What Ever Happened To...?
The Neutron Bomb
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Originally appeared in IEEE Spectrum Magazine
January, 1991
This, in effect, is what the neutron bomb is... a bomb by means of which it would be possible to kill people but to preserve all riches - here it is, the bestial ethics of the most aggressive representatives of imperialism.
-Nikita Khrushchev, in a speech to the Rumanian Party Congress, 1961
At the height of the Cold War in the late 1950s, a tremendous amount of research was under way to enhance and modernize the U.S. nuclear arsenal. The growing perception of Soviet superiority in conventional arms placed a high priority on the development of new nuclear weapons. The most likely scenario was a nuclear conflict starting in densely populated Europe, devastating most of it in the process.
Yet when the neutron bomb, a nuclear weapon that maximizes damage to people but minimizes damage to buildings and equipment, was nearing deployment in the 1970s, the ethical and political repercussions ignited a firestorm of debate the engulfed most of the Free World. In the end, however, this ultimate weapon has become a forgotten pawn in a game of global politics.
Since the early 1950s, there have been two main weapons in the U.S. nuclear arsenal: atomic and hydrogen bombs. The atomic bomb, of the type dropped on Nagasaki in 1945, uses a chemical explosion to compress a core of purified plutonium, resulting in an uncontrolled fission that releases tremendous heat and energy. The fission products and by-products formed by the radiation produce the lethal and long-lived fallout associated with nuclear weapons.
A hydrogen bomb, on the other hand, produces most of its energy by the fusion of heavy isotopes of hydrogen, such as deuterium and tritium. The energy needed to start the fusion reaction is obtained when chemical explosives implode a small core of fissionable material at the center. The energy released is used to compress a surrounding layer of hydrogen fuel, causing the atoms to fuse together to produce helium, energy, and a hail of high-speed neutrons. In a typical hydrogen bomb, these neutrons are absorbed by a uranium casing of fissionable material surrounding the device. This causes the casing to fission, resulting in an even bigger explosion, releasing even more heat and radiation and still more fallout.
In the summer of 1958, Sam Cohen, a strategic nuclear weapons analyst at Rand Corp., a military think tank in Santa Monica, California, began investigating the military possibilities of large thermonuclear warheads. During his research into the possible effects on high-flying bomber crews, he became impressed by the high neutron release accompanying the fusion reaction.
He reasoned that if the outer uranium casing of a hydrogen bomb were removed, the neutrons released would travel great distances. Such neutrons would be capable of penetrating relatively well-shielded structures with lethal doses and incapacitating the people inside. Since fallout is due primarily to products of the fission reactions, removing the outer casing would leave only the initial small fission reaction, releasing only one hundredth the radiation of a comparable fission weapon. Even so, the weapon would emit a large percentage of neutrons, making it considerably more deadly than a standard atomic or hydrogen bomb. Thus the enhanced radiation weapon (ERW) or neutron bomb was born.
The concept of a weapon that could kill people but leave most structures intact had great appeal for some in the armed forces and government. When the idea was first proposed during the 1960s, the Kennedy administration decided against building neutron weapons because it might jeopardize the nuclear test moratorium that the United States and Soviet Union were currently observing. But when the Soviet Union broke the moratorium in 1961, this barrier was removed and by 1962 the first neutron device had been successfully tested. ERWs became an on-again, off-again item until the mid-1970s, when the Carter administration proposed modernizing the U.S. nuclear arsenal by installing neutron warheads on the Lance missile and artillery shells planned for deployment in Europe.
There were many who felt that the weapon, because of its relatively small blast and fallout, was ideal for use in densely populated Europe against a Soviet tank attack. Such a weapon could penetrate the armor of attacking tanks and hardened structures, killing the people inside while limiting other damage. Others contended that deployment of the neutron warhead should be kept as a bargaining chip against the new Soviet SS-20 missile, seen as a threat to NATO forces in Europe.
Others felt that the neutron bomb would make the unthinkable thinkable. The complete destruction that nuclear weapons would bring was the primary deterrent to their use. The neutron bomb, however, could conceivably make nuclear war more possible by allowing the use of nuclear weapons without inviting wholesale devastation of the target, it was argued. Military planners might not be as hesitant to use neutron weapons as they might a standard fission warhead.
The ensuing political turmoil shook NATO to its core. The debate over the deployment and use of ERWs was as heated in Europe as it was in the United States. In 1977, West Germans, realizing their country was the most likely battleground for such weapons, began hotly debating whether or not to allow such weapons on their soil. Similar political battles raged in other NATO countries. President Carter, bowing to domestic and international pressure, decided in 1978 to defer deployment of the weapon, conditional on Soviet restraint in military production and force deployments.
In August 1981, President Reagan fueled the political debate again by re-authorizing the production of neutron warheads for the Lance missile and an 8-inch artillery shell. Because of strong opposition from Western Europe, Reagan ordered all neutron weapons to be stored in the United States, with the option to deploy overseas in case of war. The USSR publicly announced that while it, too, had tested neutron weapons, it had no plans to deploy them.
In the meantime, the deployment of neutron weapons in Europe had become more complex as other players joined the game. In 1980, France announced that it had tested a neutron device, and in late 1982, it was believed to have begun production. But in 1986, France announced that it was abandoning the production of neutron weapons because of internal and external political pressure.
The current status of neutron weapons is something of a mystery, though. The U.S. nuclear arsenal is still believed [as of 1991] to contain some 350 neutron warheads for the Lance missile and a similar number of 8-inch artillery shells. As the thawing of the Cold War makes their primary function - defense of Europe against a mechanized attack - even less likely, the possibility of their use becomes even more remote. The current antinuclear climate gives little hope that NATO allies would ever consent to their use in Europe.
In addition, the United States confronts a two-year-old interruption of tritium production at the Savannah River Plant in Aiken, S.C., the United States' sole source of tritium production. So the fuel used for these warheads will most likely be withdrawn and used elsewhere.
NOTE: This material is presented as a rudimentary introduction to the subject. Please remember that this article was published in 1991, and source material used for this article is at least ten years old. The author is not an expert in this field, and has no additional information or pictures on this subject. Please do not contact me regarding this topic. |
