
A 1950s proposal to nuke Alaska (2015) - yoloswagins
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/actual-1950s-proposal-nuke-alaska
======
mathattack
“A-blasts will mine ore now inaccessible, and recover oil locked in shale.
Subterranean atomic bombs will drive electric power plants. Underground
reservoirs dug with nuclear bombs will make deserts bloom. And the atom’s
might power will make child’s play of colossal earth-moving feats, to dig
harbors, dredge channels, and build great canals.”

This reminds me of the AI/ML hype.

~~~
acidburnNSA
Seems like a misinterpretation on the electric power part. Very few power
plant designs use atomic power resources explosively to make electricity. They
probably just meant undergrounded regular old fission nuclear power plants,
which Teller also liked.

But maybe not; that's a pretty direct statement. Certainly there were ideas to
blow weapons up and then recover energy from the heated walls (often some kind
of high heat capacity liquid).

~~~
chriswarbo
You're right that fission power plants don't rely on explosions. However,
using hydrogen bombs as a heat source is currently the only method we have for
a (man-made) fusion power plant. The economics have never made it worthwhile
to attempt (H-bombs are expensive!), but from an engineering perspective it
would mostly be a construction project.

Hopefully that will change soon, if/when tokamaks, inertial confinement, or
some similar technique are able to produce a net gain in power; yet that would
require a bunch of basic science problems to be resolved in plasma physics,
materials science, etc.

~~~
dboreham
Most of the energy released by the thermonuclear devices we know how to make
is from fission.

~~~
xoa
This is not correct and I'm curious what you're basing it on. The most
powerful bomb we ever detonated (Tsar Bomba at 50 Mt) got something on the
order of 96-97% of its energy from fusion with its 2-stage test design (tamper
replaced with lead). It's true the full power 100 Mt 3-stage with a U-238
tamper would have gotten vastly more from fission (at the cost of terrifying
levels of fallout), but it didn't need it. Castle Bravo, the biggest US bomb
ever tested, was also heavily fusion (and big thanks to the unexpected lithium
7 tritium bonus), though I think you're right that a lot of ultimate yield was
from fission of the natural uranium tamper. It did directly lead to the Mk-21
though, tested in Redwing Navajo at 4.5 Mt and 95% fusion I think?

It's true that placing a fusion bomb in a uranium case can massively boost the
yield of any single explosive, and in a full fission-fusion-fission design a
good half the energy can come from fission. It's not required to work though,
a transparent casing can be chosen too, that's the whole concept behind
neutron bombs and "low-yield" weapons after all. I'm no expert for sure, this
is just my understanding from reading some of the archives and such, so I'd be
curious to read any other sources you have.

~~~
danielrpa
I'm very interested in nuclear energy/bombs but don't know where to start. I
don't want to get _too_ deep on the physics of it (a bit deep/technical is OK)
- you seem to know a lot about the topic, do you know where I could learn more
without becoming a Nuclear engineer? I'm especially interested in the history
of bombs going beyond info on Wikipedia, basically the stuff you are talking
about.

Thank you in advance!

~~~
acidburnNSA
Richard Rhodes books.

------
howlin
The 1950's were an interesting time for grand "mad science" engineering
projects. Anyone in the Bay area should make an effort to see the Bay Model
museum in Sausalito. It contains a huge model of the SF Bay and the local
watershed. While this is interesting, it is more interesting to hear the story
of why it was made. It was intended to vet a plan to dam the bay to turn it
from salt water to a huge freshwater lake. Fortunately they decided it wasn't
feasible.

~~~
Gibbon1
Army Core of Engineers had a grand plan to fill most of the bay and build
housing on it. People put their foot down and it didn't happen.

~~~
mehrdadn
It wasn't just people disliking it, it was actually a terrible plan AFAIK
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i70wkxmumAw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i70wkxmumAw)

~~~
Gravityloss
Awesome that they went through the trouble of building the models and doing
the tests. Resources well spent!

------
teh_klev
In the early 50's there was a proposal to detonate a nuclear device in the
north of Scotland at Duncansby Head just a few miles from Wick and Thurso.
Despite this only being recently reported it was well known within the
Scottish Anti-nuclear movement for many years.

Fortunately a combination of technical issues and coming-to-their-senses put
paid to that idea. However we did end up having to accommodate the Dounreay
nuclear facility located about 20 or so miles west. That site has had a well
documented chequered history including the wholesale ruining of local beaches
due to radioactive particle contamination.

[https://www.sundaypost.com/news/experts-nearly-dropped-
atomi...](https://www.sundaypost.com/news/experts-nearly-dropped-atomic-bomb-
scottish-landmark-1950s/)

~~~
chris1993
They elected to bomb bits of Australia instead because nobody of any
importance lived there.

~~~
lostlogin
And various pacific islands - locals and relative locals complaining led to
the infamous bombing The Rainbow Warrior by the French when it was docked in
Auckland, New Zealand in 1985. With allies like that, who needs enemies?
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_Rainbow_Warri...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_Rainbow_Warrior)

------
marcinzm
I wonder what modern day ideas are considered utter insanity in 70 years.

