Re: Whoops! The Atlantic Makes Trump Look EPIC In Cover Intended as a Smear

Dimensional Traveler  <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:

>
From what I remember reading some years ago it isn't Pakistan that is
selling the weapons.  It is the Pakistani _engineer/scientist_ who was
the driving force behind Pakistan's nuclear weapons program that is (or
at least was) selling the ability to make nuclear weapons.

Dr. Khan has sold two things... first of all plans to make a uranium
bomb, which are really unimportant since any reasonable engineer
should be able to figure it out given the needed mass, having seen
plenty of pictures of the WWII weapons.

But SECONDLY and more importantly, plans for building centrifuges
for separating uranium isotopes.  This is a difficult and touchy
thing to do and just because someone describes the process and gives
you plans doesn't mean you can balance a rotor running that fast.
This is, I might add, 1940s technology and we have better machining
available today but it's still not an easy task and having plans
might cut off a lot of time for someone wanting to start a nuclear
weapons program.

This is, thankfully, a far cry from selling actual bombs, or selling
weapons-grade uranium to make bombs with. 

You will recall that when Lavrenty Beria went to Dr. Sakharov's team
with the plans stolen from the Manhattan project, the physicists said
this was a poor design and they could build a plutonium bomb instead
in half the time with four times the yield. Beria didn't like that
idea, and demanded the American bomb.  So the physicists built the
American bomb but.... the NEXT bomb they tested took half the time
and had four times the yield.

Knowing that the thing is possible is the hard part... from that part
working out how to do it isn't so hard.  And maybe there is a still
easier way to do it that hasn't been found yet.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."