Posted on Jul 9, 2015
"The Air Force Just Dropped an Expensive (and Useless) Nuke in Nevada"
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From: Gizmodo
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In the face of mounting criticism, the Air Force just completed the first test flight of the B61 Mod 12 mock up nuclear bomb in the Nevada desert. This marks the next step in updating a cold war-era weapon that many experts consider to be completely useless today. The military might as well drop a nuke on a pile of taxpayer dollars.
The whole situation is frustrating, in part, because it’s based on some scary assumptions about an impending nuclear apocalypse. Since its development in 1963—a year after the Cuban missile crisis—the B61 has been one of top weapons in the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Capable of carriage in supersonic aircraft and a two-stage radiation implosion, this is a bad bomb that we might’ve dropped on Moscow if things had escalated with the Soviets.
However, as the New York Times editorial board explained things a couple years ago, the bombs are “the detritus of the cold war.” The updated B61s are also a very, very expensive detritus. President Obama is already throwing hundreds of millions of dollars at this program to keep these nukes on life support. The total cost of the program is expected to be as high as $11 billion by its completion in the 2020s, while the true nature of the upgrade is being masked.
This is a nonsensical decision, not least because it is at odds with Mr. Obama’s own vision. In a seminal speech in Prague in 2009 and a strategy review in 2010, Mr. Obama advocated the long-term goal of a world without nuclear arms and promised to reduce America’s reliance on them. He also promised not to field a new and improved warhead.
But refurbishing warheads from the 1960s is apparently cool. Meanwhile, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the Air Force still insists on referring to these types of weapons as “gravity bombs” in this modern era. This is misleading since a gravity bomb is really any unguided bomb. Really, it’s a nuke wrapped in a gravity bomb wrapped in a euphemism.
So it’s basically bullshit when Obama and friends talk up their anti-proliferation efforts. In truth, the government is still spending billions on nukes tuned towards the former USSR, while also doing nothing to influence with China, India, or Pakistan (or Israel) to rein in their nuclear programs. An expert gave a lengthy Congressional Testimony on this very topic just a few months ago. Similarly, the Air Force is actively updating its nuclear weapons operation in order to fight a nuclear war when the time is right. As Maj. Gen. Sandra Finan, the commander of the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center, put it in an April press release, “Our mission is still to deliver nuclear capabilities and winning solutions that warfighters use daily to deter our enemies and assure our allies.”
This is what brings us back to those assumptions about a scary nuclear apocalypse. When politicians are telling us that they’re trying to create a world without nuclear weapons, it’s misleading for the military to just give nuclear weapons new names. It’s even more misleading to spend billions of dollars rebuilding and renaming old nuclear weapons, just so that those politicians can say that we’re not creating any new ones.
Just call a nuke a nuke. The Air Force just dropped an expensive and inevitably useless nuke in the Nevada desert. There was no mushroom cloud this time. But there’s always a next time.
http://gizmodo.com/the-air-force-just-dropped-an-expensive-and-useless-n [login to see] ?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=pulsenews
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In the face of mounting criticism, the Air Force just completed the first test flight of the B61 Mod 12 mock up nuclear bomb in the Nevada desert. This marks the next step in updating a cold war-era weapon that many experts consider to be completely useless today. The military might as well drop a nuke on a pile of taxpayer dollars.
The whole situation is frustrating, in part, because it’s based on some scary assumptions about an impending nuclear apocalypse. Since its development in 1963—a year after the Cuban missile crisis—the B61 has been one of top weapons in the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Capable of carriage in supersonic aircraft and a two-stage radiation implosion, this is a bad bomb that we might’ve dropped on Moscow if things had escalated with the Soviets.
However, as the New York Times editorial board explained things a couple years ago, the bombs are “the detritus of the cold war.” The updated B61s are also a very, very expensive detritus. President Obama is already throwing hundreds of millions of dollars at this program to keep these nukes on life support. The total cost of the program is expected to be as high as $11 billion by its completion in the 2020s, while the true nature of the upgrade is being masked.
This is a nonsensical decision, not least because it is at odds with Mr. Obama’s own vision. In a seminal speech in Prague in 2009 and a strategy review in 2010, Mr. Obama advocated the long-term goal of a world without nuclear arms and promised to reduce America’s reliance on them. He also promised not to field a new and improved warhead.
