Nuclear Nose Cones Mistakenly Shipped to Taiwan

Reservoir Hill writes "The Pentagon announced that the United States had mistakenly shipped to Taiwan four electrical fuses designed for use on intercontinental ballistic missiles, but has since recovered them. The mistaken shipment to Taiwan did not include nuclear materials, although the fuses are linked to the triggering mechanism in the nose cone of a Minuteman nuclear missile. Taiwanese authorities notified U.S. officials of the mistake, but it was not clear when the notification was made. An examination of the site in Taiwan where the components had been stored after delivery indicated that they had not been tampered with. The fuses had been in four shipping containers sent in March 2005 from F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyo., to a Defense Logisitics Agency warehouse at Hill Air Force Base, Utah. It was then in the logistics agency's control and was shipped to Taiwan "on or around" August 2006, according to a memo from Defense Secretary Robert Gates ordering Navy Adm. Kirkland H. Donald to investigate the incident."

Hmm...

[Corpuscavernosa]

What can Brown do for the US Government?

Re:

[Farmer Tim]

What can Brown do for the US Government?

Make them look as bad as any one else who wears it?

Re:

[contrapunctus]

Including Ubuntu?

Re:

[Farmer Tim]

It'll take more than Ubuntu to make brown look good; it barely negates the Zune's effect.

Re:

[chriseyre2000]

Probably less than Blair did.

Nosecones?

[Talking Goat]

The article references fuses designed for use in nose cones... Is this story's headline misrepresenting the true nature of the mistake?

Re:Nosecones?

[toleraen]

Welcome to Slashdot

Re:Nosecones?

[AioKits]

Agreed. Headline makes it sound like we shipped something radioactive. Reading a few lines into the article will show that nothing glowy was shipped, only the fuses. Wouldn't this be like saying "Grade schooler found with explosives equipment in backpack" when all they really had was a few fuse wicks in there? Don't get me wrong, we still screwed up, but at least be truthful of how we screwed up.

Re:Nosecones?

[jonnythan]

Not really.

The electronics and detonation systems used in nuclear bombs are very advanced, and very difficult to get right. A large portion of the time spent developing a nuclear weapon is devoted to the detonation electronics.

Mistakenly handing over a crate of said electronics would give a nation a significant shortcut toward developing their own nuclear weapons.

Re:Nosecones?

[SailorSpork]

China wants Taiwan. We like Taiwan. We could give or take China (love their cheap crap, hate their social structure that allows said cheap crap, afraid of billion-man Armageddon-sized army). How do we prop up Taiwan without pissing off China? "Accidentally" help make them a nuclear power by "oops!" letting them hold on to vital nuke bomb parts to study for a year or two!

Fiendishly clever, I say.

Real-politick and espionage

[alexhmit01]

Well, if the US notifies China (PRC) that it is giving China/Taiwan (ROC) nuclear weapons, China goes to war with US, embargoes Taiwan, etc.

If US gives ROC weapons, and nobodies knows, there is no deterrent, we violate agreements, and generally encourage proliferation.

If US just plants a news story about the parts, then PRC doesn't know, "shipping error" creates plausible deniability. PRC can't make a scene, but can wonder, does the ROC have a nuke now.

PRC doesn't care about being depopulated, but 4-10 nuclear weapons might do a number on those shiny new factories that they are building.

Re:

[darkmeridian]

Everyone knows that China has nukes that can hit Taiwan. Three nukes might hurt China, but one nuke will end Taiwan. With that kind of math, Taiwan would have to be stupid to try to play this MAD.

Re:Nosecones?

[orclevegam]

Nothing quite so fantastic as all that. First of all, China will be a self correcting problem. We outsource to them currently because they're going through a period of rapid industrialization that allows them to produce items who's quality if quickly approaching that of ours, but because of the rapid industrialization their industry controls haven't gone into place (which make for safer work environments and products, and also add a fair bit of overhead to the final cost) which allows for cheaper products. Once they achieve parity with the rest of the modern world the next step is to introduce the proper industry controls at which point costs will also achieve parity and it will no longer be economically advantageous to offshore to them.

Secondly, we knew of the mistake almost as soon as it happened. It's just that we only recently finished processing the paperwork. The next step is to file the paperwork that gets those fuses sent back over here. ETA is somewhere in 2015.

