock than for alluvium. In a sense thesemedia are the extreme cases and for any other media the curves have to lie between thetwo displayed extremes. This is the situation for the medium at Pokharan.Chemical or NuclearIt is seen from the curves that if the medium is either hard rock or alluvium theplots for nuclear explosions is enveloped by those for high explosives. Thus chemicalexplosions for a given yield and same depth of emplacement give a larger crater thannuclear explosions. That is the coupling is different. This is the result of various gasesand other chemical products produced in HE explosions. [2] has a discussion on pg. 3541

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explaining the fundamental differences between HE and underground nuclear explosions.One may also consult [8] for a further technical discussion on this point elucidating thedifferences between HE and NE and crater formation.Depth of emplacementIt is seen the curves for NE in hard rock decay sharply and cut the x-axis at theparameter value 60 where the depth of emplacement D is now measured in meters andwhere the scaled depth of emplacement Ds was plotted along the x-axis. The plots showthat for NE when Ds = 60 in hard, dry rock there will be no crater but a retarc ( areversed crater, a mound of rubble). This cut-off point is determined by the event Sulky.The mechanism of crater formation is explained in Toman’s paper. For a device buried ata shallow depth, first a small crater is formed since the bulk of the content escapes into theatmosphere or as ejecta. As the device is emplaced at deeper depths, the crater diameterincreases to a maximum, then again starts to decrease and then at a certain stage insteadof a crater a retarc is formed. Emplacing it deeper produces then no visible disturbanceon the surface. Thus from the Sulky event depths of emplacement D given by:D = 60(Y )1/3.4 meters(3)will produce a retarc in hard, dry rock. D is clearly larger in softer alluvium. Now for theevent S-1(Indian thermo-nuclear explosion of May 11, 1998), Y = 45. In hard, dry rockusing (3) we compute easily that the critical depth for producing a retarc is 194 metres,which is close to the shaft depth for S-1 stated by Chengappa in [3], pg. 427. In fact themedium for S-1 was wet [3], and somewhat softer and since Chengappa says [3] that theS-1 shaft was over 200 metres, the S-1 event did produce a small sand mound, consistentwith our equation (3).Maximum crater sizeThe cratering curves in [2] achieve a maximum at Ds = 40 and for this value of Dsthe corresponding Rs value in hard rock is 45 and 50 for alluvium. This means that for ashaft like S-1 with depth of emplacement D = 200 metres or thereabouts, the maximumcrater size will be obtained by a device whose yield is(200/40)3.4 = 237 kilotonsand this will produce a crater of radius 250 metres. Thus one can conclude that a devicewith yield 230 kilotons could have been emplaced in the shaft S-1. But this would haveproduced a gigantic crater, the largest ever if one looks at the table of PNE explosionscompiled by M. Nordyke that appears in Toman’s article [2]. This is Fig. 2 in this article.The largest crater in a US conducted PNE experiment was the event Sedan (see the tablein Fig. 2) which was emplaced in a shaft 194 metres deep in desert alluvium and produceda crater of radius 185 metres. In fact Nordyke [1] recommends using Ds values between40 and 50 for digging craters and in fact suggests using NE in a fantastic scheme to digout a secondary Panama Canal. The aim of POK-2( Indian nuclear explosions of May 11,1998) was not the creation of craters of maximum radii which would be consistent witha PNE type of shot, but the weaponization of devices. Furthermore it would have been2

