Pokhran II not fully successful: Scientist - Part-2

[Gagan]

Screen grab of the power point presentation.


Dr. R C was at pains to explain that the design is just representative. This is basically the Teller Ulam on the power point.
My mpression:
1. Dr RC sounded more like giving an educational discourse to the media.
2. The scientists and powers that be in India consider the media to be a bunch of low IQ idiots - DDM, hence this coaching the media. (I fully agree with Dr. RC and others on this )
3. The clip of the Q&A session is not available. Don't know if DDM managed to ask anything of value (or if they were asking weather this disclosure will have a bearing on the maharashtra elections).
4. One standard method that has never been know to fail, and often utilized to perfection by all sarkari babus is "Information Overload" with moderately useful info, so that the actual issue gets obfuscated in the smoke and din.
This seems to be along the same line.
The NDTV video does not clarify much for this forum I guess.

[Gagan]

wrt geology of the site. There is simply no open source info. There will never be.

Ok maybe it was loose soil upto 60m then another 80m of pink granite, then the water table, and then loose rocks and soil. Too many permutations.

If the device was placed below a relatively solid pink granite layer, it goes to reason that the surface disturbance will be lesser.

[NRao]

Can build nuke deterrence upto 200 kilotons: Kakodkar
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/new ... 050409.cms

Dunno.

MUMBAI: Rubbishing doubts on the efficacy of the hydrogen bomb test in 1998, Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Anil Kakodkar on Thursday said scientists have achieved success in building deterrence capability of upto 200 kiltons.

Which one is it?

Perhaps I need to re-visit the video. Or perhaps AK made this comment at the end (which is missing from the video).

[NRao]

wrt geology of the site. There is simply no open source info. There will never be.

Ok maybe it was loose soil upto 60m then another 80m of pink granite, then the water table, and then loose rocks and soil. Too many permutations.

If the device was placed below a relatively solid pink granite layer, it goes to reason that the surface disturbance will be lesser.

Gagan ji,

That statement will not cut it (not a knock on you). In fact it will only add to the confusion (googlebot too).

The RR article provides a lot more information than seems to have been provided all these years.

[shiv]

Has anyone posted this before. I did not even read it when it first appeared on BRM

Notes on certain technical aspects of P.K.Iyengar's article
http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/I ... rajan.html

[shiv]

6. My take is that 230m shaft in “pink granite hard rock” could take a 500kt-1MT TN explosion.

Malhotraji have you read this?

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/I ... crater.pdf

[shiv]

The NDTV video

I have some very important information abou

[Sanku]

The NDTV video

I have some very important information abou

Sorry Ramana just this once...

[Sanjay]

I am asking Shiv and Ramana an indulgence. I am going to answer almost every question - as far as I can - but at this stage I will not reveal sources. At some point all will be published. May I do so with the understanding that while I will try to explain how I know, there will be a limit ?

[NRao]

Has anyone posted this before. I did not even read it when it first appeared on BRM

Notes on certain technical aspects of P.K.Iyengar's article
http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/I ... rajan.html

Then, to just complete the picture, is:
http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/I ... amana.html

[shiv]

Sanjay I don't care what information is posted and who posts it as long as the credibility of that information is not sought to be enhanced by character assassination of any person who contests the information.

[NRao]

I am asking Shiv and Ramana an indulgence. I am going to answer almost every question - as far as I can - but at this stage I will not reveal sources. At some point all will be published. May I do so with the understanding that while I will try to explain how I know, there will be a limit ?

Underground BR will work?

indicgroup at netscape . net

To preserve the sanity of this threat, I can do the job of distributions to others.

[Sanjay]

Underground I wouldn't share sources yet - I will at some point. I am simply asking if it is OK if I were to answer the questions as far as possible without being pressed on sources.

I should note - my sources tend to be military rather than academic.

[ramana]

Sanjay if there are credible science based info go ahead. It will help clear the matters. BTW of the two, am the admin.

ramana

[Sanjay]

It isn't science - its operational stuff. Moving away from academics to dropping things on people's heads.

