When on May 11, 1998 India tested nuclear explosives, there was considerable doubt about whether we had tested a bona fide thermonuclear or hydrogen bomb. Every country’s strategic nuclear deterrent has thermonuclear weapons, and to announce itself as a ‘true’ nuclear weapons power India had to demonstrate that we had the capability to build hydrogen [...]
All of us are rightly spewing indignation and anger at the spineless machinations of India’s politicians regarding the proposed Indo-US nuclear deal. However it is also instructive to take a look at what the technical and strategic issues and their implications are. The issues are admittedly complex, but as I sifted through some of the [...]
Back in the days when I was still cutting classes and fortifying my immune system by hanging out in the university cafeteria, one of the running departmental jokes among my friends was about the decrepit-looking old building designated “nuclear chemistry”, a remnant of the sometime heyday of that science when a well-known nuclear chemist had [...]