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ludicrous to test such massive yield devices with the device relatively shallowly emplaced.One could ask the question what Ds value would BARC be comfortable with. To answerthis question we recall POK-1(Indian nuclear explosion of May 18, 1974). We will seein an instant that its Ds value is around 52 thus it qualifies as a PNE, but we will usethe terminology MCE, maximal cratering experiment. In fact for POK-1, the depth ofemplacement was 107 metres[6] and the yield 12 kt. Using (2),Ds =107121/3.4= 52.Thus POK-1 is a genuine MCE. Now the shaft for S-1( the thermo-nuclear device at POK-2) was supposedly over 200 metres [3]. Thus let us compute the maximum allowed yieldfor a device that is to be emplaced in a shaft exactly 200 metres long and with scaleddepth of emplacement parameter chosen so that Ds = 52. We pick Ds = 52 since thisis the parameter picked by BARC for a maximal cratering experiment on May 18, 1974.Thus BARC used this parameter confident that there would be no release of radio-activegases and at the same time to produce the largest possible sub-surface effect, a PNE whichis consistent with the geology of the Pokharan site. Thus using Ds = 52 and depth ofemplacement D = 200 metres, we compute using (2),52 =200Y 1/3.4.Solving for Y the permissible allowed yield for shaft S-1 we get, Y = 100 kilotons. Forthe Ds value 52 the corresponding value for Rs is Rs = 30 where we have taken a pointbetween hard, dry rock and alluvium. This would have produced a crater of radius 138metres. This is a far more reasonable assumption of what the shaft S-1 could have carriedmaximally. Thus the shaft S-1 was at most capable of a maximum of 100 kilotons.R. Chidambaram’s Lecture at IISc(Indian Institute of Sciences)In notes taken by Dr. Shiv Sastry [4] at a lecture by R. Chidambaram at IISc, (alsosee [5]) the following points were made by Dr. Chidambaram.(a) For a 1 kt. device a burial depth of 150 metres is needed to prevent crater forma-tion. The meaning of this is now clear from the Toman plots. The emplacement depthChidambaram refers to is clearly in alluvium. Thus in alluvium the critical burial depthDcritical satisfies the relation,Dcritical = 150(Y )1/3.4.(4)(b) Chidambaram also made the statement that the burial depth at Pokharan is abouthalf. One thus suspects that the strength of the material at the depth at which the S-1device was emplaced is roughly double that of alluvium. Thus the material has a strengthmidway between alluvium and hard, dry rock. Thus the critical depth of emplacementwhere only a retarc will be produced at Pokharan isDcritical = 75(Y )1/3.4.(5)3

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Now using the announced yield of S-1, Y = 45 kilotons, we easily compute using (5) thatDcritical = 229 metres. Thus if S-1 was buried at over 200 metres as per Chengappa[3], pg.427, S-1 would have produced a small subsidence crater or a retarc. This was indeed thecase, pg. 431, [3].Pokharan-1, The Indian PNE of May 18, 1974As seen above the Ds value for POK-1 was 52. The curves of Toman show thatfor a medium that has the strength midway between hard, dry rock and alluvium thecorresponding Rs value is approximately, 30. Since the yield of POK-1 was 12 kilotonswe see that POK-1 would have produced a crater of radius, (12)1/3.430 = 62 metres. Thisagrees very well with the crater radius stated in [6], [7].C. Sublette’s analysis of the Pokharan-1 eventSublette[6] has made an analysis of the crater data for the Pokharan explosion of May1974. However, there are serious errors in his analysis. We now point out these flaws.(a) In arriving at the plot, Fig. 1 in [6] Sublette has completely ignored the effect of themedium and essentially assumed that cratering effects are the same in all media, thus theplot in [6] consists of a single curve as opposed to the plots in [2] where multiple curvesare obtained for different media.(b) More seriously the plot in [6] has been obtained by combining data from both NE andHE. Thus Sublette assumes that the coupling for NE and HE is the same. This is false asis clearly seen from Fig. 1 in this article which is taken from [2]. Both [1], [2] emphasizethat one cannot combine data from HE and NE to arrive at cratering curves. Furthermore,computer simulations by Burton et al[8] clearly show that coupling is markedly differentfor Nuclear and High explosives and one cannot estimate yields by combining data fromboth types of explosions.(c) To arrive at his plot [6], Sublette uses the Sulky event which produced no crater but aretarc, (see Nordyke’s table, Fig. 2 in our article). In fact [2] contains a photograph of theretarc formed by Sulky,on pg. 361. Furthermore the Sulky event defines the point wherethe cratering curve for NE in hard, dry rock crosses the x- axis in Fig. 1, that is producesno crater. Thus one is baffled as to how Sublette assigns a crater radius to Sulky in hisplot.(d) To arrive at his plot Sublette uses another event, Palanquin. As is seen from Nordyke’stable Fig. 2 in our article, Palanquin, was emplaced at 24 metres, and had a yield of4.3 kilotons. It was supposed to produce a retarc. However, a failure of the stemmingmechanism occured and thus a crater of radius 36.4 metres formed. This failure of theexperiment has been explained on pg. 375, [2]. Thus Palanquin was a flawed experiment.However, Sublette has used data from this event to construct his plot. It also clear thatin the all important steep part of the graph from where yield estimates for the POK-1event are deduced, Sublette uses only two data points from nuclear explosions, one theflawed experiment Palanquin and another event Sulky which did not produce a crater butto which Sublette nevertheless assigns a crater radius.The effect of failure to be careful and address the issues pointed out in (a)-(d) aboveis that Sublette produces a plot that is markedly shifted to the right in comparison with4

