nuclear weapon
It's one thing to build a nuclear bomb. It's another thing entirely to deliver the weapon to its intended target and detonate it successfully. This was especially true of the first bombs built by scientists at the end of World War II. Writing in a 1995 issue of Scientific American, Philip Morrison, a member of the Manhattan Project, said this about the early weapons: "All three bombs of 1945 -- the [Trinity] test bomb and the two bombs dropped on Japan -- were more nearly improvised pieces of complex laboratory equipment than they were reliable weaponry."
The delivery of those bombs to their final destination was improvised almost as much as their design and construction. The USS Indianapolis transported the parts and enriched uranium fuel of the Little Boy bomb to the Pacific island of Tinian on July 28, 1945. The components of the Fat Man bomb, carried by three modified B-29s, arrived on August 2. A team of 60 scientists flew from Los Alamos, N.M., to Tinian to assist in the assembly. The Little Boy bomb -- weighing 9,700 pounds (4,400 kilograms) and measuring 10 feet (3 meters) from nose to tail -- was ready first. On August 6, a crew loaded the bomb into the Enola Gay, a B-29 piloted by Col. Paul Tibbets. The plane made the 750-mile (1,200-kilometer) trip to Japan and dropped the bomb into the air above Hiroshima, where it detonated at exactly 8:12 a.m. On August 9, the nearly 11,000-pound (5,000-kilogram) Fat Man bomb made the same journey aboard the Bockscar, a second B-29 piloted by Maj. Charles Sweeney. Its deadly payload exploded over Nagasaki just before noon.
Today, the method used in Japan -- gravity bombs carried by aircraft -- remains a viable way to deliver nuclear weapons. But over the years, as warheads have decreased in size, other options have become available. Many countries have stockpiled a number of ballistic and cruise missiles armed with nuclear devices. Most ballistic missiles are launched from land-based silos or submarines. They exit the Earth's atmosphere, travel thousands of miles to their targets and re-enter the atmosphere to deploy their weapons. Cruise missiles have shorter ranges and smaller warheads than ballistic missiles, but they are harder to detect and intercept. They can be launched from the air, from mobile launchers on the ground and from naval ships.
Tactical nuclear weapons, or TNWs, also became popular during the Cold War. Designed to target smaller areas, TNWs include short-range missiles, artillery shells, land mines and depth charges. Portable TNWs, such as the Davy Crockett rifle, make it possible for small one- or two-man teams to deliver a nuclear strike.
Modern chemical weapons tend to focus on agents with much greater killing power, meaning that it takes a lot less of the chemical to kill the same number of people. Many of them use the sorts of chemicals found in insecticides. When you spray your lawn or garden with a chemical to control aphids, you are, in essence, waging a chemical war on aphids.
Many of us tend to imagine a chemical weapon as a bomb or missile that releases highly toxic chemicals over a city. (For example, the movie "The Rock" featured a scenario in which terrorists tried to launch a missile loaded with the chemical VX, a nerve toxin.) But in 1995, the group Aum Shinrikyo released sarin gas, a nerve gas, in the Tokyo subway. Thousands were wounded and 12 people were killed. No giant bombs or missiles were involved -- the terrorists used small exploding canisters to release the gas in the subway.
Although the attack wasn't intentional, Blackwater Worldwide, contracted by the U.S. to protect officials in Iraq, accidentally dropped canisters of CS, a gas similar to tear gas, on soldiers and civilians at a checkpoint to clear the road for a convoy in 2005 [source: Risen].
A modern biological weapon would use a strain of bacteria or a virus that would kill thousands of people. Tom Clancy has explored the idea of biological terrorism in two books: "Executive Orders" and "Rainbow Six." In both books, the source of infection is the Ebola virus. In these plot lines, the infection is spread through small aerosol cans (like those used by insecticide products to create "bug bombs") released at conventions, or through misting systems used to cool sports venues.
[PDF]
Origins of chemical biodefence
[PDF]
Biological warfare, bioterrorism, biodefence and the biological and ...
