Atomic demolition munition
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Atomic demolition munitions (ADMs), colloquially known as nuclear land mines, are small
Military uses
Instead of being delivered to the target by missiles, rockets, or artillery shells, ADMs were intended to be emplaced by soldiers. Due to their relatively small size and light weight, ADMs could be emplaced by military engineers or special forces teams, then detonated on command or by timer to create massive obstructions. By destroying key terrain features or choke points such as bridges, dams, mountain passes and tunnels, ADMs could serve to create physical as well as radiological obstacles to the movement of enemy forces and thus channel them into prepared killing zones.[5][6]
According to official accounts, the United States deployed ADMs overseas in Italy and West Germany (Fulda Gap) during the Cold War.[7][8][9] The most modern types (SADM and MADM) were deployed in South Korea.[10][11][12] Seymour Hersh referred to the deployment of ADMs along the Golan Heights by Israel in the early 1980s.[13]
Civilian uses
ADMs have never been used commercially although similar small devices, often modified to cut down on fission yield and maximize fusion, have been deeply buried to put out
The
United States ADMs
In the 1950s and 1960s, the United States developed several different types of lightweight nuclear devices. The main one was the
- W7/ADM-B (c. 1954–67)
- T4 ADM (1957–63) gun type
- W30/Tactical Atomic Demolition Munition (1961–66)
- W31/ADM (1960–65)
- W45/Medium Atomic Demolition Munition (1964–84)
- W54/Special Atomic Demolition Munition (1965–89)
TADM
The Mk 30 Mod 1 Tactical Atomic Demolition Munition (TADM) was a portable atomic bomb, consisting of a
SADM
The Special Atomic Demolition Munition (SADM) was a family of man-portable nuclear weapons fielded by the US military in the 1960s, but never used in actual combat. The US Army planned to use the weapons in Europe in the event of a Soviet invasion. US Army Engineers would use the weapon to irradiate, destroy, and deny key routes of communication through limited terrain such as the Fulda Gap. Troops were trained to parachute into Soviet occupied western Europe with the SADM and destroy power plants, bridges, and dams.
The weapon was designed to allow one person to parachute from any type of aircraft carrying the weapon package and place it in a harbor or other strategic location that could be accessed from the sea. Another parachutist without a weapon package would follow the first to provide support as needed.
The two-person team would place the weapon package in the target location, set the timer, and swim out into the ocean where they would be retrieved by a submarine or a high-speed surface water craft.
MADM
The
Russian controversy with ADMs
In the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States and Russia developed a deep cooperation designed to assure the security of Russia's nuclear arsenal. While a number of steps were taken to consolidate and improve the security of Russia's strategic nuclear arms, particularly under the Cooperative Threat Reduction program, concern [by whom?] remained over the security of the Russian tactical nuclear weapons arsenal. In particular, a serious debate arose over the status of what are known as "suitcase nuclear weapons", very small Soviet-era nuclear devices. The term suitcase nuke is generally used to describe any type of small, man-portable nuclear device although there is serious debate as to the validity of the term itself. In a worst case analysis, a suitcase nuke would be small enough to be hand-carried into a major population or leadership center undetected and then detonated. Although, by most accounts, the yield of such a device is likely far less than ten kilotons, its combined effects may have the potential to kill tens of thousands, if not more. There is a great deal of confusion over just how many of these suitcase devices exist or if they even exist at all. By some accounts, the Soviet Union built hundreds of these devices, of which several dozen were missing. Based on other reports, suitcase nukes were never built in large numbers or were never deployed.
There is no definitive open source information on the number, location, security, or status of these suitcase nuclear bombs. No Soviet suitcase bomb or any of its presumed components has ever been found, much less used, in the three decades after the collapse of the USSR. As of 2018[update], it is likely they would not work or would fizzle at worst by lack of the required specialized maintenance common to all nuclear weapons, if they ever existed.