~~~
Kednicma
Probably at least one part of our current electrochemical model will be
considered hilariously wrong, on the same level of wrongness as the planetary
model of the atom is considered today. Perhaps our hopes of the island of
stability [0] will be dashed.

Economists and mathematicians will eventually have a conversation which upends
all known slogans of economics, forming a new school. It happens every few
decades.

The era of antibiotics is drawing to a close, as antibiotic resistance
continues to grow. Meanwhile, phage therapy [1] is still being discovered but
likely will give us a route to a kind of antibacterial and antibiotic therapy
which is not as broad-spectrum as our existing drugs. Similarly, chemotherapy
may give way to more targeted ways to deal with cancers, and eventually we
might see some of these harsher treatments as akin to the overuse of
radiotherapy during the era of radioactive quackery [2].

High fructose corn syrup may yet have its reckoning. Strangely, before 2020,
this wouldn't have been thinkable, but we know from history that the Great
Depression and World Wars changed the composition of dishes all around the
world and even in industrialized recipes. The pandemic may yet change peoples'
diets in ways which we won't understand for a decade or two, and the proper
nutritional correction may take another few decades after that.

Our children may be sincere about dealing with climate change. If so, then
they may fly less, shrink standing armies, forbid the import/export of oil,
drive less, set the thermostat a couple degrees hotter, or take many other
relatively minor changes to parts of society which we usually imagine not
changing at all.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_of_stability](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_of_stability)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_therapy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_therapy)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_quackery](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_quackery)

~~~
xkcd-sucks
Chemistry is all about good-enough approximations, of which the planetary
model is one, for simple organic reactions at least. Doubt it's going away

~~~
Kednicma
For simple organic reactions, the shape of benzene [0] matters. Benzene has
its quirky ring shape thanks to pi bonds [1], which only make sense in a 3D
orbital model. The planetary model already has trouble with benzene formation
and reactions. Another good example is water, whose hydrogen atoms are
physically positioned almost entirely within the oxygen atom, according to the
planetary model. Water's actual orbitals [2] have massive "echo" interactions
on the hydrogen sides, which "push" the electrons onto one side of the
molecule. Doing this with orbital mechanics alone would be, at a minimum, a
headache.

The essential main problem with the planetary model is in the word "planetes"
or "wanderer"; electrons are not exactly point charges whizzing about the
nucleus at high speed (although they kind of are, because of gold's color and
other properties) but more like smeared-out across an orbital. Think of soft
electron-butter being spread by a galactic butter knife.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benzene](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benzene)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi_bond](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi_bond)

[2]
[http://www1.lsbu.ac.uk/water/h2o_orbitals.html](http://www1.lsbu.ac.uk/water/h2o_orbitals.html)

------
catalogia
Alaska was in fact nuked three times; from 1965 to 1971 three underground
tests were conducted on Amchitka in the Aleutian Islands, including the
largest underground detonation ever conducted by the US.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amchitka#Nuclear_testing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amchitka#Nuclear_testing)

------
cycomanic
Edward Teller is an interesting person to read up on. I'm not surprised he was
leading this. He seemed to have been extremely unscrupulous and obsessed with
everything nuclear. Dr strangelove was loosely based on him. The way he
treated Oppenheimer and some others is quite telling.

~~~
habosa
My wife’s grandmother worked for him for a long time and wrote his memoirs if
anyone wants to read about him:
[https://g.co/kgs/KpuXzs](https://g.co/kgs/KpuXzs)

------
rmason
As I have detailed here before as a schoolchild in Detroit our class visited
the Enrico Fermi nuclear power plant. In a movie that we saw at the plant in
the early sixties they envisioned nuclear powered automobiles.

Ford even created a concept car called the Nucleon as a demonstration of what
a nuclear powered car would look like.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Nucleon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Nucleon)

~~~
acidburnNSA
The Nucleon was a gag. Nobody serious thought there would be nuclear-powered
cars even in the 1950s. There are even intros to textbooks that dismiss the
idea as "not within the bounds of reality", as Glasstone did in 1956 [1]