Re:

[calcapt]

I think you're talking about the PRoC instituting proper industry controls, not the ROC. The difference? The former is China proper (mainland China, communist China) and the latter is Taiwan. While it's obvious China has some issues, made evident by the diethylene glycol laden toothpaste scandal, I'm pretty sure Taiwan has had systems in place for a while now to ensure something doesn't happen to their exported products. http://taiwanreview.nat.gov.tw/site/Tr/fp.asp?xItem=311&CtNode=128 [nat.gov.tw]

The article I jus

Re:

[MrSteveSD]

It is sort of a case of accidental nuclear proliferation. Of course the Nuclear powers are obligated to disarm under the NPT but it's a topic the media refuses to touch. They would rather focus on countries that don't have nukes, like Iran.

Re:

[sm62704]

The electronics and detonation systems used in nuclear bombs are very advanced, and very difficult to get right

When they say "fuse" are they referring to a piece of solder or lead designed to melt when subjected to an overcurrent, or (as you imply) is it something more dangerous and sinister?

Re:

[confused one]

They are referring to an electronic device designed to detonate a warhead when certain criteria have been met.

Re:

[sexybomber]

Think of one of those black spherical cartoon bombs that Wile E. Coyote uses. In that case, the "fuse" is the piece of string coming out the top that Wile E. has to light to make it explode.

What we sent Taiwan were electronic strings for nuclear bombs.

Re:

[Bombula]

And if it's got electronics in it, then it's either "Made in Taiwan" or, increasingly, "Made in China." I'm guessing that outsourcing production of the components is the explanation for this gaff. Or maybe it's just coincidence that our nuke nosecone ended up in Taiwan and not, say, Portugal or the Maldives?

Re:Nosecones?

[jonnythan]

The 1960s were a full 20 years after we developed the only nuclear weapons ever to be used against a real target.

That's 20 years of development.

Why do you think we still have these nose cones, anyway? The US has not come all that far since the 60s in terms of nuclear weapon design. By the 60s we were already detonating fusion bombs, and I guarantee you that the designs and electronics used in the 60s to create hydrogen bombs will still work today.

I don't think anyone would care whether the megaton hydrogen bomb just detonated in their city was based on 1960s designs or 1980s designs :)

Re:Nosecones?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think anyone would care whether the megaton hydrogen bomb just detonated in their city was based on 1960s designs or 1980s designs :)

And I thought I had bad timing with smileys.

Re:Nosecones?

[megaditto]

Taiwan is not the same thing as China. They are at war with each-other, so it's unlikely they'd actually hand over any of this to the Chinese. Besides, they are among our strongest allies and already have a lot of the advanced missile tech just like Japan for example.

So yeah, they should have better controls over where our nuclear tech is shipped, but in this particular case there's no problem.

Re:

[Amouth]

personaly i bet they where shipped back there for RMA - and they for got to put the number on the outside of the box so it took them awhile to get around to them

Re:

[readin]

Taiwan is not the same thing as China. They are at war with each-other, so it's unlikely they'd actually hand over any of this to the Chinese.

The problem is that Chiang Kai-shek brought a couple million Chinese with him when he took over after WWII. They and their descendants have long dominated government and military affairs in Taiwan. Further, for some 40 years Chiang's party ran an authoritarian state where it was illegal to say you weren't Chinese and everyone was forced to talk about how wonderful

Re:

[gnuman99]

No, not at war. Also UN does not recognize Taiwan as a nation, but as a "Province of China". And China is too stubborn to let Taiwan go as a separate nation and *threaten* war (invasion) if they do declare independence.

And don't even start with Chinese that "Taiwan is a country" or they'll treat you as enemy of state. But then saying that Quebec is an independent nation from Canada would be similar. Though in Canada a lot of people would just ignore you ;)

Now, if you state that Tibet should be an independen

Re:

[bkr1_2k]

It's actually irrelevant what tech China uses, when the crates were shipped to Taiwan. China's tech may be just as good as our (the USA) current stuff, but it's very unlikely Taiwan's is, since there are significantly smaller than their mainland cousin and spend far less on military funding. Having a "big step up" in technology through "accidentally" released fuse designs could play a significant role in their status against China in the future.

Re:

[treeves]

Even though it was first deployed in 1970, we still maintain operational Minuteman (III) missiles - it is currently our only land-based ICBM. Your comparison is meaningless. There is no smaller "modern" ICBM.

Re:

[asuffield]

But the parts in question are from designs in the 1960s, how far behind/ahead of that mark is China with regards to being able to create a nuclear fuse of similar function?

Well, they had them in the 1970s. That's either 30 years ahead or 10 years behind, depending on how you look at it.

Also, we're talking about electrical fuses here. An electrical fuse is a bit of wire or something similar that gets hot and melts when you put too much current through it. You'll find the details in your physics textbook. The

Re:Nosecones?