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the plots in [1] and [2]. Thus the conclusion one would obtain using Sublette’s plot is aclear underestimation of yields due to the rightward shift of the plot. This is the origin ofSublette’s lower estimate of the yield of Pokharan-1.Further Comments(a) The surface features of the S-1 shaft after the explosion coupled with information ofits burial depth indicate that the yield of S-1 is in agreement with crater and emplacementdata.(b) The data of 7,000 sq. metres of steel sheets to line shafts as claimed by Chengappa[3], pg. 40 is now seen as the amount needed to line both shafts S-1 and S-2.(c) Finally, we address the question as to why BARC did not test a 100 kt device in shaftS-1. The aim was to test a Agni configured device with the sole opportunity provided tothe weapons design team. Thus to fit a package into the requisite dimensions probablycalled for a device design with yield of about 45 kt. If there were no constraints, mostlikely a test of 100 kilotons would have been likely with the attendant large crater.(d) Lastly a perusal of Fig. 2 shows PNE experiments for craters were either sub kiloton,sub-sub kiloton or within 2 kilotons. Only two experiments were large. These were Sedanalready mentioned above and Schooner at 35 kilotons at 135 metres emplacement. Thisproduced a crater of, 130 metres radius.(e) The reader who is more mathematically minded perhaps will gain a better under-standing of this topic in the context of the Pokharan events by studying the articles [9],[10].

REFERENCES[1] Nordyke, M.D., Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Explosions, IAEA-PL-388/12, 49-107, PeacefulNuclear Explosions, Phenomenology and Status Report, Proceedings of a Panel, Interna-tional Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA), Vienna, 2-6 March 1970.[2] Toman, J., Results of Cratering Experiments, IAEA-PL-388/16, ibid, 345-375.[3] Chengappa, R., Weapons of Peace, Harper Collins, India, 2000.[4] Sastry, S., Notes taken at R. Chidambaram’s lecture at IISc, Strategic Affairs Archivesat http://www.bharat-rakshak.com[5] Chidambaram, R., The May 1998 Pokharan Tests: Scientific Aspects,http://www.saag.org/papers5/paper451.html[6] Sublette, C., What are The Real Yields of India’s Tests?http://nuketesting.enviroweb.org/hew/In ... lds.html[7] First Nuclear Test In Pokaran in 1974,http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/india/nuk ... -pix.htm[8] Burton at al, Computer Design of High Explosive Experiments to simulate subsurfaceNuclear detonations, Nuc. Tech., 26, 1975, p.655

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[9] Ranga Rao, M.P., Cavity Radius Estimation for Contained Peaceful Nuclear Explosions,An analytic approach, Proc. Indian Acad. of Sciences, Section A, 87A, 1978, 13-21.[10] Chidambaram, R., et al, Phenomenology of the Pokharan Peaceful Nuclear Experi-ment, Pramana, 24, 1985, 245-258.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

Unfortunately all the tables and graphs that accompanied my article seem missing. Sikka seemed most impressed as to how I had taken apart Sublette's argument of using data where there was a stemming failure. He asked me if Seismology was my field and I said no but I read enough of all the events that Carey Sublette used to set up his graph. The original article as posted on the Monitor was typed up by me in PDF and formatted beautifully with the charts and tables and graphs.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Ashokk »

vsunder wrote:If some of you know how to retrieve that article great.
https://www.bharat-rakshak.com/archives ... crater.pdf
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

@ Ashokk thanks. Yes now all the graphs and tables are there. Interestingly the article with Ramana and Thundyil has been quoted in “stink tank” publications in that era.