[1]
[https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015003994194&vi...](https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015003994194&view=1up&seq=19)

Of course today there are literal nuclear-powered cars all over the place.
They're electric cars charged by nearby nuclear power stations. But I guess
that's semantics.

~~~
catalogia
Nuclear reactors _almost_ small enough to make it feasible (but not a good
idea) have been created before. TOPAZ and SNAP-10A from the 60s and 70s come
to mind. A TOPAZ-I reactor weighing 320kg and could produce 5kW for 3-5 years.
That's not good enough for a car, but I think it's impressive nevertheless.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNAP-10A#/media/File:SNAP_10A_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNAP-10A#/media/File:SNAP_10A_Space_Nuclear_Power_Plant.jpg)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TOPAZ_nuclear_reactor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TOPAZ_nuclear_reactor)

~~~
acidburnNSA
Things are either forbidden by the laws of physics or possible, so yeah it is
physically feasible. But it is not within the bounds of reality because the
cores for those two reactors are millions of dollars and the weights don't
include the shielding necessary to operate without dying.

Those space reactors are indeed awesome. Nuclear has a rich future in space in
almost all possible scenarios where humans continue to exist.

------
userbinator
They also had plans to nuke _the moon_ :
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A119](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A119)

~~~
HenryKissinger
When I was in high school, I had to read a novel called "The Ice People". In
it, the Moon's current appearance was explained as the result of an old
nuclear war between two human factions on the satellite body.

~~~
TedDoesntTalk
This?
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ice_People_(Barjavel_nov...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ice_People_\(Barjavel_novel\))

~~~
HenryKissinger
Yep!

------
grecy
The Russians were keen to use Nukes for "construction" too, and actually went
ahead with "building" a lake [1]

This [2] Document goes into all the details of what else they wanted to do.

I think it would be a great idea to use nukes for construction, if only it
wasn't for all that pesky radiation. I can only imagine how often we'd be
using them for mining and what-not.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Chagan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Chagan)

[2]
[https://web.archive.org/web/20161223024850/http://e-reports-...](https://web.archive.org/web/20161223024850/http://e-reports-
ext.llnl.gov/pdf/238468.pdf)

~~~
krasin
Thank you for giving the link. Never knew about Lake Chagan, and it was very
interesting to dive into stories about it.

Apparently, they intended to use such nuclear explosions across the whole
country, but they learned quickly. What's even more interesting, they had a
bio lab that would add new aquatic species into the atomic lake (as Lake
Chagan is known to locals) and see what happens. Most of them died, some of
them had mutated across several generations, including "positive" mutations,
like increased size.

Source (in Russian):
[https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%BA...](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%BA%D1%82_%C2%AB%D0%A7%D0%B0%D0%B3%D0%B0%D0%BD%C2%BB#%D0%91%D0%B8%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%B8%D1%87%D0%B5%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B5_%D1%8D%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%BF%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BC%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%82%D1%8B)

~~~
bawolff
People did similar things with land plants
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_gardening](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_gardening)

------
sjackso
For a more in-depth look at Project Chariot and the general strangeness that
surrounded it, find yourself a copy of The Firecracker Boys:
[https://www.amazon.com/Firecracker-Boys-Dan-
ONeill/dp/046500...](https://www.amazon.com/Firecracker-Boys-Dan-
ONeill/dp/0465003486)

------
panta
That the current hedonist lifestyle based on consumerism is sustainable in the
long term.

------
aSplash0fDerp
The 1950's were beyond the Wild West for atomic research (no rules to speak
of).

While on the other side of the US at the same time, they were leaving time
capsules (which may explain global or atmospheric changes over the decades).
Its strange hearing it in their own words.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVz8iCkdsSo&t=52](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVz8iCkdsSo&t=52)

------
moneytide1
I wonder if thermonuclear would be a cheap method to break up valuable
asteroids into safer sized chunks to be routed into an orbit around Earth
where they could be further processed or even decelerated before being crashed
into remote areas where they could be conventionally mined. Dust from such an
event could be a regional issue, perhaps shallow water body landing instead?

~~~
moneytide1
Not radiated material because mostly fusion explosion with a small fission
spark so if you really wanted a clean "catch" you would just leave out the
area where the charge was placed.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Not radiated material because mostly fusion explosion

Neutron flux is radiation, so things exposed to it are (ir)radiated.

It also induces radioactivity, which is probably the actual concern with
(ir)radiated material.