[egomaniac]

Believe it or not, some words in the English language have more than one meaning. Since the "bit of wire that gets hot and melts when you put too much current through it" definition obviously doesn't apply, perhaps you should consider that it's talking about the "ignition system for an explosive device" definition.

I don't know the details of this particular weapon, but nuclear ignition fuses can be very sophisticated. In an implosion-style weapon, you've got a bunch of detonators arranged in a pattern on the outside of a sphere of high explosive. It's of utmost importance that the explosive shock wave hit the center of the sphere from all sides at pretty much exactly the same time, to maximize compression on the nuclear material. There are two things that have to happen for this to be the case:

1) Explosive lenses. As each detonator fires, it creates an expanding sphere of detonation throughout the high explosive. All of these spheres will meet in the middle as the entire explosive detonates, but it's a messy and irregular shock front. You instead want a perfectly spherical shock front to all hit the nuclear material (itself a sphere) simultaneously. The most straightforward way to do this is to have two different explosives which detonate at different velocities. Basically directly underneath each detonator (the point that the expanding spherical shock wave would naturally hit first), you've got to slow the explosion down by using a lower-velocity explosive, and in between the detonators (the point that the expanding spherical shock waves would naturally hit last), you've got to speed it up by using a higher-velocity explosive. By precisely calculating and machining the interface between the two types of explosives, you can control how long it takes the shock wave to reach the nuclear material at each point -- ideally, exactly simultaneously.

2) Precise detonation. If one of the detonators fires a couple of milliseconds late, you've got a lopsided shock wave which leads to much poorer compression of the nuclear material. Poor compression leads to low yield or even no nuclear ignition at all. But you've got perhaps dozens of detonators, and making them all go off within microseconds of each other is highly non-trivial. It takes quite a bit of sophistication to time dozens of explosions to all happen at more-or-less precisely the same time, and not only is it hard, nuclear bombs are pretty much the only case in which you ever have to time things this precisely. And that means that short of specialized research into this exact problem, you're not going to have the technology to do it.

The devices which were inappropriately shipped are a solution to problem #2. Problem #1 is actually quite a bit easier -- the underlying math and science is quite straightforward (as these things go). Solve #1 and #2, and you've got the ability to create a perfectly spherical shock wave. Put a an appropriate sphere of plutonium in the middle of a sufficiently powerful spherical shock wave, and you've got a nuclear bomb.

Re:

[mcpkaaos]

I believe the tag means a nuclear power, not nuclear energy.

Re:

[Talderas]

Far from it, nuclear weapons are a sign of power. If I have a nuke and you don't, and I told you to give me all your porn and if you didn't I would nuke you, would you comply or risk possibly being nuked?

See, I have power.

Nuclear power baby.

Re:

[darkmeridian]

The fuzes in question are sophisticated and highly-specialized devices meant to precisely trigger the implosion of the warhead. The technology involved is very complicated and top-secret. The export of these switches (fuzes) is tightly-controlled because they are basically used only for nuclear bombs.

Re:

[jandrese]

That said, these particular fuses were from the 60s and are pretty much obsolete by todays standards. Taiwan almost certainly has their own fuses that are more sophisticated already.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[Otter]

If I'm understanding TFA correctly, the "fuse" is what a layman would consider the nose cone, or at least the body of the cone. It's not like a fuse you change in your fusebox or under your dashboard.

Re:Nosecones?

[Ellis D. Tripp]

I saw the story on TV news last night, and the items they showed looked like the stereotypical "nose cone", with a big wiring harness and connectors hanging out of the open end.

What I am curious about is exactly WHAT the electronics here consisted of. Are we talking about the system that senses altitude and triggers the detonation sequence (which would be serious enough), or was this the actual "X-unit" electronics package that fires all the separate detonators on the explosive lenses to compress the plutonium pit?

If the latter is actually what they shipped out (complete with the krytron switches, high energy capacitors, etc.), then some heads REALLY need to roll over this one. The media isn't being all that specific about what is actually involved here, either because the DoD isn't telling them, or because of the usual "dumbing down" of anything that might be considered too technical for Joe Sixpack to care about.

Re:

[Lumpy]

It's dumbed down.

I had a co-worker ask... "Why dont hey use circuit breakers instead of fuses?"

He's still mad that I printed out a 11X17 page with a giant DUH printed on it and taped it to his cube.

Re:

[Deadstick]

Umm, no, a nose cone is not a fuse in any sense of the word. It's the conical housing -- IOW, the pointy thing on the front of a missile -- which contains the warhead and protects it from the heat of reentry. TFA describes the misrouted objects as being cone-shaped, and someone along the line conflated "cone" with "nose cone", which is a totally different kind of cone.