[Kanson]

Not an issue Sanjay...pls go ahead.

[NRao]

Not sharing sources is fine with me.

How big are these "things"? : )

[ss_roy]

So what is holding them back? We have to get our older leaders (in politics and other areas) to retire!

They come from an era (and world view) in which they are never as good as whitey. Seriously, this defeatist attitude is far rarer in people born after the mid 1960s.

Can build nuke deterrence upto 200 kilotons: Kakodkar

[NRao]

Can build nuke deterrence upto 200 kilotons: Kakodkar

Big diff between "Can" and "Have".

[kenop]

Indian Express on the press conference
There is a claim of capability of upto 200kT.
Additionally

"We scientists cannot go beyond that as proliferation sensitive information cannot be divulged," said Chidambaram, also a former AEC Chairman.

With reference to the recently reported aha moment by Shiv, I get the idea that it may mean that sharing details from the radiochemical analysis means informing the whole world about the contents of the tested device. I am not too nooklear literate, but it seems to me that information on contents can help another group to create such a device.
So, IMVHO, it does not necessarily have the implication of the lineage of the Indian device being traced to the Russian.

[RamaY]

This is the most logical post in this thread. The poster brings the name-less mothers and unborn babies to cover his own fears..

Yes but RamaY jee the "poster's fears" are shared by a lot of other Indians who are SDRE shivering Shivshankars like the poster himself and brave people are in a minority.

That is the problem with an eliteman not being aware of life in India and imagining some Rama RajYa

tough no?

Shiv-ji completely agree.

The subject is of national security capability. It is not about intents and ideologies. If the TN is successful, so be it. If it is not, so be it. The discussion is about whether India has the capability or not and whether the tests were successful or not. Answering that question with statements such as "Fission Devices offer enough deterrent” or “nuke-war is not practical” etc doesn’t add much value to national security.

PM of India, NSA, AEC, BARC etc told the nation that such capability exists. Some scientists from the same and equally important national security apparatus are questioning the “yields” and validity of those claims. Isn’t it the responsibility of GOI to present the facts in a scientific manner?

For a moment, let us assume GOI thinks it doesn’t want to claim the TN capability publicly. Doesn’t it then create an opportunity for the adversary to mis-calculate Indian capabilities? For example TSP is convinced that there are no Indian-TNs and only tactical nukes. And it uses one of their tactical nukes on Indian Army. If TSP is a vassal to PRC then PRC would definitely know about this escalation would be interested to pre-empt the possible Indian second strike. So irrespective of who starts what, India will have to be prepared for a massive first strike from PRC and even USA. In such a scenario how can 1,7800,00003 tactical nukes help Indian cause, especially when the political leadership is decapitated, >70% of military arsenal is wiped out, and 20-50 Indian cities are destroyed from a PRC pre-emptive strike?

If my adversaries are willing to and capable of an nuke war, what Dharma I should follow? What about all the mothers and unborn babies killed by a PRC nuke or a TSP nuke? How can a Bharatiya (assuming the poster is an Bharatiya) value one civilian in Calcutta or Arunachal Pradesh more or less than another civilian in say Chennai or Mumbai?

National security decisions will be taken by national leadership not aam-admi and the leadership will have to make certain compromises (cold decisions) to preserve the idea of Bharat irrespective of which cities will survive and which will not in a possible nuke-war. Only a nation capable of and willing to use a nuke weapon should possess one.

Deleted OT comment

[NRao]

IF you are having a very slow day, try reading this:

"Indian Nuclear Doctrine", Statement by Ambassador Munir Akram in the Conference on Disarmament, August 19, 1999

[Gerard]

India nuclear tests 'successful'

Mr Chidambaram said proliferation sensitive information such as the composition of materials used or their quantities had not been revealed so it was "speculative" on the part of others to calculate the yield.

"No one outside the design team has the data to calculate this fission-fusion yield break-up or any other significant parameter related to fusion burn," the two men said in a statement.