OTOH, the actual reaction products themselves aren't radioactive, unlike
fission reactions.

~~~
moneytide1
The surface of the chunk of rock facing such a radioactive blast could be
shaved off before it somehow has its trajectory changed towards where heavier
processing equipment is orbiting. Such a "harbor" would have to "speed up" to
match this incoming new orbital body of rock, with supply launches necessary
along this planned path (pre fired before new heavy tonnage arrives). Fuel
shipments necessary to slow the entire rock shipment (constant thruster firing
for days or weeks, affixed to the surface of the decontaminated asteroid
slice).

How far does radiation penetrate through rock? Some YouTube video virtually
demonstrated using regolith as automated 3D printed habitat above ground
structure protection from radiation in a place with no ionosphere.

------
chaosphere2112
My old gig was at Lawerence Livermore (home of Edward teller); there’s a photo
of the sedan test with a few lab engineers posed next to it in the building
that they interview new comp sci hires in. One of the senior engineers I was
on an interview panel with told me all about Plowshare; weird to hear it from
someone who wasn’t on the project.

------
donw
tl;dr: In the 1950s, scientists and engineers had yet to understand the long-
term effects of radiation, and looked at nuclear weapons as just super-
powerful conventional explosives.

Thus, Project Plowshare, in which we investigated using nukes to create
harbors, dig mines, etc.

Let this serve as a reminder to exercise a degree of caution with any
revolutionarily new technology, lest you look a catastrophic moron in the eyes
of history. :)

~~~
TedDoesntTalk
> In the 1950s, scientists and engineers had yet to understand the long-term
> effects of radiation

Marie Curie died in 1934. And there was that little experiment in Japan in
1945 that was 13 years old by the time this Alaska thing was being discussed

And Operation Plowshare didn’t end until the 1970s.

I think everyone knew very well about radiation risks in the 1950s.

~~~
bawolff
I think also in the modern context we overstate the danger of nuclear fallout
from nuclear bombs because we think of plant meltdowns like Chernobyl and not
actual nuclear bombs (which to be very clear, nukes are still terrifying)

~~~
DuskStar
Yeah, you actually get more fallout from an uncontained meltdown than a nuke
at ground level, by a really high margin. (Which should make sense - modern
thermonuclear warheads are in the hundreds of kilogram range _including
explosives, electronics, and casings_ while a reactor at a power plant will
generally contain a hundred tons _of uranium alone_.)

For example, you can visit the Trinity test site with no protective equipment,
and the glass the ground turned into isn't incredibly radioactive. Compare to
the area around Chernobyl's reactor #4.

~~~
anoncake
Hiroshima and Nagasaki are also very much populated today.

------
nimbius
Straight out of the fallout universe

------
paulcole
Think of all the insanely stupid decisions that were actually made in the
1950’s. Things probably wouldn’t be that much different today if they went
through with this one.

------
rurban
"While ultimately nuclear weapons were never used for construction projects"

That's arguably untrue. Nuclear bombs were secretly placed under several high
profile US skyscrapers for eventual demolition. Chicago Sears Tower, World
Trade Towers 1 + 2 and such. Times were different then.

~~~
veddox
What? Do you have any source for that?

~~~
rurban
I said secretly, so the sources are of course hidden. They will never show you
the cellar blueprints, and will never confirm why they demolished the three
WTC towers this way. But it started with Sears, and worked for WTC. Question
is if they would demand it for future such skyscrapers, as they saw the
radiation problems with the WTC. Could not touch it for 10 years. A more
conventional destruction would be better nowadays, but those were the days in
the construction business.

------
Melting_Harps
> “A-blasts will mine ore now inaccessible, and recover oil locked in shale.
> Subterranean atomic bombs will drive electric power plants. Underground
> reservoirs dug with nuclear bombs will make deserts bloom. And the atom’s
> might power will make child’s play of colossal earth-moving feats, to dig
> harbors, dredge channels, and build great canals.”

How exactly is the State not evil?

There are/were Aboriginal/Indigenous [1] people there for millennia and they
knew that, then again that didn't stop them from destroying the lives of the
People of the Marshall Islands [2], either with this headlong pursuit to use
this technology if given the chance.

1:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Natives](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Natives)

2: [https://www.latimes.com/projects/marshall-islands-nuclear-
te...](https://www.latimes.com/projects/marshall-islands-nuclear-testing-sea-
level-rise/)

~~~
Gibbon1
Well to the credit of the US and USSR they did get stopped eventually. Total
madness while it lasted though.