"Fuse" can mean the kind of fuse you have under your dashboard, or a detonating device that amounts to a fancy blasting cap. In the latter

Re:

[Otter]

As the article explains, and a sibling post to yours elaborates, these were the mechanisms that go inside the housing on the tip of the missile, although it's not clear exactly what was in them when they were shipped. Whether missile engineers and crews use "nose cone" to refer to the housing, the innards (as is the case here) or to the combination of the two, I have no idea.

In layman's terms, as I said, these are much closer to a "nose cone" than to what the OP probably envisioned when he read "fuse". (Ye

Re:

[Nimey]

To reduce confusion, the thing that starts a bomb exploding is called a "fuze", with a "z". Many people get it wrong, though.

Re:

[Romancer]

Completely misleading title

The editor that put this blatant sensationalism on the front page should be exposed to radioactive material to get the point across that calling something "Nuclear Nose Cones" when refering to an electric firing pin is not journalism and has a better place in checkout stand tabloids.

Re:Nosecones?

[Romancer]

And to pre-empt any of you who have not read the article and feel the need to show off your knowledge just to argue:

FTA:
"The fuses were manufactured for use on a Minuteman strategic nuclear missile and are linked to the triggering mechanism in the nose cone, but they contain no nuclear materials."
it was also in the summary if you even got that far.

Also in the same article:
"Four of the cone-shaped fuses were shipped to Taiwanese officials in fall 2006 instead of the helicopter batteries they had ordered."

These were not the "Nuclear Nose Cones" themselves but cone shaped fuses that are "linked" to the complex triggering system that makes up most of the nose cone volume. This is how CBS refers to them: "... four electrical fuses for nose cone assemblies for ICBMs" and if you take a second to look up the way these things work you will see that the majority of the system is not the fuses themselves but the triggering system.

disparity...

[m2bord]

we send them really nifty stuff like nuclear nose cones and they ship us some crappy sneakers...

what gives? this is worse than the xmas gifts i get at work....

Re:disparity...

[Otter]

we send them really nifty stuff like nuclear nose cones and they ship us some crappy sneakers...

This is Taiwan, not the PRC. They make the computers around which your nerdly life revolves.

Re:

[AioKits]

This is Taiwan, not the PRC. They make the computers around which your nerdly life revolves.

Would it be okay if I sent them a fruit basket as well then? You know, a lil icing on the cake...

Re:

[m2bord]

uhmm...sorry but the timberland's that i'm wearing right now say taiwan on them. not all cheap shoes are made in china and don't forget...china would argue that taiwan is technically part of china. taiwan begs to differ. i would love to see that in a celebrity death match...get the two heads of taiwan and china to go at it in a MMA match inside a steel cage with rowdy roddy piper officiating.

ROC vs. PRC

[mutube]

china would argue that taiwan is technically part of china. taiwan begs to differ.

Conversely Taiwan [wikipedia.org] would argue that China [wikipedia.org] is part of it.

Re:

[bberens]

Just think. This is the stuff we KNOW about. Imagine how bad the truth must really be.

Misleading Title: "fuses" not "nose cones"

[Swave An deBwoner]

Hmmm.. fuses not nose cones. Still not good, but different.

This is terrible

[sakdoctor]

With those electrical fuses plus "a bunch of other stuff" they could build a nucklar bomba!

Re:

[j00r0m4nc3r]

They're going to be pissed when they realize we sent them a shoddy bomb casing filled with used pinball machine parts.

Why is this reported?

[amplt1337]

You know, I read a couple articles about this yesterday afternoon.

I can't seem to figure out why it was being reported at all. The story as it's published is "nothing much happened, somebody filled out the shipping form wrong, we returned it all to sender." So in whose interest is this story being reported?

It would be a reasonable story to spread as cover if the shipment had been intentional and China found out about it (or if there had been, say, six fuses shipped and four returned); or it could be a useful story to ratchet up tensions with China before the Olympics (to whoever's benefit). Thing is, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, so I don't really buy that without it being more obvious whose interest it serves; but if it's just a "gotcha" story talking about how the US military screwed up, then the shots fired in the Suez [google.com] might be a more interesting one (especially since as of yesterday afternoon the USAF was denying that anybody got hurt).

So, in short, this nuke-fuse story is weird, and I can't figure out why it's getting reported.

(Full disclosure: I wish Taiwan had nukes, to make sure China stays polite and on its side of the Strait.)

Re:

[blair1q]

Those are items controlled under roughly the same rules as the rest of the device.

