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A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs , a more compact size, a lower mass, or a combination of these benefits.
The hydrogen bomb primarily has 2 units: a nuclear bomb, which was the primary unit, and a secondary energy unit. The first stage of the hydrogen bomb resembled the layer-cake design, except the main difference is that the initiation is carried out by a nuclear device, rather than a conventional explosive. [ 10 ]
The Cold War (1948–1953) is the ... Truman ordered the development of a hydrogen bomb. In early 1950, the U.S. took its first efforts to oppose communist forces in ...
Tactical nuclear weapons were a large part of the peak nuclear weapons stockpile levels during the Cold War. US scientists with a full-scale cut-away model of the W48, a very small tactical nuclear weapon with an explosive yield equivalent to 72 tons of TNT (0.072 kiloton). Around 100 of such shells were produced during the Cold War.
The first successful hydrogen bomb test occurred on November 8, 1957, which had a yield of 1.8 megatons. [26] An amendment to the Atomic Energy Act in 1958 allowed nuclear cooperation once again, and British-U.S. nuclear programs resumed. During the Cold War, British nuclear deterrence came from submarines and nuclear-armed aircraft.
The hydrogen bomb, which carried the force of 50 million tons of conventional explosives, was detonated in a test in October 1961, 4,000 meters over the remote Novaya Zemlya archipelago above the ...
The bomb was hailed as a hydrogen bomb, and the truth that it was actually a large fission bomb was kept secret by the British government until the end of the Cold War. [135] [136] An Operational Requirement (OR1142) had been issued in 1955 for a thermonuclear warhead for a medium-range ballistic missile, which became Blue Streak. This was ...
In a New Mexico PBS series, "A Commitment to Peace," it looks closely at how the following dramatic Cold War years were complicated by personalities, ideologies, old fears and new visions. Michael ...