2. The Cold War Intensifies 7.3

5. Nuclear Weapons
When we learn that the Soviets have the atomic bomb, Truman authorizes research on a thermonuclear bomb, which is many times more powerful than an atomic bomb.

7. Nuclear Bomb Yields Kiloton = 1000 tons of TNT
Megaton = 100,000,000 tons of TNT
Little Boy (Hirosima) = 13 Kilotons (390,000,000lbs!)

8. “Davy Crockett” - .01 to 1 Kiloton
Since this was the Cold War, American war planners thought nothing of arming troops with a W54 nuclear warhead. The resulting weapons system was known as the "Davy Crockett," and it's range was just 1 to 1.5 miles. Which meant that depending on the range it was fired at, plus other factors like the direction the wind was blowing in, it might've been a suicide weapon for its 3-man team under the right conditions.

9. Castle Bravo – 15 Megatons(3,000,000,000,000lbs)
1,200 times more powerful than the atomic bombs which were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII

10. The race heats up… 1953 – We test our first thermonuclear bomb
1954 – Soviets test their first thermonuclear bomb
1954 – We test 19 thermonuclear bombs

11. TSAR bomb 50 megatons (10,000,000,000,000 lbs)

12. Mushroom cloud was 64 miles high
Blast was felt in Finland
Broke glass windows 1000 miles away
Shockwave traveled the Earth 3 times

14. The US government believes in a policy of deterrence
The US government believes in a policy of deterrence. We will become so strong, no one will attack us
Brinksmanship – the ability to go the very edge of open war to achieve political goals
ICBM’s – since we had much better planes to deliver our bombs, the Soviets began to develop missiles
ICBM=intercontinental ballistic missile

30. The Cold War “Race for Space”

33. A time-lapse map of EVERY nuclear detonation from 1945-2008
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