The fact that any part of such a thing was mishandled is a big deal, because it validates the probability that the dangerous parts can be mishandled.

You think it was a couple of irrelevant parts. To the process involved in controlling them, this was an "escape" from the process, and the process has to be re-engineered to ensure such things can not happen at all, because next time it may not be the mundane stuff that gets lost

Re:

[amplt1337]

You think it was a couple of irrelevant parts. To the process involved in controlling them, this was an "escape" from the process

No, I think it was a couple of extremely important parts, that were shipped to a friendly country who, as far as I can tell, promptly returned them unmolested, meaning that the only people who should really care are the ones who'll be reworking the process to prevent future escapes.

Re:

[Chris Mattern]

Two main reasons:

1) This involves NUCLEAR WEAPONS.

2) The *next* time we send nuclear weapon components to the wrong address, the recipient might not be nice enough to send them back. And they might wind up somewhere we wouldn't like.

Re:Why is this reported?

[someone1234]

Rest assured, they'll send it back in one form or another.

Re:

[z0idberg]

2) The *next* time we send nuclear weapon components to the wrong address, the recipient might not be nice enough to send them back. And they might wind up somewhere we wouldn't like.

Or even worse, if you sent nuclear weapons components to the wrong address and they put them all together and THEN sent them back.....express.

Re:

[cyfer2000]

Or you mean "last" time?

Re:

[CmdrGravy]

Really ? So given the lengths the US goes to around the world to ensure other countries cannot develop this sort of technology themselves you think shipping ready made components randomly around the world is a total non event !

Look at the huge amount of pressure the US exerts on the likes of Iran and North Korea to stop them developing this sort of thing to judge how important this really is.

Re:

[amplt1337]

It's not random at all. We have tons of military shipments to Taiwan.

We go to great lengths to ensure that (current) ideological enemies don't get the Bomb. Neutral parties, we are concerned but don't intervene (we disapproved of India, but didn't go to any great lengths to stop it, and then basically had to accept Pakistan in too or we'd have a war). Friends, we couldn't care less (Israel ferinstance).

Re:

[OpenSourced]

I think you are right. It _sounds_ like a PR job. Something happened, probably the Chinese got wind of it, and so a fitting story is cooked and released. Not that the Chinese will believe that, but it may throw them out of the real scent. And also, now the USA has its back sort of covered if the Chinese decide to raise a stink about it. It's also probably non-coincidental that this happens just days after a new government is elected in Taiwan.

However, I don't think there is a chance that we ever know what r

Re:

[malsdavis]

"So, in short, this nuke-fuse story is weird, and I can't figure out why it's getting reported."

It could be something to do with the utter incompetence displayed by people handling weapons capable of killing millions and what are meant to be amongst our country's most closely guarded technology. So I think it's pretty obvious why the mainstream news outlets reported it.

Not sure why it's on Slashdot though, hardly "news for nerds". Then again, a lot of non-"news for nerds" stories are on Slashdot these days

Re:

[vertinox]

I can't seem to figure out why it was being reported at all. The story as it's published is "nothing much happened, somebody filled out the shipping form wrong, we returned it all to sender." So in whose interest is this story being reported?

The fact that it happened at all is newsworthy. Of course no nuclear material was sent, but the parties that would be interested in it already have the ability to make nuclear material and would be more interested in the detonation technologies.

Its not farfected to thin

Re:Why is this reported?

[Hal_Porter]

I'm in Taiwan at the moment.

Taiwan has just had an election and Chen Shui Bian [wikipedia.org] who was basically in favour of formal independence (which would cause China to attack) has been replaced with Ma Ying Jeou [wikipedia.org] who's policy is "no independence, no unification and no war" and trying to increase economic ties with China and possibly sign some sort of peace treaty. The US strongly supports this since they don't want a war between large but totalitarian China and small but democratic Taiwan which they might get dragged into. Taiwan elects its own leaders, has its own army and so on anyway, and is a rich free country, quite unlike China. Formal independence wouldn't actually do any good, but it might do a lot of bad by triggering a full on war.

No I've no idea what the story behind all this, but I guess the US and/or Taiwan have decided to disclose this rather than risk China finding out about it later. Taiwan having nuclear weapons is one of the things that would cause the China to attack [wikipedia.org]. Since China is in scheming mode rather than bullying mode because of the Taiwanese election result, maybe now is as good a time to make the announcement as any.

