The Difference Between Strategic And Tactical Nuclear Bombs
How different nukes differ from one another.
“Nuke” by blueforce4116 is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
Although most people consider nuclear weapons (nukes) as just the exact same big bomb, there are actually much more than that. There are two main types of nuclear weapons – strategic and tactical. In this article we are going to go over the differences between them, starting off with the purpose.
The purpose of a strategic bomb is to wipe out cities, factories, and oil deposits, thus crippling the economy and war production in an area. If you don’t have oil you can’t power your tanks or factories and factories make guns and ammunition. If the soldiers don’t have guns or ammunition, you can’t fight. Without oil the military of any nation will fall. The idea of a strategic bomb is to target the source of your enemie’s power – for most countries this is oil. Because of this goal, strategic nukes need to be able to cross continents and hit areas deep within enemy territory, therefore they have huge ranges, sometimes worldwide.
The purpose of a tactical nuke is to wipe out ground units like tanks and infintry and all ground units. You can use this to clear the way for a big offensive. You can also use this to clear defensive positions within enemy territory. Tactical nukes can only go about 300 miles, so that if there was a surprise attack you could neutralize it quicker. This is also faster responses, you don’t have to wait for a nuke to go all the way around to help you. For example, say the U.S. and Russia were at war and the U.S. wanted to take Moscow, the U.S. could tactically nuke specific military encampments around Moscow letting the U.S. have an easier time pushing in to Moscow via land.
Strategic bombs are big, they are typically above 100 kilotons of TNT (that’s 220 million pounds of TNT). Those are the small strategic bombs. The biggest one ever made, the Tsar Bomba made by the USSR, was 1 megaton of TNT (that’s over 2 billion pounds of TNT in a single bomb). For some comparison, the two bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had a combined total weight of 35 kilotons of TNT (that’s 77 million pounds of TNT). If you dropped the Tsar Bomba on New York City you might be safe if you are in Ohio. Along with destroying the city, the areas around New York City would become uninhabitable for several years. If you did survive, you would probably also get radiation poisoning, which could also kill you. You would also see an increase in cancer rates and birth defects for several years.
Tactical nukes are smaller but are not small by any means. Tactical nukes range from 1 kiloton to 50 kilotons of TNT (that’s 2.2 – 110 million pounds of TNT). Once again, compared to the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they had a combined total of 35 kilotons of TNT which is like a medium tactical nuke. If you want even more comparison, the largest conventional, non-nuclear bomb used by the U.S. is the MOAB (Mother of All Bombs) which had 0.01 kilotons of TNT (22,000 pounds of TNT). Tactical nukes still have a radioactive effect, but it is smaller because the bombs are meant to be used in close quarters or as breaching defenses. You don’t want there to be a lot of negative effects to your own soldiers, you just want to hurt the opposing side.
With the war in Ukraine and nuclear tensions rising with North Korea, when they talk about nukes on the news now you will be able to get a better understanding of what is being said.
RELATED STORIES:
https://www.cfr.org/article/if-russia-goes-nuclear-three-scenarios-ukraine-war
https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15250.doc.htm
https://apnews.com/article/russia-nuclear-weapons-belarus-ukraine-ad058c18a3ff259bcbb64cf61ea6251d
https://www.rferl.org/a/explainer-tactical-nuclear-weapons-russia-ukraine-putin/32079565.html
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