[Raveen]

Waiting for the info Sanjay

[ramana]

From Pioneer, 24 Sept., 2009

FLASH | Thursday, September 24, 2009 | Email | Print |


Can build nuke deterrence upto 200 kilotons: Kakodkar

PTI | Mumbai

Rubbishing doubts on the efficacy of the hydrogen bomb test in 1998, Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Anil Kakodkar on Thursday said that scientists have achieved success in building deterrence capability of upto 200 kiltons.

"Once again I would like to re-emphasise that the 1998 nuclear tests were fully successful. We had achieved all the objectives in toto.

"It has given us the capability to build deterrence based on both fission and thermonuclear weapon systems from modest to all the way upto 200 kilotons," he said addressing a press conference here.

Kakodkar, who was Director of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre in 1998, termed as "unnecessary" the controversy over the Pokhran-II nuclear tests triggered after claims by a former DRDO scientist that the hydrogen bomb experiment was a failure.

R Chidambaram, Chairman of the AEC in 1998 and the current Principal Scientific Adviser to the Union Government, made a presentation on the results of the Pokhran-II nuclear tests.

Former DRDO scientist K Santhanam, who was the DRDO coordinator for the 1998 tests, had claimed that the thermonuclear test was much below expectation triggering a controversy.

Santhanam had also demanded an inquiry by an independent panel of experts into the test results.

Both Kakodkar and Chidambaram termed as "unnecessary", the row triggered by the remarks of Santhanam, a former DRDO scientist and a coordinator of the nuke tests and said "we are perplexed by the controversy."

"We are saddened that two of our colleagues used heavy rhetoric which is not substitute of good science," Chidambaram, who was accompanied by several BARC scientists, including its director S Banerjee, said.

"Culture of science is to have discussions in the scientific fora or peer reviewed scientific journals and they (Santhanam and former AEC Chairman and India's top physicist P K Iyengar) should have understood the proliferation sensitive nature of the information," he said.

"No one in this business would do that and our Bhabha Atomic Research Centre scientists are doing progressive work in the strategic area for the past 11 years and we are confident about the design of the device," Chidambaram said.

Santhanam had also demanded an enquiry by an independent panel of experts into the test results.

Explaining how the two-stage device needed a thorough understanding of advanced seismology and radiochemistry, Chidambaram said "our results were so accurate that we disclosed the yield on the same day of the explosion which no other country has done as science has evolved in the last two decades."

The results were presented before the Atomic Energy Commission four times (Chidambaram was then the Chairman) where Raja Ramanna, father of India's nuclear bomb of 1974, was a member, Chidambaram said.

To the doubt about the yield raised by Santhanam and Ashok Parthasarathy that 'the fission bomb yield from DRDO's seismic instrumentation was 25 kiloton', Chidambaram said, "the BARC estimate of the yield for the fission device is 15 kiloton (and not 25 kiloton) and for the thermonuclear device 45 kiloton."

One of the methods used for the estimation of the device yield was close-in acceleration measurement, for which both the DRDO and BARC had set up instrumentation, he said.

It soon became apparent after discussion among the two groups of specialists that the DRDO data had anomalies and had to be rejected and that the BARC data, which had the expected waveforms, would be accepted, he said.

Chidambaram said, "the important point is that P K Iyengar does not dispute the yield of thermonuclear test."

Iyengar, however, raised doubts about the efficiency of the bomb in 2000 and repeated recently ---- 'in my opinion that ratio of fission fission to fusion energy must have been around 1:1...Therefore, by my best estimate, the fusion yield could not have been more than 20 kiloton...This suggests that the fusion core burnt only partially, perhaps less than 10 per cent..'.

Responding to this doubt, Chidambaram said to understand the efficiency of the bomb, one has to be closely associated with the design, material and quantity of material.

"We do not understand how without the knowledge of the design and therefore, without knowledge of the fusion-fission break-up and the quantity of thermonuclear material in the device and its isotopic composition, he has tried to calculate the efficiency of the fusion burn," he said.

On another doubt of Santhanam that "the fission bomb left a crater 25 metre in diameter and if the thermonuclear device had really worked with a yield of 50 kiloton, it should have left a crater almost 70 metre in diameter," Chidambaram said, the surface feature producing a Ground Zero depends on the depth of burial and rock medium around the shot point.