Even when the US still had diplomatic relations with Taiwan instead of China, they forced Taiwan to dismantle some nuclear facilities [globalsecurity.org] to reduce the risk that they provoke a war with China. Despite the change in diplomatic recognition, which was forced on them by a vote in the UN General Assembly [virginia.edu], the US still views Taiwan as a protege and would defend them if China attacked, unless they provoked that attack by declaring formal independence.

Because nuclear proliferation...

[copponex]

Because nuclear proliferation is the greatest single threat to our species.

If you want to loose some sleep, find the BBC Documentary "Baiting the Bear" from 1996.

Re:

[sorak]

You know, I read a couple articles about this yesterday afternoon.

I can't seem to figure out why it was being reported at all.

Any time the words "nuclear" and "mistake" appear in the same headline, it's news.

Re:

[Waffle Iron]

A few nuked cities now and then is much preferable to another non-nuclear world war.

Maybe so, but it's rather doubtful that a nuclear war could somehow be stopped after just a "few" cities.

Correction

[eebra82]

Nuclear Nose Cones Mistakenly Shipped to Taiwan - (People's Republic of) China Rejoice

There, fixed it.

How long did it take to get them back?

[downix]

I mean, if I had 4 fuses suddenly show up, I might be tempted to "look em over" a bit...

Expected news considering that

[zappepcs]

The US appears to have been dealing in nuclear information and weapons for quite some time now. A few lost shipments of this and that are to be expected when you are shipping with fly-by-night-drugs-R-us airlines.

Seriously, I'm amazed that we don't find more shipping accidents. A CIA plane crash lands with a buttload of cocaine on it, nuclear fuses get shipped to a foreign country like lost luggage on an airliner? Rumors and stories everywhere of secretly selling nuclear secrets to now declared enemies of the USA. Where does it stop? Ooops, Sorry Los Angeles. We mistakenly sent that suitcase bomb to Iran. Brown was supposed to handle that, but Columbian based DruglordCo came in at a cheaper price.

In other news, the US government looks foolish for trying to stop Iran's non-weapons nuclear program with war if need be, while misplacing EVERY FUCKING THING Iran needs to build a bomb, through some shipping miscommunication...

Fuck, I give up. Either the Whitehouse and government is full of evil geniuses or they are incompetent as to be less useful than tits on a boar hog as my grandfather used to say. How can they pull off the media circus they did to get us into war with Iraq but clumsily admit "oh, yes, we made a mistake with some nuclear weapons stuff, sorry about that" ?!?!?!?!?!?

Isn't Taiwan the good China?

[fucket]

Isn't Taiwan the good China? At least that's the impression I've pieced together from the back of sugar packets and Tom Clancy novels.

Funny how many ppl believe it

[WindBourne]

I have written about this before. I worked at a job before where we designed special hardware/software for sale to several different 3 letter agencies. It was interesting work. But at one time, we went out to find funding. One of them was a Taiwanese guy from Loveland CO. He had recently sold a Chinese restaurant there. He wanted to fund us, but wanted full access to the hardware. In particular, he wanted the ability to take this to Mainland china. He said that he could sell it for a bundle (and he would have gotten millions more for it there, than we were able to sell it here). Even we told him that this was prevented from leaving the country, he still wanted to own if the company collapsed. When pointed out that the code hardware would have to go back to a different company, he was upset with it. All in all, this man saw no difference between mainland vs. taiwan. In fact, I would say that he viewed it more as China vs. America. And this man had grown up in Taiwan.

Re:

[WindBourne]

First, I do not extrapolate a view country based on a person. In fact, you can not. Many ppl from overseas would assume that W represents America. Yet, I think that you would have to agree that his views are VERY far from the average American. The same is doubtless true of every other nations (more so in a country like China, or anywhere there is a dictatorship or a totalitarian system). I do not dislike Chinese ppl. I do not trust Chinese gov, though (of course, having worked in various capacities with our

Re:

[WindBourne]

BTW, sorry, if you believed that I was knocking Taiwain. I was not saying that it was "bad china". I simply do not assume things about a country.

Also, if you live in Loveland, then I am sure that you have been to the Chinese restaurant off of 34 down the road from old A&W, west side of town? He sold that about a decade ago.

Re:

[Bryansix]

Yes, basically. China is actually all pissed off about this and wants to know what went wrong and an in-depth investigation with the finding sent to them. I say screw em'. China ships all kinds of weapons illegally all over the world and makes all kinds of money off of it. They aren't even making mistakes; they DO IT ON PURPOSE. They are really scared that if Taiwan had Nukes then they might have to behave. They shouldn't feel any less safe if Taiwan had nuke because we already do and China is on the short

Yeah, big today, gone tomorrow

[WindBourne]

The simple fact is that China is trying hard to put a major spotlight on this to pull it off of themselves and Tibet. In a normal time, China would be pretty quiet about this. It should be obvious that this is nothing more than a mistake. Otherwise, why would we bring it up?