The delivery of those bombs to their final destination was improvised almost as much as their design and construction. The USS Indianapolis transported the parts and enriched uranium fuel of the Little Boy bomb to the Pacific island of Tinian on July 28, 1945. The components of the Fat Man bomb, carried by three modified B-29s, arrived on August 2. A team of 60 scientists flew from Los Alamos, N.M., to Tinian to assist in the assembly. The Little Boy bomb -- weighing 9,700 pounds (4,400 kilograms) and measuring 10 feet (3 meters) from nose to tail -- was ready first. On August 6, a crew loaded the bomb into the Enola Gay, a B-29 piloted by Col. Paul Tibbets. The plane made the 750-mile (1,200-kilometer) trip to Japan and dropped the bomb into the air above Hiroshima, where it detonated at exactly 8:12 a.m. On August 9, the nearly 11,000-pound (5,000-kilogram) Fat Man bomb made the same journey aboard the Bockscar, a second B-29 piloted by Maj. Charles Sweeney. Its deadly payload exploded over Nagasaki just before noon.
Today, the method used in Japan -- gravity bombs carried by aircraft -- remains a viable way to deliver nuclear weapons. But over the years, as warheads have decreased in size, other options have become available. Many countries have stockpiled a number of ballistic and cruise missiles armed with nuclear devices. Most ballistic missiles are launched from land-based silos or submarines. They exit the Earth's atmosphere, travel thousands of miles to their targets and re-enter the atmosphere to deploy their weapons. Cruise missiles have shorter ranges and smaller warheads than ballistic missiles, but they are harder to detect and intercept. They can be launched from the air, from mobile launchers on the ground and from naval ships.
Tactical nuclear weapons, or TNWs, also became popular during the Cold War. Designed to target smaller areas, TNWs include short-range missiles, artillery shells, land mines and depth charges. Portable TNWs, such as the Davy Crockett rifle, make it possible for small one- or two-man teams to deliver a nuclear strike.
Chemical Weapons
A chemical weapon is any weapon that uses a manufactured chemical to kill people. The first chemical weapon used effectively in battle was chlorine gas, which burns and destroys lung tissue. Chlorine is not an exotic chemical. Most municipal water systems use it today to kill bacteria. It is easy to manufacture from common table salt. In World War I, the German army released tons of the gas to create a cloud that the wind carried toward the enemy.Buried, but Not Gone Until a treaty banned it in 1972, it was legal to dump chemical weapons into the ocean. The United States, the former Soviet Union, Germany and other nations have sunk hundreds of thousands of tons of weapons. The weapons are still killing: Fishermen have died off the coast of Italy, and as recently as 2005, fish there had hazardous levels of arsenic. You can now surf a Google Earth map of the dumping sites |
Many of us tend to imagine a chemical weapon as a bomb or missile that releases highly toxic chemicals over a city. (For example, the movie "The Rock" featured a scenario in which terrorists tried to launch a missile loaded with the chemical VX, a nerve toxin.) But in 1995, the group Aum Shinrikyo released sarin gas, a nerve gas, in the Tokyo subway. Thousands were wounded and 12 people were killed. No giant bombs or missiles were involved -- the terrorists used small exploding canisters to release the gas in the subway.
Although the attack wasn't intentional, Blackwater Worldwide, contracted by the U.S. to protect officials in Iraq, accidentally dropped canisters of CS, a gas similar to tear gas, on soldiers and civilians at a checkpoint to clear the road for a convoy in 2005 [source: Risen].
Biological Weapons
A biological weapon uses a bacteria or virus, or in some cases toxins that come directly from bacteria, to kill people. If you were to dump a load of manure or human waste into a town's well, that would be a simple form of biological warfare -- human and animal manure contain bacteria that are deadly in a variety of ways. In the 19th century, American Indians were infected with smallpox through donated blankets.A modern biological weapon would use a strain of bacteria or a virus that would kill thousands of people. Tom Clancy has explored the idea of biological terrorism in two books: "Executive Orders" and "Rainbow Six." In both books, the source of infection is the Ebola virus. In these plot lines, the infection is spread through small aerosol cans (like those used by insecticide products to create "bug bombs") released at conventions, or through misting systems used to cool sports venues.
[PDF]
Origins of chemical biodefence
[PDF]
Biological warfare, bioterrorism, biodefence and the biological and ...