But refurbishing warheads from the 1960s is apparently cool. Meanwhile, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the Air Force still insists on referring to these types of weapons as “gravity bombs” in this modern era. This is misleading since a gravity bomb is really any unguided bomb. Really, it’s a nuke wrapped in a gravity bomb wrapped in a euphemism.
So it’s basically bullshit when Obama and friends talk up their anti-proliferation efforts. In truth, the government is still spending billions on nukes tuned towards the former USSR, while also doing nothing to influence with China, India, or Pakistan (or Israel) to rein in their nuclear programs. An expert gave a lengthy Congressional Testimony on this very topic just a few months ago. Similarly, the Air Force is actively updating its nuclear weapons operation in order to fight a nuclear war when the time is right. As Maj. Gen. Sandra Finan, the commander of the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center, put it in an April press release, “Our mission is still to deliver nuclear capabilities and winning solutions that warfighters use daily to deter our enemies and assure our allies.”
This is what brings us back to those assumptions about a scary nuclear apocalypse. When politicians are telling us that they’re trying to create a world without nuclear weapons, it’s misleading for the military to just give nuclear weapons new names. It’s even more misleading to spend billions of dollars rebuilding and renaming old nuclear weapons, just so that those politicians can say that we’re not creating any new ones.
Just call a nuke a nuke. The Air Force just dropped an expensive and inevitably useless nuke in the Nevada desert. There was no mushroom cloud this time. But there’s always a next time.
http://gizmodo.com/the-air-force-just-dropped-an-expensive-and-useless-n [login to see] ?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=pulsenews
Air Force
Nuclear
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 10
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0
I disagree with the premise of the author - a deterrent is of no use unless everyone knows you have the capability, therefore advertise the upgqrades so the other side knows you still have it. Also, the world has changed since 2008/9 when Obama said a world with no nukes would be great. In fact we all think that, but hostile countries that have nukes don't agree. Since 2008/9 the threat of outliers developing weapons increased making our deterent more meaningful. So, after going through this reasoning I wonder what the author really wanted to say? Maybe he's a true pacifist who thinks if we all lay down our weapons no one will pick them up again - if so, he's not a realist. Just my humble opinion.
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Lt Col Stephen Petzold
Unfortunately we cannot uninvent nuclear weapons so will need to have some level of deterrent. Leaving weapons unchanged from the 60's is not a good plan so upgrades, for safety if nothing else, need to be done from time to time.
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Well, in addition to a failed premise (nukes are useless), the author contradicts himself at least twice. First, he introduces the B-61, as it was called in 1963. Then he says the Air Force still calls it a gravity bomb "in this modern era" (as if gravity doesn't apply anymore?). Then he says, " it’s misleading for the military to just give nuclear weapons new names". Huh? He just got done complaining and explaining we're still using the SAME names. Then there's the "very, very expensive" part. $11B over what, 10 years? Expensive compared to what? AIDS in Africa was $15B. Where's the context? Well, I guess that's what we should expect when you use the NYT editorial board as a source.
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Col Joseph Lenertz
LOL, the author would very likely be happy to cut all of the above, if they are a part of his conspiratorial "military-industrial complex". Many things happen in Nevada that stay in Nevada. Vegas baby!
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TSgt Gwen Walcott
TSgt (Join to see) - What happened in Nevada is the same thing that has been happening over the past 70+ years ===> It was a TEST of the weapon, paid for by the Department of Energy (the owner of the weapon) and not by the Air Force (the carrier) {who only provided the equipment, the sortie of which was (again) paid for by the Department of Energy}
Nothing new here (except the author's leftist lame brain.
Nothing new here (except the author's leftist lame brain.
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TSgt Gwen Walcott
((I should have said that the test was DESIGNED and PAID for by the Department of Energy))
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TSgt (Join to see)
TSgt Gwen Walcott I had no idea this pretzel of a news spin job was that far out of shape. Thanks for the enlightenment!
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A rather lengthy anti-nuke rant. Do I believe that we should be as reliant on them as before; no way. However, I don't believe we will ever live in a world without them.
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