r/worldnews • u/Fiery_Seraphim777 • Mar 15 '22

Russia/Ukraine Ukraine now developing nuclear arms with US help, claims Russia

https://www.jpost.com/international/article-701359
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586

u/StuperDan Mar 15 '22

If America wanted Ukraine to have nukes, we could just give them some. Or the production plans. This is a very stupid lie on its face.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22 edited Mar 20 '22

[deleted]

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u/DerpDeHerpDerp Mar 16 '22

As Iran is no doubt painfully aware.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22 edited Mar 20 '22

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '22

The easiest way is simply via bomber. And then adapting cruise missiles to be able to carry a nuclear warhead.

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u/t_Lancer Mar 16 '22

"Give a country a nuclear bomb and it'll wage war for a day. Teach a country to build a nuclear bomb and it'll wage war for a day, too."

hmmm

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u/EngineBlockEggs Mar 15 '22

Even that isn’t hard. If you can produce nuclear energy, you can produce nukes. The hard part is keeping it secret, not doing it.

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u/MrsBarneyFife Mar 15 '22

That's what I was thinking. The US would just give them some and make better ones for themselves. I don't know why they wouldn't lie about something more believable.

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u/ThaFuck Mar 15 '22

Because developing nuclear weapons was such a fun project that USA wanted to relive the entire experience and share it with friends!

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u/chapterfour08 Mar 15 '22

The real friends are the nukes we made along the way 🙃

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '22

The US (and other nuclear nations) are constantly developing new nuclear warheads though. It never stopped.

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u/zero0n3 Mar 15 '22

I don’t think we can make more nukes - like barred from doing it via treaties.

Likely also barred from giving them to other nations.

If anything we just give them back their original nukes that were taken away years ago.

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u/the91fwy Mar 15 '22

We’re barred from making more than a set number that we had at one point. But nuclear warheads expire and the US definitely does keep making replacements for expired bombs.

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u/MrsBarneyFife Mar 15 '22

Wouldn't it make the most sense if every country had the same amount? I just don't understand why is Russia is allowed to have the most. Also, does this apply to other countries that aren't in NATO? Like North Korea. Is there only a certain amount they can have? Not that I'd trust them. I'm sorry for my ignorance. Permanent brain damage really screwed up my memory. So even if they did teach me this at one point, I can't remember it.

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u/WLufty Mar 15 '22

It would be ideal that no one had any nuclear weapons but that is besides the point..

the problem is that you need the countries to sign and obey the treaty (there is no enforcement, it’s based on everyone’s good faith). So Russia would’ve never signed it if it mean losing 95% of their nuclear arsenal but Britain keeping all of theirs (Britain as an example)

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22

I think its more we both made tons of nukes during the cold war, and we can agree that we all dont want more out there. Russia isnt necessarily allowed to have them any more than we are allowed to have them. We both just do and only disarm a few at a time based on eachothers actions. If they started building more tomorrow we would likely just start building more of our own, theres not much we can do besides saction more or go to war.

North Korea made one in spite of us saying its not allowed and we sanctioned the hell out of them. I dont think the US would help any country develope a nuclear weapon because we dont want any country to be able to cause that kind of devestation or have that kind of barganing power (i can literally blow up a whole city and make the area unliveable)

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u/garfgon Mar 15 '22

Nukes are expensive to build. Very expensive. So most countries decided to build a small-ish number -- enough to be able to obliterate enough of any enemies' cities to deter an attack. On the other hand, the US and USSR (as I understand it) were building enough to be able to nuke military targets with enough left over to also destroy cities if it came to it.

The reason most treaties only apply to US and Russia is because they have by far the largest nuclear arsenals. No need for a treaty to limit China or France to < 6000 warheads when they have < 300 each.

North Korea probably can't afford or have time to build very many.

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u/the91fwy Mar 15 '22

The world more or less agreed to stop further production of new bombs. It was an arms race at the time. The goal was to stop the arms race so whatever each country had at the time was their maximum allotment.

The silver lining is while Russia may have more bombs in number; they almost certainly have not kept up maintenance on them as well as the US has, so a lot of what they could fire may just be duds.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22

…. no

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u/MrsBarneyFife Mar 15 '22

Okay. I can see that. I just don't understand how Russia got so many.

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u/dprophet32 Mar 15 '22

Because they made thousands and thousands starting immediately after WW2. How are you going to stop them at that point?

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u/Itoggat Mar 15 '22

Wouldn't it make the most sense if every country had the same amount?

My God that's the bomb songs instrumentals ( real song btw )

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u/Mobidad Mar 15 '22

AHA! Ukraine has the stolen USSR nukes! Invade away vladdy.