It's no longer cool to be in the nuclear military

[MichaelCrawford]

A board that investigated the accidental flight of nuclear-armed cruise missiles across the country a few months ago found that our nation's nuclear armaments are now trusted to much lower-ranking officers and civilians than used to be the case. They found that working with nuclear arms was no longer regarded by military personnel as being a good way to advance one's career.

The US has been fighting conventionally ever since the first Gulf War - even after that war ended, there was quite a bit of combat activity to enforce Iraq's no-fly zone. With the current wars, this has resulted in military personnel regarding conventional fighting as the way to get ahead in the military.

Let me find you a link...

• Air Force's Nuclear Focus Has Dimmed [latimes.com]

After the Cold War, the once-vaunted Strategic Air Command, which controlled all Air Force nuclear weapons, was dismantled. The military's nuclear missiles were assigned to a division responsible for operations in space, and its nuclear bombers were moved to Air Combat Command, which also includes nonnuclear fighters and reconnaissance aircraft.

...

However, the Welch report is highly critical of the split commands. The report concludes that combining nuclear forces with nonnuclear organizations has led to "markedly reduced levels of leadership whose daily focus is the nuclear enterprise and a general devaluation of the nuclear mission and those who perform the mission."

Re:It's no longer cool to be in the nuclear milita

[cybrthng]

Actually we use nuclear technology a lot (spent technology) - it just isn't the kind that goes "kaboom" - its more of a face/tank/armor piercing "splat" sometimes followed by a mild boom compared to detonated plutonium munitions.

Re:It's no longer cool to be in the nuclear milita

[icepick72]

A board that investigated the accidental flight of nuclear-armed cruise missiles across the country

I saw those missiles fly by too, went right over my state.

"Fuze" is probably a small radar

[Animats]

If it's the "fuse" in the "nose cone", it's probably the radar proximity fuze, used to detonate a nuclear weapon at a specific height above ground. This is essential only for ICBMs intended for use against hardened targets, where the detonation has to occur at just the right height to maximize the blast effect against something like a missile silo lid.

If you're delivering your bomb in a Ryder truck, this component is unnecessary.

Re:

[LWATCDR]

Actually the fuses for used for hardened targets detonate after the warhead hits the target Often underground.
Airbursts are used for soft or area targets like airfields military bases, and I am sorry to say cities.

Trust Republicans With National Security

[Doc Ruby]

How many other critical nuke parts were shipped to people who didn't report the "mistake"? How many of them have customers in China, N Korea, jihadist gangs?

There used to be all kinds of failsafe procedures to keep critical weapons far, far from our enemies' hands. But that was before 7-13 years of Republicans running the system according to the principle "shrink government small enough to drown it in New Orleans^W^Wa bathtub".

These kinds of "mistakes" are top-notch marketing for a Star Wars "missile defens

Teh republicans!!! Oh, noes!

[halivar]

Specifics. Which fail-safe procedures were cut during the great "government shrinkage" [heritage.org] of the 2000's? Or are you making stuff up because it fits your partisan political narrative? What if I say that things got sloppy because our bureaucracy is so big it can no longer effectively run, as has been for decades?

Re:

[Doc Ruby]

Here's a specific one, right off the top of my head, within the last half-year: nuke cruise missiles "mistakenly" flown out of their base [google.com]. And that report comes out of the most secretive government ever in American history. How many more are there "redacted" for "national security" purposes (of covering up this government's failures)?

Or are you just looking for any excuse to blame "big government", when you voted twice for Bush, and who knows how many times for the other Republicans, who for years have prov

Re:

[halivar]

I asked what procedural measures were cut. So far you haven't given me anything but finger-pointing and innuendo. BTW, does...

Republicans, who for years have proven they'll expand government faster than anyone, even as they hollow it out to make it less safe?

...mean that you acknowledge the following statement to be false?

But that was before 7-13 years of Republicans running the system according to the principle "shrink government small enough to drown it in New Orleans^W^Wa bathtub".

BTW, I'm not really bl

Re:

[Doc Ruby]

Thanks for pointing out all the national secrets that have been given away by Republicans operating and datamining our personal info database, and distributing secret nuke tech to all kinds of unstable governments, including enemies like N Korea.

Feel safer now?

why not put nukes on taiwan?