"It also depends on the rock medium between the shot point and the ground," he said, adding the geology of Pokhran is inhomogeneous and the propagation of the shock wave due to explosion is affected by every interface. {This the most unique featrue of Pokhran site. Its a trifecta layered cake of sandstone, shale and granite and depth of burial will effect the surface phenonemology. So S-2 must have been in shale which gave a big crater. One more confirmation I want is the pink granite scaled depth of 67m verification from the TBRL tests on pink granite from serving BARC people. Sikkaji is retired.} So

When asked why the depth of the placing of the device was not disclosed in the peer reviewed papers as was done by BARC scientists in 1974 Pokhran I, Chidambaram said, "1974 test was a peaceful nuclear experiment and it is a global practice to give more details but the 1998 device was a nuclear weapon device and the information about it is proliferation sensitive.

This is correct for it teaches those who dont know how deep to bury stuff. In this regard the US has been quite careless about this info: Banberry etc. but could be psy-ops and if you follow their formula it might lead to venting!}

Next step I want is a joint SFC-BARC-DRDO conference to announce the induction of the weapons.

[shiv]

In this regard the US has been quite careless about this info: Banberry etc. but could be psy-ops and if you follow their formula it might lead to venting!}[/i]

I had posted a link (obtained from Sanjay) of the yields and depth of burial of US tests - will try and locate.

To their credit ( I believe) they have tended to bury so deep that next to nothing (or nothing?) happens at the surface. I believe the Baneberry event was an unexpected anomaly with venting via fissures much later.

[enqyoob]

ramana: question out of (vast and deep) ignorance:

If fusion burn can be achieved using a fission trigger, then what stops scale-up to 1MT? Doesn't some fusion provide enough trigger for a lot more fusion? Or is there some time element where characteristic time for fusion > characteristic time for blowing apart? Seems like the mass difference between a 2KT fusion burn and a 1MT fusion burn is quite small?

Also, does anyone have the number for the actual energy figure of "1kT"? In GigaJoules or whatever? (this is to do an e=m*c^2 conversion which is all the nyookulear pissiks I know)

[shiv]

N3 I am not ramana - but it appears that the fusion burn sparks off fission in a tamper surrounding the fusion fuel - and apparently that tamper can be made of fissionable U 238, or U 235 o even Thorium. It is the fission of that tamper that gives most of the yield in TN weapons (60-70%?)

If you use Lead for tamper the device (assuming fusion occurs) is low yield - such as claimed for S1

I believe the "fusion causing a lot more fusion" was used only for demo purposes with the Soviet 50 MT tsar bomba and some US 15 or 25 MT device

Jai Wiki etc

[enqyoob]

That's disappointing. So I can't make a thermonuke using a battery and salt water to generate the H2 and a beaker of acetone on a dog whistle to do the "sonoluminescence" fusion?

I did have an aircraft cannon shell with a depleted uranium tip somewhere in my desk, but got rid of that after 9/11 etc.

[SaiK]

if we assume its a proof by saying pink granites did reduce the signature, and if scientific folks agree, then i am all for using the same technique to reduce to appear like a sub kilton signature for future test.

lets call it container tests. layered black granite or layered RRC iron cask containers.. we need to test again is what the call is.

i agree with RC, Kakodkar et al.. and so do I agree with our babooze who all are playing by their respective CYA postures.

if we can contain by geological materials, lets do a silent explosion tests. For this to happen, are we ready with lawerance livermore type labs well established for our future designs?

what is RC/KK or any other top notch brains thinking about such labs, yet?

[enqyoob]

If "contained" tests are possible with, say, 100m radius spherical blobs of soil+ rock, is it feasible to put such a thing on vibration isolating feet and hence do an off-ground test, totally defeating all seismic detectors? Of course, hiding this would be a challenge..

[RamaY]

^^^ SaiK garu,

building on your thoughts...

