Originally Posted by
rickair7777
You don't even need an exquisitely timed implosion device... gun type works just fine, if you want an easy, reliable bang and don't care too much about weight or efficiency (ala Little Boy @ Hiroshima).
Not great for ICBM use, but if they just wanted to a demo to prove their point, or the shipping container thing...
True, but the point is that this is 80 year old technology. With 3D printing, CNC machining, and modern electronics (and the foreknowledge that it actually WILL work) the terminal stages of making a workable device are a lot easier and quicker to do than they were back in the 40s. And even back then, we went from the first primitive pile in a racquetball court under Stagg field in Dec 1942 for a proof of very concept of self sustained induced fission (how primitive? The emergency method to scram the reactor in case of runaway was for someone to use an axe to cut a rope to gravity drop a control rod into the pile. For those unfamiliar with Stagg Field, it was on the University of Chicago campus
https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhatt...1_critical.htm) to an actual proof of concept weapon test at Trinity Site in July of 1945 in 18 months.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=18ZFUCOT8Xc
And Hiroshima was hit all of three weeks later. And that was with 1940s technology and logistics. If the Iranians had anywhere near the amount of 60% enriched Uranium they claimed they had they were indeed only weeks short of having a nuke.