[circletimessquare]

north korea and iran have discovered the value of deterrence

of course, china might pull a kennedy. that is, kennedy said there would be war if the russians put nukes on cuba, so the russians backed down. and the us should most definitely back down if china threatens war over nukes in taiwan

but after china's recent actions in tibet, i'm not interested in seeing them in taiwan anytime soon

at the very least, this "mistake" of nuclear missile parts sends the grumpy old technocrats in beijing a message, and if i

Because it's the dumbest idea ever, that's why

[Chris Burke]

Oh, China might "pull a Kennedy"? Ya think?

China has threatened to invade every time the Taiwanese so much as utter the word independence, and threatened war with us if we try to materially support Taiwan's independence, and you think it's even remotely possible that us trying to put nukes on Taiwan wouldn't cause them to "pull a Kennedy"? In what universe?

At least you recognize that it would be insane to not back down WHEN they threaten war.

And WHEN we backed down and removed the nukes, Taiwan, having in

The inner conspiracy theorist...

[tekiegreg]

The inner conspiracy theorist in me is saying "What accident? The cover was blown!". While definitely remote speculation I wonder how likely this is...

Dear Mr. Pentagon:

[Hyppy]

Dear Mister Pentagon,
Please ship me a Peacekeeper [army.mil] missile [modeltrainjournal.com]. They're really pretty.
Sincerely,
Hyppy

Re:

[Notquitecajun]

Here ya go. RUSH delivery. Catch it if you...ooops. Sorry. I figured you may as well get a free explosion.

ugh

[AxemRed]

I have been reading this story though various news outlets since yesterday. And I am going to post here the same thing I posted on Fark...

This is a non-issue. Something got mixed up when we were shipping them some batteries, and we shipped them some fuses instead. And they returned them with no problems. This story keeps on cropping up, and it's just sensationalism... especially using the word "nuclear" in the headline in this particular case. For shame.

So THAT was what this was all about !!

[unity100]

postman delivered an unexpected package this morning. i told him i wasnt expecting anything, but he said it was shipped priority from united states so it had to be mine. a curious electronic device was in it. i didnt know what to do with it so i integrated it with my toast machine. it works very well tbh. apparently pentagon is in ecommerce business now. thanks pentagon !

What about the ones shipped from Taiwan to US?

[heroine]

The Detroit nose cones are trash compared to the nuclear nose cones made in Taiwan for US.

Bureaucratic delay or something more sinister?

[BlackCobra43]

The fuses were shipped in 2006, according to TFA. How come we're JUST NOW getting informed of this?
 
If the US government was made aware of it, why was this matter of national security not revealed and those responsible fired?
 
If the US government wasn't informed until just now, what good is the their inspection certifying no tampering has occured? It's far too easy to completly disassemble and reasssemble something when you have 18 months to do it..

Next on Slashdot....

[jlf278]

Millions in California Die...

Summary: ...ve into the ocean today as ocean currents bring warmer waters to west coast beaches.

They should have used the CIA

[TheLink]

Makes things more interesting...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/jan/05/energy.g2 [guardian.co.uk]

On paper, Merlin was supposed to stunt the development of Tehran's nuclear programme by sending Iran's weapons experts down the wrong technical path. The CIA believed that once the Iranians had the blueprints and studied them, they would believe the designs were usable and so would start to build an atom bomb based on the flawed designs.

The Russian studied the blueprints the CIA had given him. Within minutes of being handed the designs, he had identified a flaw. "This isn't right," he told the CIA officers gathered around the hotel room. "There is something wrong." His comments prompted stony looks, but no straight answers from the CIA men. No one in the meeting seemed surprised by the Russian's assertion that the blueprints didn't look quite right, but no one wanted to enlighten him further on the matter, either.

In fact, the CIA case officer who was the Russian's personal handler had been stunned by his statement. During a break, he took the senior CIA officer aside. "He wasn't supposed to know that," the CIA case officer told his superior. "He wasn't supposed to find a flaw."

"Don't worry," the senior CIA officer calmly replied. "It doesn't matter."

Re:

[MaWeiTao]

I guess you envision George Bush kind of like Jesus Christ in those awkward paintings [lordsart.com] where he's secretly standing behind everyone. Bush is there observing us, regardless of whether we've joined the family for dinner, are sitting on the crapper, or have mistakenly just typed in Taiwan on the shipping invoice.

Is he shedding a tear or cackling with sinister glee?

Re:

[janrinok]

The OP is correct. They haven't been tampered with. They might have been inspected, X-rayed, studied, replicated, imaged or whatever, but they haven't been tampered with.....

Re:

[Hatta]

Are you assuming X > 1? Why? With proper auditing, X could be very small indeed.