Project Sword
After World War II, nuclear power became an important bargaining chip in great power competition and geopolitical games. And in this contest of power, the hydrogen bomb is undoubtedly the most striking protagonist. Since the atomic bombs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, people have come to understand the power of nuclear weapons. Atomic bombs, which use nuclear fission reactions to release enormous amounts of energy, are usually tens of thousands of tons of TNT equivalent. However, with the development of science and technology, the nuclear ** family has ushered in a new member - the hydrogen bomb.
The hydrogen bomb, also known as the fusion bomb or thermonuclear bomb, is based on the principle of using the energy of the nuclear fission device to trigger the self-sustaining fusion reaction of light nuclei such as deuterium and tritium, and instantaneously release huge energy. Compared with the atomic bomb, the hydrogen bomb has the same lethal and destructive factors, but it is much more powerful, reaching tens of millions of tons of TNT equivalent. This makes the hydrogen bomb a veritable mass destruction**. It would not be an exaggeration to say that it destroyed a city in one piece.
During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union competed for world hegemony and competed for nuclear research and development. On November 1, 1952, the United States conducted the world's first hydrogen bomb test, codenamed "Mike". The test was carried out on the Eniwetok reef in the Pacific Ocean and reached a power of 1 million tons of TNT. Despite the enormous power of the Mike hydrogen bomb, the United States believes that its size and weight are too large to be used as a combat **. As a result, the United States began to develop a more miniaturized nuclear ** to meet the needs of actual combat.
In order to obtain more political benefits and show strong military strength, the Soviet Union developed the most powerful nuclear ** in human history - Tsar Bomba, also known as the "king of nuclear bombs". The test explosion test was carried out on October 30, 1961, and its power was equivalent to 50 million tons of TNT, in fact, at the beginning of the experiment, its equivalent was 100 million tons of TNT, and the design team was worried that its power would be too great, and the radiation impact after the nuclear explosion was huge, so in order not to cause more international trouble, the equivalent was reduced to 50 million tons. Despite this, it is still 3,333 times more powerful than the Hiroshima atomic bomb.
It is recorded that the Tsar Bomba was detonated by the Soviet Union using a modified Tu-95 bomber because of its large size. The projectile body is about 8 meters long and has a diameter of 21 meter, weighing 27 tons, an ordinary bomber can't pull at all. The experimental site is Novaya Zemlya in the Arctic Ocean, which is geographically remote and uninhabited, and is more than 1,000 kilometers away from the nearest cities, using parachute airdrops, dropped at 10,500 meters, and set to detonate at 4,000 meters.
At 11:32 a.m. on the same day, with a loud bang, a fireball with a radius of 4,600 meters was generated, accompanied by a huge mushroom cloud rising into the sky, it is not an exaggeration to say that it is 7 times higher than the world's highest peak Everest, with a cloud height of 64 kilometers and a width of 40 kilometers. And the power generated by ** is also unprecedented, first of all, all the buildings in the test explosion area, 1500 animals all turned into dust. It has been determined that the resulting impact burst reached 1,000 kilometers, and the glass of houses as far away as Finland was shattered.
In Alaska, the United States, 4,000 kilometers away from the test site, a level 5** was generated, and the local radar communication system was jammed and all paralyzed for more than 20 hours, in addition, the ** also pushed the Eurasian continent southward by 9 mm. And the hot wind generated at the time of **, even people who were 51 kilometers away were burned and blinded. In addition, the atmospheric disturbance caused by it has circled the earth more than three times. Despite the success of the Tsar Bomba's experiments, due to its enormous size and weight, as well as its uncontrollable power, the Soviet Union eventually gave up on continuing to develop a larger nuclear model.
At that time, the Soviet Union only made 2 Tsar Bomba, in addition to the test explosion, there was also a 100 million yield inherited by Russia, and its power was equivalent to 6666 "Little Boy" Hiroshima atomic bombs. For many years, the United States has also been very afraid of this hydrogen bomb.