Lost, by a mile (or potentially being a product of faulty inventory to begin with). The logistics involving nuclear weaponry are so extreme and involve so many people that something getting lost is more likely than some kind of crime.
Do you think presidents can smuggle a nuclear warhead across borders with a donkey or something? Reagan couldn't even manage to sell weapons to fund a bunch of terrorists under the table.
> The logistics involving nuclear weaponry are so extreme and involve so many people that something getting lost is more likely than some kind of crime.
The logistics being so extreme and involving so many people is evidence against loss, not for it. Also, the US placing nukes in a place that only a few silent people are aware of is not a crime.
> Do you think presidents can smuggle a nuclear warhead across borders with a donkey or something?
Do you think they can lose them down the kitchen sink drain, or accidentally leave them in a cab?
Did you read how these were lost? So in your world an entire B-47 crew disappeared in 1956 just so Eisenhower could “launder” a pair of nuke cores (not entire bombs) to <waves hands> somebody.
Nobody from the B-47 crew has ever been heard from again, and nobody, anywhere saw the plane ever again.
And in your world this is more likely than a plane crashing in the Med?
Losing a bomb is pretty easy. It just requires a convergence of mistakes. Laundering it requires you make those mistakes happen and avoid anyone finding out you did it.
Atomic bombs are useful for blowing stuff up (which requires detonating them) or threatening to blow stuff up (which requires other people knowing you possess them). "Laundering" a bomb that remains unknown for 50 years doesn't seem that useful.
Seems prima facie easy, but at least in the USA each part is certainly contained within a different special access program, and never the twain shall meet.
I feel like the implication was clearly that it was done on the sly. Outright defecting to the other country is quite a bit different from being paid to look the other way.
I personally find this saying extremely overrated and damaging in many cases. Especially considering the pacifying effect it can have on attempting to undo certain injustices.
Best use of it is in your personal life with family, friends, retail worker in your local grocery shop etc.
I agree. My guess is that institutional malice is fully explained by economic incentives 99% of the time. Which the version from the other comment cover: "Never attribute to stupidity, that which can be adequately explained by economic incentives"
Would assume stolen by Russia or China… espionage to reverse engineer our tech to see if they could find flaws or exploits to reduce its effectiveness, or ideas to improve their own designs.
Makes me feel safer anyway since the bomb would be out of commission.
So these bombs, if found, they aren’t just pull the pin and chuck it to detonate, right? would they even pose a risk of found by a civilian?
I don't think the basic Pu-239 / U-235 cores themselves degrade, those isotopes have extremely long half lives, but other components of the bombs certainly do.
Particularly, the tritium used in boosted nuclear weapons has a half life of just over 12 years. Furthermore all Pu-239 cores have some Pu-240 contamination that undergoes spontaneous fission, the neutron flux from which probably degrades other components of the bomb over time.
I think a 50 year old "lost" bomb would be a radiological hazard at most. Nuclear weapons require upkeep.
After 50 years, only 6% of tritium remains from the initial 100%. Any weapon using tritium (boosted fission bombs and hydrogen bombs) would likely fail to work.
Chemical explosives that initiate nuclear detonation also degrade. Successful weapon function requires an extremely precise initial chemical explosion, not likely to be possible with a 50 year old bomb.
Do you think presidents can smuggle a nuclear warhead across borders with a donkey or something? Reagan couldn't even manage to sell weapons to fund a bunch of terrorists under the table.