1 Jun 2012 21:35 AEST SBS 1 - documentary "World's Biggest Bomb"

[gary]

For students of the history of the Cold War, SBS is airing the 2011
PBS/Thirteen/WNET New York/National Geographic documentary
"World's Biggest Bomb", which tells the story of the arms race that
led to the detonation by the Soviets of a 50 megaton thermonuclear
device in 1961 designated as AN602 but nicknamed "Tsar Bomba".

This device had 1400 times the combined yield of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki
explosions and 10 times the combined power of all conventional weapons used
in WWII.

[omegacrux (David)]

That's one I'm going to watch
Thanks to Abc and Sbs for there docos

Dave

[acropolite (Phil)]

Set to record, I'll watch it tomorrow.

[h0ughy (David)]

i recorded it - was at a NAS meeting

[MrB (Simon)]

Oooo!
Thanks for the heads up Gary, and special thanks to David for the bump!
Would have missed it otherwise. Starts in 5min here.

[gary]

Will also soon be available on SBS OnDemand for the next 14 days -
http://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/video...s-Biggest-Bomb

[astroron (Ron)]

Thanks for the heads up Gary

Watched it last night, Scary stuff hey!

I was in the British Army in Germany at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis and I can tell you it was a very tense time, withe the Soviet Warsaw pact countries sitting on the boarder only 60 miles away from me,and the so called Doomsday clock stopped at about 5 minutes to midnight
To think that they could such a big mistake in putting too much Hydrogen in the bomb, that nearly wiped them out was so frightening.
But that Russian Bomb was just ,Words fail me, it was just so hard to describe .
Cheers

[GeoffW1 (Geoff)]

Originally Posted by astroron

Thanks for the heads up Gary

Watched it last night, Scary stuff hey!

I was in the British Army in Germany at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis and I can tell you it was a very tense time, withe the Soviet Warsaw pact countries sitting on the boarder only 60 miles away from me,and the so called Doomsday clock stopped at about 5 minutes to midnight
To think that they could such a big mistake in putting too much Hydrogen in the bomb, that nearly wiped them out was so frightening.
But that Russian Bomb was just ,Words fail me, it was just so hard to describe .
Cheers

Hi,

Yes, apparently we did come quite close indeed to Armageddon more than once. Whatever his other faults Kennedy was the right man for the time, refusing to be pushed by his own military into a first strike, the "logic" of which was to devastate the Soviet Union and its capabilities in order to "reduce" US casualties to "only" 30 million. OMG.

It always makes me feel a bit sick when I see docos about this era of madness. It is true that if Edward Teller had not come up with his ideas, someone else would have, but I think he was an evil genius of the first order. Simplistic, but what justification stands up?

Cheers