If it is so simple and one can avoid the damage to nearby buildings by going further deep, I suggest we should have a permanent underground test facility with ~300-400 meter shafts to test different devices. The oil industry should be able to dig upto few thousand meters, no?

[Raveen]

If "contained" tests are possible with, say, 100m radius spherical blobs of soil+ rock, is it feasible to put such a thing on vibration isolating feet and hence do an off-ground test, totally defeating all seismic detectors? Of course, hiding this would be a challenge..

I believe the vibration isolating feet would reduce the signature but not totally eliminate it...eventually the energy has to dissipate somewhere and somehow...gurus pls correct me if I am wrong

[shiv]

SaiK the two subkiloton tests done in 50 meters of sand were not detected at all. If those tests have not been repeated again and again in the last 10 years it will only be because of lack of political will.

[NRao]

To their credit ( I believe) they have tended to bury so deep that next to nothing (or nothing?) happens at the surface. I believe the Baneberry event was an unexpected anomaly with venting via fissures much later.

I think the RR article refers to the Baneberry modeling effort, when he states that great care was taken to buryy S1 at proper depth to ensure that there would no venting, etc.



BTW, the RR article SEEMS to have been changed!!!! Grrrrrrr...........................

I recall RR stating the Ds value (being 67) being published. ramana I think you brought to my attention. It does not seem to be there any longer.

How can we do peer review when articles either lack tech stuff or keep changing?

[Raveen]

SaiK the two subkiloton tests done in 50 meters of sand were not detected at all. If those tests have not been repeated again and again in the last 10 years it will only be because of lack of political will.

Or lack of scalability of that design?

[ramana]

ramana: question out of (vast and deep) ignorance:

If fusion burn can be achieved using a fission trigger, then what stops scale-up to 1MT? Doesn't some fusion provide enough trigger for a lot more fusion? Or is there some time element where characteristic time for fusion > characteristic time for blowing apart? Seems like the mass difference between a 2KT fusion burn and a 1MT fusion burn is quite small?

Also, does anyone have the number for the actual energy figure of "1kT"? In GigaJoules or whatever? (this is to do an e=m*c^2 conversion which is all the nyookulear pissiks I know)

Your real question is can S-I be scaled? The answer is depends. If it is the same as is it was tested, might not be as people who know more (PKI and similar thinkers) have said. Deals with red part. Its like a sponge ball(stress relief) you need to squeeze uniformly before the other thing comes and blows it apart.

However if there were lessons learned as is implied in the 11 years comments by RC then its feasible. To be honest what they tested is so complex and has so many innovations its difficult to judge by outsiders. Thats where the peer review thing comes. It doesn't have to be outsiders and those four reviews by AEC might have been that. What is the review in 2002 that Gagan referred to? That year is significant.

This pink granite thing is coming up only now. If they have confidence as they confirm in today's conference, its time to call it closed and induct. Only that will close the matter.


Regardless of S-I succeeded or not their capability for TN did not change. Those are two different things.

---
You kidding NRao? What about the 230m?

[shiv]

SaiK the two subkiloton tests done in 50 meters of sand were not detected at all. If those tests have not been repeated again and again in the last 10 years it will only be because of lack of political will.

Or lack of scalability of that design?

No I believe subkilo tests are done only to gather data to fill up gaps in tables or confirm predictions of simulation. The last series of tests done by China and France was to boost their confidence in simulation by testing subkiloton nukes.

The US of course is way ahead of the rest. I learned on BRF that both China and Russia have been doing subkiloton tests too.

[Gerard]

Also, does anyone have the number for the actual energy figure of "1kT"? In GigaJoules or whatever? (this is to do an e=m*c^2 conversion which is all the nyookulear pissiks I know)

1 kt = 4.184 × 10^12 J

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

A gram of TNT releases 980–1100 calories upon explosion. To define the tonne of TNT, this was arbitrarily standardized by letting 1000 thermochemical calories = 1 gram TNT = 4184 J (exactly).[1

[PratikDas]

It isn't science - its operational stuff. Moving away from academics to dropping things on people's heads.

Waiting with bated breath, Sanjay ji.