Frontline broadcast about suitcase nukes
In May 1997 General Alexander Lebed told an American Congressional delegation that Russia had lost dozens of atomic demolition units.[21] In a later interview with American investigative program 60 Minutes he revised his estimate, saying that they had lost more than 100 units - a claim that the Russian government rejected.[22][23]
On 23 February 1999, the
Suitcase nukes and bin Laden
By late 1999, the concern had expanded from nuclear armed Chechen rebels to include concerns about Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network. Although unsubstantiated, some reports suggested that bin Laden had already managed to acquire weapons from the Russian nuclear arsenal. In August 1999, Voice of America broadcast a story about the threat posed by bin Laden. In it, Yossef Bodansky, an American terrorism analyst, author, and head of the Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Non-Conventional Warfare claimed that he had learned, through sources in Russia and the Middle East, that bin Laden had "a few of the ex-Soviet 'suitcase' bombs acquired through the Chechens.″[25] Two months later, on 5 October, the Moscow daily Komsomolskaya Pravda published an interview in which Bodansky, citing "various intelligence sources," claimed that bin Laden had acquired, through Kazakhstan, "from several to twenty tactical nuclear warheads." Bodansky also claimed that bin Laden had attempted to buy "nuclear suitcases" in Kazakhstan. In the same article, the director of the Atomic Energy Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan declared that all nuclear weapons had been removed "long ago" from Kazakhstan and that suitcase nuclear devices were never built in Kazakh territory. The head of counterintelligence for the Kazakhstani Committee on National Security told Komsomolskaya Pravda that all nuclear weapons were removed from Kazakhstan in 1995 in accordance with the START I treaty and denied reports that bin Laden had attempted to purchase nuclear weapons there.[26] Bodansky's claims surfaced again on 25 October 1999 when The Jerusalem Report published an article on bin Laden and suitcase nuclear devices. In this report, Bodansky's claim of "a few to twenty" weapons was repeated. In addition, Bodansky claimed that bin Laden had purchased the weapons using "$30 million in cash and two tons of Afghan heroin."[27] Very little information is available to back Bodansky's claims, however, and they remain in doubt.
Suitcase nukes concerns post-9/11
Following the 11 September terrorist attacks on the United States, fresh attention was focused on al-Qaeda's desire for weapons of mass destruction but with more urgency than in the past. A serious concern was that al-Qaeda terrorists might attempt to obtain Russian warheads or weapon-usable nuclear materials. Former GRU Colonel Stanislav Lunev's 1998 statements were resurrected following the attacks. During an appearance on CBS, Lunev reasserted his claim that suitcase bombs existed, even going so far as to claim that bin Laden had obtained several of the devices from the former Soviet Union. In the same segment, Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution discounted Lunev's claims: "Our view is that this is not a major worry. If those devices ever existed, they were under the control of the Soviet state, and not available to terrorists."[28] On 20 December 2001 UPI reported that the FBI had stepped up its investigation into terrorist access to Russian nuclear stockpiles. Representative Weldon, once again at the forefront of the debate, stated "Do I think he [bin Laden] has a [sic] small atomic demolition munitions, which were built by the Soviets in the Cold War? Probably doubtful."[29]
On 17 January 2002, Russia's Atomic Energy Minister, Aleksandr Rumyantsev, told Interfax it would be impossible for terrorists to construct a portable nuclear weapon, citing a lack of "necessary potential and materials." The Interfax report went on to state "major nuclear powers have an effective system of control over miniature nuclear charges, which weigh a total of several dozen kilograms." According to Rumyantsev "all of these [miniature nuclear devices] are registered ... it is technically impossible for such charges to find their way into the hands of terrorists."[30]
See also
- Tactical nuclear weapons
- Suitcase nuke
- List of nuclear weapons
References
- ^ Some sources refer to the test as Jangle Uncle (e.g., Adushkin, 2001) or Project Windstorm (e.g., DOE/NV-526, 1998). Operation Buster and Operation Jangle were initially conceived as separate operations, and Jangle was at first known as Windstorm, but the AEC merged the plans into a single operation on 19 June 1951. See Gladeck, 1986.
- ^ Adushkin, Vitaly V.; Leith, William (September 2001), USGS Open File Report 01-312: Containment of Soviet underground nuclear explosions (PDF), US Department of the Interior Geological Survey, archived from the original (PDF) on 9 May 2013
- ^ Ponton, Jean; et al. (June 1982), Shots Sugar and Uncle: The final tests of the Buster-Jangle series (DNA 6025F) (PDF), Defense Nuclear Agency, archived from the original (PDF) on 10 July 2007
- ^ Operation Buster-Jangle, The Nuclear Weapons Archive
- Washington, DC, United States: Department of the Army, July 1984, 5-106 (unclassified).