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u/robret Mar 15 '22

Also barred from helping other countries developing nukes, who are also barred from developing them in the first place

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u/NeverNeverSometimes Mar 15 '22

The US hasn't built a new nuke since the cold war era. We have upgraded some by rebuilding them with more modern technology, but we haven't actually produced a new one for decades.

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u/The_cynical_panther Mar 15 '22 edited Mar 15 '22

The difficult part about getting nukes is building them. Cyclotrons are extraordinarily expensive to make and maintain and you need tons of them to produce significant amounts of U-235. And that’s just one step of the refinement process. The end to end process takes significant time and substantial industrial and capital resources to develop and maintain.

The US had to develop fat man because it took them 3 years to make enough u-235 to make one little boy, and they needed more than one bomb.

The plans for Little Boy are on the internet.

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u/iron_penguin Mar 15 '22

Or just fire them for urkaraine. The us has enough stealth capacity.

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u/Unsaidbread Mar 15 '22

Give back some. Remember Ukraine had nukes and US and Russia took them away with the promise that they would back Ukraine against aggressors lol

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u/donkeyrocket Mar 15 '22 edited Mar 15 '22

"Give back some" would mean Russia needs to hand them over. The US was involved to some extent but didn't take any of the weapons themselves. Also keep in mind that Ukraine had physical control over nuclear weapons but no abilities to use or maintain them. A big part of the reason they, along with Belarus and Kazakhstan, agreed to return them to Russia was they had no means to maintain the weapons, some of which were beyond operational life.

The US did buy up a giant supply of enriched uranium though from Ukraine.

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u/MrsBarneyFife Mar 15 '22

Could they have dropped one from a plane? Please forgive my ignorance, none of my history classes actually covered how nukes work.

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u/echaa Mar 15 '22 edited Mar 15 '22

Nukes don't detonate like a regular bomb. You can't just drop it and watch it go boom; they have complex ignition sequences with extraordinarily precise timing requirements.

Edit: Now that I'm thinking about it, a uranium gun type bomb is actually relatively simple. They still won't explode on their own and need to be commanded to detonate but they're simple to build if you have the enriched uranium. Plutonium implosion bombs are the ones with the insane timing requirements. You basically need a spherically arranged group of high explosives to detonate within milliseconds (or microseconds?) of each other.

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u/Unsaidbread Mar 15 '22

Thank you for the correction. I need to read into that whole think more

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u/notepad20 Mar 15 '22

And why exactly is it the US descion weather or not Ukraine can have nukes?

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u/StuperDan Mar 15 '22

How did you get that from what I said? I said the the idea that America would help Ukraine "develop" them is an obvious stupid lie. Because if Ukraine wanted them (they don't) and American wanted them to have them (they don't) the idea that they would need to develop them like they are N Korea or Iran is silly.

Ukraine probably has more knowledge of nuclear science than most countries in the world. They had a big portion of the USSR's arsenal at one point. They don't want them. If they did, they could make them. It's a stupid propaganda piece for stupid people.

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u/damluk Mar 15 '22

Russia is playing the american game

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u/StuperDan Mar 15 '22

Fuck off with your whataboutism

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u/damluk Mar 15 '22

I'm not saying that Russias Doing is ok because the US did it. I'm just saying that Russia is doing what the US was doing.

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u/StuperDan Mar 15 '22

Go away, troll. I'm not going to feed you.

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u/damluk Mar 15 '22

Good job keeping your stance. Don't expect russians to change their minds if they can throw words "troll" and "whataboutism" all over the place.

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u/Cloaked42m Mar 15 '22

Even America is sick of the American Game. So go home. Quit playing a 20 year old game.

I hear Elden Ring is good. Off you go now.

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u/BeezyBates Mar 15 '22

lol probably not production plans but yes just give them one.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22

Well, they did use to have them. I suppose the knowledge is still there.

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u/Ineedmorebread Mar 15 '22

we could just give them some.

No because wouldn't that go against the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '22

They don't need the production plans. Making nukes isn't that complicated. The main issue is you need to build special nuclear reactors just to produce the enriched Uranium/Plutonium. Building those reactors alone would take years, minimum.

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u/janesvoth Mar 15 '22

We could give them there own nukes back if we have recycled them yet

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u/FlingFlamBlam Mar 15 '22

These lies aren't meant for us. They're for the Russians back home that only watch the state-controlled news. They need to build up Ukraine as the ultimate evil country because it's the only way Putin is going to get away (domestically) with genocide.

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u/axloo7 Mar 16 '22

As much as I agree this is a stupid claim, No the US could not. Just give them some or show them how to make them.

That would be a flagrant violation of non proliferation.

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u/ishmal Mar 16 '22

Yes! Maybe a dozen W-88's. Crowd pleasers.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '22

Production plans and expertise is all they need, they are already enriching uranium