Jack Evernden a seismologist who Ramana and I quote in our summary paper on the Pokharan tests, on BRM, did an analysis of Rayleigh waves which are surface seismic waves and came to the conclusion that the announced yields were indeed as stated. I cannot locate his article. Evernden who was a Univ. of California Berkely, Geologist maintained that surface Rayleigh seismic waves were the most accurate way to estimate yields. Seismic waves like the S and P waves that traveled through the Earth's core were subject to all sorts of biases. He argued that the US on the basis of these S and P waves had consistently over estimated the yields of devices being tested by the Soviet Union and thus the FSU were in violation of the 150kt test ban treaties and so cheating. He applied Rayleigh wave analysis to the 1998 tests too and his analysis was in agreement with the stated yields of the DAE. We quote the paper of Evernden and Marsh in our summary, I think Evernden's paper on POK-2 appeared in Physics and Society an APS journal, but I can be wrong.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

For completeness and historical reasons the Summary paper on the May 1998 tests

https://www.bharat-rakshak.com/archives ... amana.html

Seismic waves that travel through the Earth's core encounter discontinuities. One of the most famous is the Mohorovicic discontinuity(in short the Moho discontinuity) that lies about 22 miles deep. Seismic waves speed up as they cross this discontinuity. Gutenberg and Repetti discontinuities and a whole host of other discontinuities are also present. This makes in part prediction of yield through body waves rather tricky. It is for this reason Evernden advocated surface Rayleigh waves.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohorovi% ... continuity
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ramana »

One outstanding thing you did was to do Fourier transform of the Pak test data and estimated the yield as half of what POK-II was.

That was brilliant.
GJ Nair sent a whole lot of papers via ex-admins to look at.

The summary article was like a white paper.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ramana »

AmberG, In the Chinese test what was the importance of the HEU implosion design for the Chinese?
I know its more complex than the gun design that Hiroshima used.
Was this a stepping stone to the Pu designs when available?
Why were the US folks impressed?
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Cyrano »

Some serious guru log we have here !
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

@Ramana: Fourier Analysis was staring at everyone's face I am simply amazed that Harsh Gupta et al (he was at NGRI, Hyderabad) did not do anything about it. So that was the origin of the Current Science paper of mine. I copied the graphs from Gupta et al and just computed the "area" under the curve by putting graph paper and counting squares and so that is how I wrote the Current Science article and estimated the Pakistani yields. Gupta rose to become a Secretary in Earth and Environment ministry and wrote to me to visit him in Delhi which I of course would not do. Sikka also sent me seismic data from a whole bunch of Chinese tests at Lop Nor and I am aware GJ Nair BARC seismology head was in contact with some BRF admins after my Current Science article. It was a bit more complicated than just area as one had to square the frequencies, generate a new graph and then calculate the area under the new graph. That is a measure of the energy detected at the NGRI seismograph network. Then roughly do the same for some equidistant stations from Pokharan and Chaghai. I suspect the Pakistanis tested two fission devices together given by China at Chaghai test site. That was my conclusion.

FAS still has a link to our paper which is dud as BRM links changed

https://sgp.fas.org/news/secrecy/2001/06/060501.html

https://nuclearweaponarchive.org/India/IndiaRef.htm

There was a book edited by someone from UPenn and Perkovich's contribution there refers to our summary paper. Given we were novices at the time, and the time and energy and care we took to understand the stuff makes it totally worthwhile. It was really heady days when I used to look forward to the Monitor. A whole bunch of stalwarts contributed, Narayanan and his LCA article, Shiv, you, JeM and Sachin, L. Subramaniam's article on Chushul I still recall.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

P. Balaram was the editor of Current Science when I sent in my article. When they sent me the galley proofs for checking after peer review, I noticed that Balaram had himself done some editing and put a note saying that what I had to say was important and would be read by many people so he had tried to make stylistic improvements. I agreed with the changes he suggested and thanked him when I sent the proofs back to the editorial office. Later he became director IISc, Bangalore. hahahaha

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Padmanabhan_Balaram
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ShauryaT »

reposting to state the record is not clear. Nothing new.
Now the shaft for S-1( the thermo-nuclear device at POK-2) was supposedly over 200 metres
vs
the 120-metre deep shaft at the bottom of which the TN device was placed
The failure of India?s sole H-bomb is the latest in DAE and BARC?s long history of being economical with the truth.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by disha »

ramana wrote:AmberG, In the Chinese test what was the importance of the HEU implosion design for the Chinese?
I know its more complex than the gun design that Hiroshima used.
Was this a stepping stone to the Pu designs when available?
Why were the US folks impressed?
My take on this is reverse. USSR helped China a lot to set up its nuclear bum. Particularly Nikita Khrushchev. Chinese approach was to get to nuclear weapon state as soon as possible & exploit their uranium deposits.

