Part 2 of 3 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
       The Poseidon is thought to have a top speed of over fifty-seven miles per hour. This would make it about twice as fast as a conventional submarine and much harder to track. Kaushal said, “It’s more difficult to intercept because, you know, while missile defenses exist, very few countries are prepared to defend against a nuclear torpedo, particularly one that moves very fast.” He also said that as a practical matter, it is not that different from any other nuclear weapon. He added, “In truth, intercepting a nuclear strike, whether it’s a torpedo at sea or an ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile), is an inherently difficult task against any sophisticated attacking body. I don’t know if this particular capability changes much in that respect.”
     Defense experts say that based on what is currently known about the nuclear torpedo and its dimensions, the yield of a nuclear warhead carried by Poseidon could be as high as two megatons. This estimate of yield has also been repeatedly mentioned by the Russian TASS news agency in recent years. That is a big warhead. It is more than one hundred times the destructive force of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima which was fifteen kilotons. It is more than ten times the force of the latest B61 nuclear bomb developed by the U.S.
      Hambling said “Atomic torpedoes have existed way, way back, certainly since about the 1950s. And your normal torpedo is about a foot and a half in diameter and weighs a few tons. This thing is at least 1.5 m in diameter and weighs tens of tons, so it’s carrying a very big warhead”.
     Kaushal, Hambling and Podvig said that they doubted the claim made by Russian TV anchor that Poseiden packed a yield of a hundred megatons. Hambling said that that claim was “simply insane – that would be the biggest warhead ever deployed. I mean, with the current Russian regime, who knows? It’s possible that they might have the hubris to build something like that, but it certainly is grotesquely gigantic.” (The biggest nuclear warhead ever detonated was called the Tsar. It was created by the Soviet Union and had a yield of fifty megatons.)
      Kiselyov warned that “The explosion of this torpedo near the British coast will cause a giant tsunami wave up to sixteen hundred feet high,” in his May 1st primetime show. He added that “the wave would also carry extreme doses of radiation and after its passage over Great Britain leave a radioactive desert, unfit for anything for a long time”. Kiselyov report was illustrated by an animation of the giant torpedo, a massive wave, and the U.K. and Ireland being completely destroyed. The experts said that his treat was totally unrealistic.
       Hambling said, “We know that from quite a lot of work which was actually done again back in the crazy days of the Cold War about doing this very thing and creating tsunamis with nuclear warheads. It turns out you need a vast amount of energy to do that – even more than you can get out of a nuclear blast,” he explained, noting that earthquakes fared much better at causing tsunamis. If it’s moved into a harbor and detonated very close offshore, it would certainly be able to destroy a city. But it probably wouldn’t damage much beyond that, and it certainly wouldn’t do as much damage as a large nuclear airburst.”
Please read Part 3 next