No kidding, and far before that point we will be having to build giant radiators to expel excess thermal energy or risk cooking our planet. The future is going to be absolutely nuts if we don't end up killing everyone.
Sure, the terrorists will dive right down the mile deep shaft to get non-weapons-grade material. /s
Nation-states don’t have any problem getting uranium…and weapons proliferation isn’t a concern with any nuclear power. In other words, these could be installed widely in suitable US, British, French, Israeli, Russian and Chinese locations with no concern at all.
I’d like to see a map showing US cell coverage that offers minimum 20 mbps rates (current bar for ‘high speed’ internet). I expect the vast majority of rural locations aren’t covered. Other countries will be far worse on average.
Cell internet is also quite expensive.
Starlink offers 10x the minimum bandwidth.
Running fiber everywhere it needs to go for backhaul would be fabulously expensive, and involve major environmental impacts.
Sure, some cell networks suck. That's not an immutable law of nature though. There is plenty of bandwidth available for terrestrial cellular networks. And backhauls can be point to point microwave rather than fiber.
The pit (primary) is a hollow shape that gets crushed, producing a fission explosion. The X-rays released by that are absorbed by a (highly classified) foam encasing the secondary, which vaporizes (explodes), compressing the secondary causing fusion. The foam, and the secondary, are encased in a substantial tamper made of U-238.
The tamper’s mass impedes the expansion of the secondary, making it more efficient. The tamper is also largely converted to Pu-239 by the neutron flux from the secondary, and immediately fissions releasing a whole lot more energy. This approach is used in all modern thermonuclear weapons, with the majority of the total energy coming from fission.
The ‘Tsar Bomba’ weapon, the largest ever detonated, was designed to be a 100 megaton blast, but Khrushchev was concerned about fallout. So, he directed the U-238 tamper be replaced with lead, which reduced the explosive yield to ~60 MT.
It was actually a reference to executive orders being dictatorial. Both BHO and JRB have referred to them that way when convenient, the used them liberally (sorry/not sorry) once they were able to.
Some of JRB’s first actions were executive orders that undid a lot of DJT’s border security measures, for instance.
Stealth has real benefits. Portable radars can only be so big.
There are reasons the F-35 is being bought around the world. You should also look at how the F-22 and F-35 have done at Red Flag type events, which are as close as possible to real combat.
FLIR/IRST also have a place, but have their own limitations.
I consider it to be the 21st century equivalent of the Brewster Buffalo. It will probably end up killing as many of our pilots as the Buffalo did in the 1940s.
That's the wildest hyperbole, although NK is a far cry from Russia.
One or a few ICBMs from NK would likely get shot down by BMD. I hope the US response would be measured, meaning Russia and China would be diplomatically notified before the US wipes Pyongyang and the NK military off the Earth - one hopes avoiding nuclear holocaust.
If the US/Europe and Russia/China have an exchange, it'll be horrific and utterly world-altering.
It shouldn’t matter anyways, surely fusion will be here sooner rather than later…and possibly LENR.