Russia helped with the gas diffusion based uranium enrichment process. China used the uranium implosion design.

US was caught unaware because they knew that China is pursuing nukes & with implosion design, but they assumed that it will be plutonium based & China did not have enough plutonium to conduct one.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ramana »

I agree those are the facts. However why the Chinese used the implosion technique on HEU?
It must be something sophisticated and caught the US by surprise.
It could be something highly classified to understand.
Oto Hahn calculations show what is HEU critical mass and that's what the gun design brings about.
The Pu has another aspect of compressing the critical mass to reduce free space.
So HEU in an implosion is something quite big.
I just want a physicist to weigh in on.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by vsunder »

@Ramana Look up Operation Sandstone and Operation Ranger. Your question is answered there. It took the US what 7 years to get to Ranger. You will realize many things, in particular the quickness with which the Chinese exploded a TN device so quickly after their first N test. Ranger is the key to all that.
Last edited by vsunder on 04 Jun 2023 07:29, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by fanne »

what are you guys talking about? In English?
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Varoon Shekhar »

What were the legitimate criticisms made by the total fizzle group led by Santhanam, and what were the equally good points made to counter them, by Kakodar et al. Or should we not revisit that debate.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by RoyG »

Varoon Shekhar wrote:What were the legitimate criticisms made by the total fizzle group led by Santhanam, and what were the equally good points made to counter them, by Kakodar et al. Or should we not revisit that debate.
Wont be able to prove one way or another. But logically, there are some big anomalies with the sizzle group. The first being the cancellation of Shakti VI test, the French offer to Vajpayee to use the ICF facility in Bordeaux, and of course the messy debate which took place during during the nuclear deal.

Had the tests been a complete success, the conversation would’ve been far different. Doesn’t mean we don’t have reliable TN deterrent. It’s just that we needed to do more to debug and validate it beside underground testing.

Based on my personal conversations with forum experts it seems as though there was a problem with the design itself somewhere. Something went wrong with the ability to set off the tertiary resulting in minimal burn up. There seems to have been some panic resulting in abortion of Shakti VI. This is the biggest mystery for me in this whole debate and the excuse to conserve fissile material doesn’t hold weight with me. They had taken the trouble to bring the second device into the desert. Why not simply just give it a go?

The only thing that makes sense is that the TN device didn’t work as expected and they needed to go back to the drawing board to debug it and therefore aborted the test.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Varoon Shekhar »

^^^
Thanks, makes sense. So the sixth untested device was a thermonuclear one, not a sub-kiloton or boosted fission.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by RoyG »

Varoon Shekhar wrote:^^^
Thanks, makes sense. So the sixth untested device was a thermonuclear one, not a sub-kiloton or boosted fission.
Those in the know will tell you it was. Had it been the other types you mentioned why abort? You went to great lengths to setup the test.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Varoon Shekhar »

Right. Is it safe to say, though, that the boosted fission trigger of the thermonuclear device worked very well, flawlessly? There are knowledgeable commentators who are certain that the S-1 fusion bomb fizzled( or even didn't ignite at all) but that the primary went off superbly
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Re: Deterrence

Post by Tanaji »

I wanted to stay out of this but:

There is zero hard evidence that TN failed
There is some evidence that TN succeeded
There is no evidence that the S6 was a TN device
We don’t know why Santhanam said what he said

Ultimately what to believe is up to oneself. Classic case of blind men of Hindustan and the elephant…
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Re: Deterrence

Post by RoyG »

Tanaji wrote:I wanted to stay out of this but:

There is zero hard evidence that TN failed
There is some evidence that TN succeeded
There is no evidence that the S6 was a TN device
We don’t know why Santhanam said what he said

