Yes, Virginia, India’s H-bomb fizzled. K Santhanam (who was director of test site preparations for India’s 1998 nuclear tests; pictured above, handing the firing keys to the range safety officer) has admitted what everyone else has known for a long time — that India’s 1998 test of a thermonuclear device was unsuccessful: “Based upon the …
ASAT Test Bans
by | 2009-08-27 | 9 Comments
The last serious debate over ASAT testing occurred in the 1980s. In addition to advocating the Strategic Defense Initiative, Reagan administration officials pushed for the testing of a kinetic energy ASAT system employing the Air Force’s F-15 as a launch vehicle (above). The Soviet Union had previously tested, with decidedly mixed results, a co-orbital interceptor …
Nuclear Warfare
by | 2009-08-27 | 24 Comments
By no means do I wish to pick on Lourdes Garcia-Navarro, who was only repeating a common misconception in an NPR segment this evening when she said: On June 7, 1981, Israel launched the first confirmed military strike ever against a nuclear site. Actually, it wasn’t even the first military strike against that particular facility. …
Persbo & Hibbs on ElBaradei
by | 2009-08-26 | 14 Comments
Six bucks or not, Andreas Persbo and Mark Hibbs have a must read profile of outgoing IAEA Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists: The IAEA after ElBaradei. As ElBaradei’s tenure reaches its close, a deep and troubling divide has opened up on the IAEA Board of Governors between advanced nuclear states, including …
