A Cold War without Hydrogen Fusion Bombs

[Genmotty]

"A decision on the proposal that an all-out effort be undertaken for the development of the "Super" cannot in our opinion be separated from consideration of broad national policy. A weapon like the "Super" is only an advantage when its energy release is from 100-1000 times greater than that of ordinary atomic bombs. The area of destruction therefore would run from 150 to approximately 1000 square miles or more.

Necessarily such a weapon goes far beyond any military objective and enters the range of very great natural catastrophes. By its very nature it cannot be confined to a military objective but becomes a weapon which in practical effect is almost one of genocide.

We base our recommendation on our belief that the extreme dangers to mankind inherent in the proposal wholly outweigh any military advantage that could come from this development. Let it be clearly realised that this is a super weapon; it is in a totally different category from an atomic bomb. The reason for developing such super bombs would be to have the capacity to devastate a vast area with a single bomb. Its use would involve a decision to slaughter a vast number of civilians. We are alarmed as to the possible global effects of the radioactivity generated by the explosion of a few super bombs of conceivable magnitude. If super bombs will work at all, there is no inherent limit in the destructive power that may be attained with them. Therefore, a super bomb might become a weapon of genocide.

We believe a super bomb should never be produced. Mankind would be far better off not to have a demonstration of the feasibility of such a weapon, until the present climate of world opinion changes.

To the argument that the Russians may succeed in developing this weapon, we would reply that our undertaking it will not prove a deterrent to them. Should they use the weapon against us, reprisals by our large stock of atomic bombs would be comparably effective to the use of a super. In determining not to proceed to develop the super bomb, we see a unique opportunity of providing by example some limitations on the totality of war and thus of limiting the fear and arousing the hopes of mankind.”

October, 1949


Assume that in early 1950 an accord is signed between the West and the Soviets initially at the pressure of the western scientific community that also gets picked up on the Soviet side against the development of hydrogen bombs on grounds similar to the Geneva Convention against chemical and biological weapons as a weapon too cruel to be deployed, with only limited theoretical research into hydrogen bombs ever taking place, meaning that atomic arsenals are limited to fission type weapons throughout the Cold War.

How would this affect the evolution of the Cold War?

 

[asnys]

I have a really hard time believing that either the Western or Soviet leadership would ever go for this. It's essentially impossible to detect cheating on this, for one thing, at least once they start doing underground testing.

If they somehow did, the first thing that comes to mind is that ICBMs will be delayed significantly, and counterforce becomes a much harder proposition. Early ICBMs were so inaccurate that they needed twenty-megaton city-smashers to be sure that their target was in the zone of destruction. Even later on, once the missile accuracies get better, you're still going to have a hard time doing counterforce, because the yield/weight ratio of a pure fission device is going to be much worse.

 

[marathag]

And wouldn't stop the Boost provided by Tritium.
That just makes for more complete fissioning of the Pu Pit, with the result of more yield

 

[asnys]

And wouldn't stop the Boost provided by Tritium.
That just makes for more complete fissioning of the Pu Pit, with the result of more yield

I was assuming that boosting would also be disallowed. That actually raises an interesting question: how do you define a hydrogen bomb for a treaty? This is trickier than it seems, especially if you still want to allow boosting. I've seen academic papers debating whether or not research into inertial confinement fusion should be considered a violation of the comprehensive test ban treaty, since it does constitute an "explosion" deriving its energy from fusion.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

The bomb probably gets built by the mid-50's anyway. The Soviets likely would have never accepted such an accord, and any supposition of their scientists being able to politically pressure them doesn't really understand the Soviet political system, and push on ahead with their own program, spurring the US on itself once the Layer Cake bomb becomes apparent. Relevant article.