- ^ The Nuclear Matters Handbook, archived from the original on 2 March 2013,
At the height of the Cold War, however, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces had contingency plans to use craters from nuclear detonations to channel, contain, or block enemy ground forces. The size of the crater and its radioactivity for the first several days would produce an obstacle that would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for a military unit to cross.
- ^ Condit, Kenneth W (1992), The History of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—The Joint Chiefs of Staff and National Policy, vol. VI, 1955–56, Washington, DC, US: GPO, p. 146.
- ^ US Security Issues in Europe, 93rd Congress, 2 December 1973, p. 15.
- ISSN 0362-4331, retrieved 22 September 2017
- ^ Hayes, Peter (1991), Pacific Powderkeg: American Nuclear Dilemmas in Korea (PDF), Lexington, Massachusetts, US: DC Heath and Co, p. 48, archived from the original (PDF) on 1 December 2008.
- ^ Gervasi, Thomas ‘Tom’ (1986), The Myth of Soviet Nuclear Supremacy, New York City, US: Harper & Row, pp. 416–7.
- ^ Arkin, William M; Fieldhouse, Richard W (1985), Nuclear Battlefields: Global Links in the Arms Race, Cambridge: Ballinger, p. 61.
- ^ Hersh, Seymour (1991), The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy, New York City: Random House, p. 170.
- ^ Isotope recovery; neutron physics experiment; examination of heat recovery; seismic measurements; and explosive development. (PDF)
- ^ "Index of /series/symposium4/ms in file becker.ps.gz", symposia.obs.carnegiescience.edu, retrieved 17 November 2022
- ^ McWilliam, A.; Rauch, M., eds. (2004), Origin and Evolution of the Elements, Carnegie Observatories Astrophysics Series, archived from the original on 10 February 2006, retrieved 7 December 2013
- U.S. Department of Energy, Nevada Operations Office, December 2000, archived from the original(PDF) on 15 June 2010, retrieved 10 June 2010
- OCLC 231585284[page needed]
- ^ "Operation Nougat", nuclearweaponarchive.org
- ^ Combating WMD Journal (PDF), p. 47, archived from the original on 9 April 2013, retrieved 1 July 2013
- ^ "Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives concerning the location and removal of weapons caches placed in the United States by the Russian or Soviet Government, H. RES. 380, 106th Congress", www.govinfo.gov, 1999, retrieved 17 November 2022
- ^ Reeves, Phil (5 September 1997), "Some of our nuclear bombs are missing, Lebed tells the West Reality", The Independent, retrieved 14 March 2022
- ^ Paddock, Richard C. (9 September 1997), "Lebed Says Russia Has Lost Track of 100 Nuclear Bombs", Los Angeles Times, retrieved 14 March 2022
- ^ "Russian Roulette", PBS, Frontline, 23 February 1999
- ^ Simeone, Nick (6 August 1999), "Bin Laden Bombing Anniversary", Voice of America
- ^ "Youssef Bodansky: Terrorist No. 1 Has an Atomic Bomb", Komsomolskaya Pravda, 5 October 1999
- ^ Bin Laden Has Several Nuclear Suitcasework=The Jerusalem Report, 25 October 1999
- ^ "Nuclear Terror?", CBSNews.com, 5 November 2001
- ^ Nicholas Horrock (21 December 2001), FBI Focusing On Portable Nuke Threat, UPI, archived from the original on 28 April 2017, retrieved 28 April 2017
- ^ "Russian Minister Says Miniature Nuclear Charges Out Of Reach Of Terrorists", Agentstvo Voyennykh Novostey, 17 January 2002
External links
- SADM Delivery by Parachutist/Swimmer (Special Atomic Demolition Munition) (Film Clip), United States: DoE, archived from the original (MPEG) on 4 February 2012, retrieved 14 May 2012
- Declassified U.S. Nuclear Test Film #31, YouTube
- "SADM", Cold war nuclear weapons (image), 3AD, archived from the original on 5 December 2012, retrieved 14 May 2012.
- 567th ADM.
- Atomic Demolition Munitions, Brook, archived from the original on 18 March 2006.