Ultimately what to believe is up to oneself. Classic case of blind men of Hindustan and the elephant…
Go to great lengths to setup and then abort. Right, not a TN…
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Re: Deterrence

Post by RoyG »

Varoon Shekhar wrote:Right. Is it safe to say, though, that the boosted fission trigger of the thermonuclear device worked very well, flawlessly? There are knowledgeable commentators who are certain that the S-1 fusion bomb fizzled( or even didn't ignite at all) but that the primary went off superbly
The consensus among the fizzle crowd is the fbf trigger worked but a design flaw prevented ignition of the tertiary.
Some info I can’t share but if you want to talk more you can email: mail for nrg @g ma il. Com
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Re: Deterrence

Post by disha »

RoyG wrote:...

Based on my personal conversations with forum experts it seems as though there was a problem with the design itself somewhere. Something went wrong with the ability to set off the tertiary resulting in minimal burn up. There seems to have been some panic resulting in abortion of Shakti VI. This is the biggest mystery for me in this whole debate and the excuse to conserve fissile material doesn’t hold weight with me. They had taken the trouble to bring the second device into the desert. Why not simply just give it a go?

The only thing that makes sense is that the TN device didn’t work as expected and they needed to go back to the drawing board to debug it and therefore aborted the test.
The above is plausible. Assuming this plausability, I can say is that the tertiary might have been dialed down way too much.

If we were to entertain this plausibility, we also have to entertain the plausability that the sixth test was conducted, but never detected.

The sub-kiloton tests were using reactor grade plutonium and that's and important aspect. And they were not detected until announced.

Either way, when the window opens up and India needs to prove a better yielding TN, it must do so. How do we know with absolute certainty if the baby is going to be grow up to be a Pappu or Modi? :-)
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Re: Deterrence

Post by RoyG »

disha wrote:
RoyG wrote:...

Based on my personal conversations with forum experts it seems as though there was a problem with the design itself somewhere. Something went wrong with the ability to set off the tertiary resulting in minimal burn up. There seems to have been some panic resulting in abortion of Shakti VI. This is the biggest mystery for me in this whole debate and the excuse to conserve fissile material doesn’t hold weight with me. They had taken the trouble to bring the second device into the desert. Why not simply just give it a go?

The only thing that makes sense is that the TN device didn’t work as expected and they needed to go back to the drawing board to debug it and therefore aborted the test.
The above is plausible. Assuming this plausability, I can say is that the tertiary might have been dialed down way too much.

If we were to entertain this plausibility, we also have to entertain the plausability that the sixth test was conducted, but never detected.

The sub-kiloton tests were using reactor grade plutonium and that's and important aspect. And they were not detected until announced.

Either way, when the window opens up and India needs to prove a better yielding TN, it must do so. How do we know with absolute certainty if the baby is going to be grow up to be a Pappu or Modi? :-)
We tested sub-kt devices and announced. So why not announce the sixth. It's not plausible to me even for reactor grade plutonium.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ShauryaT »

One thing to consider doing is to prep the nation MEA, bureaucracy, media, military, BARC, DRDO, NWS that India will have to test again - If China raises their numbers or does MIRV or does any aggressive deployment. It will put all on notice and the US will find ways to accommodate. Either ways China gets the pressure, China is on notice and China is unlikely to pay heed - opening a window for us with mitigated consequences.
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Re: Deterrence

Post by ramana »

fanne wrote:what are you guys talking about? In English?
*
The US Hiroshima device was a gun device to bring about critical mass and was quite wasteful of the nuke material.
The US Nagasaki device was a Pu implosion device.

The Chinese first test was an HEU implosion device showing mastery of the science of explosions.
The US did an implosion explosion of HEU in the Ranger series of 1952 i.e. about 7 years after it all began.
The Chinese in 1964 started already at the 1952 level of knowledge and not the expected Stone Age gun device of Hiroshima.
It means the Chinese were quite advanced in the theoretical and practical aspects and were marching ahead.

So not a wonder that they got their TN going off soon.

Now you see the urgency to get NPT into force in 1968 to preclude others from fast-forwarding the nuke weapons technology.

* As my Mumbai friends say watch and "enjoy karne ka!"

ShauryaT, it is not China that will object.
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