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The effort to develop nuclear weapons was ruinously expensive. I doubt we would have undertaken it in peacetime, so we may not have seen nuclear weapons until

by gozur88 10y ago

The effort to develop nuclear weapons was ruinously expensive. I doubt we would have undertaken it in peacetime, so we may not have seen nuclear weapons until the early 1960s if not for the war. We almost certainly would have been at war with the Soviets before that.

astrodust 10y ago
It was expensive, but not ruinously expensive. As pointed out recently, the Norden bombsight program cost nearly half as much and people don't think of that as ruinously expensive. The US interstate highway program cost vastly more as well. Russia developed nuclear weapons in peace-time as well, if you consider the cold war peaceful. South Africa also produced some nuclear capability despite not being at war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#Nuclear_weapons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa_and_weapons_of_ma... Naturally a country rich in uranium would be tempted to see what applications there were.
- WalterBright 10y ago
  > the Norden bombsight program cost nearly half as much That's very difficult to believe.
  - astrodust 10y ago
    Research and development, manufacturing, training, it ended up being fantastically expensive. Remember, this was a highly capable analog computer that had to operate in a difficult environment and even included a self-destruct feature. http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombsight-accurate-beyond-belief/ http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombs... > ...the cost of the entire program came to more than $1 billion.
    - 24gttghh 10y ago
      So the Norden cost $1B (~$12-14B now), the Atom bomb cost $2B (~$25-27B now), and the F-35 today is ~$150B over budget. How's that strike you?
  - nostrademons 10y ago
    His source is probably a Malcolm Gladwell tech talk [1] It is corroborated by other sites on the Internet [2], though Gladwell frequently gets his information from secondary sources so who knows if these are independent? Based on the history of the project though [3], it seems plausible - the Norden bombsight is basically an analog computer whose development started during WW1, and building a computer with WW1-era technology seems like it could easily cost half as much as building an atom bomb with WW2 technology. [1] https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell/transcript?langua... [2] http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombsight-accurate-beyond-belief/ http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombs... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norden_bombsight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norden_bombsight
- gozur88 10y ago
  The entire US economy had be reworked to a wartime footing in WW II. The government was far smaller and poorer and would have stayed that way but for the war. And frankly it's difficult for me to believe the Norden gunsight cost that much. The Russians developed nuclear weapons because they didn't have a choice given the US had already done so, and it's not clear when they would have been successful without the US project. The reason I picked the early 1960s for peacetime development is nuclear weapons development became much easier with the introduction of nuclear power. At that point it became much easier for any motivated government, so it's not surprising the South Africans were able to do it in the '70s. And still they needed US help to do it on that timeline.
  - avar 10y ago
    I have no idea what's true in this, but I've heard exactly the opposite economic theories about WWII as it pertains to the US. I.e. that untold amounts of capital was spent on making equipment that was just sent overseas to get blown up, if the US wasn't in the war it's not like it wouldn't have had a giant export market, and all that workforce could still be mobilized to manufacture goods, except some of the working-age people wouldn't have been sent overseas to die & get maimed.
    - gozur88 10y ago
      That's the Broken Windows Fallacy writ large. The US economy grew tremendously throughout the 19th century without making things and then destroying them.
      - astrodust 10y ago
        Yes, the 19th very same century where America went to war with Britain and later itself.
        gozur88 10y ago
        That's seven years out of a hundred, though you missed a few. The point was we were never on a wartime economic footing in the same way were were in WW II.
- LordKano 10y ago
  Russia developed nuclear weapons in peace-time as well, if you consider the cold war peaceful. Much of their advancement on that front was due to espionage against the US.
  - gozur88 10y ago
    Hard to say for sure. The way the Russians tell it, their program was already too far along to benefit from successful espionage beyond confirming they were on the right track.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > Russia developed nuclear weapons in peace-time as well, if you consider the cold war peaceful. Parts of the Cold War were peaceful for some countries (including the USSR), but the period in which the Soviets developed nuclear weapons (1943-1949) was a period during which the USSR was constantly involved in international armed conflict, and was absolutely not peacetime for the USSR.

by gozur88 10y ago

astrodust 10y ago

It was expensive, but not ruinously expensive. As pointed out recently, the Norden bombsight program cost nearly half as much and people don't think of that as ruinously expensive. The US interstate highway program cost vastly more as well. Russia developed nuclear weapons in peace-time as well, if you consider the cold war peaceful. South Africa also produced some nuclear capability despite not being at war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#Nuclear_weapons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa_and_weapons_of_ma... Naturally a country rich in uranium would be tempted to see what applications there were.

WalterBright 10y ago
> the Norden bombsight program cost nearly half as much That's very difficult to believe.
- astrodust 10y ago
  Research and development, manufacturing, training, it ended up being fantastically expensive. Remember, this was a highly capable analog computer that had to operate in a difficult environment and even included a self-destruct feature. http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombsight-accurate-beyond-belief/ http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombs... > ...the cost of the entire program came to more than $1 billion.
  - 24gttghh 10y ago
    So the Norden cost $1B (~$12-14B now), the Atom bomb cost $2B (~$25-27B now), and the F-35 today is ~$150B over budget. How's that strike you?
- nostrademons 10y ago
  His source is probably a Malcolm Gladwell tech talk [1] It is corroborated by other sites on the Internet [2], though Gladwell frequently gets his information from secondary sources so who knows if these are independent? Based on the history of the project though [3], it seems plausible - the Norden bombsight is basically an analog computer whose development started during WW1, and building a computer with WW1-era technology seems like it could easily cost half as much as building an atom bomb with WW2 technology. [1] https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell/transcript?langua... [2] http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombsight-accurate-beyond-belief/ http://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-norden-bombs... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norden_bombsight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norden_bombsight
gozur88 10y ago
The entire US economy had be reworked to a wartime footing in WW II. The government was far smaller and poorer and would have stayed that way but for the war. And frankly it's difficult for me to believe the Norden gunsight cost that much. The Russians developed nuclear weapons because they didn't have a choice given the US had already done so, and it's not clear when they would have been successful without the US project. The reason I picked the early 1960s for peacetime development is nuclear weapons development became much easier with the introduction of nuclear power. At that point it became much easier for any motivated government, so it's not surprising the South Africans were able to do it in the '70s. And still they needed US help to do it on that timeline.
- avar 10y ago
  I have no idea what's true in this, but I've heard exactly the opposite economic theories about WWII as it pertains to the US. I.e. that untold amounts of capital was spent on making equipment that was just sent overseas to get blown up, if the US wasn't in the war it's not like it wouldn't have had a giant export market, and all that workforce could still be mobilized to manufacture goods, except some of the working-age people wouldn't have been sent overseas to die & get maimed.
  - gozur88 10y ago
    That's the Broken Windows Fallacy writ large. The US economy grew tremendously throughout the 19th century without making things and then destroying them.
    - astrodust 10y ago
      Yes, the 19th very same century where America went to war with Britain and later itself.
      - gozur88 10y ago
        That's seven years out of a hundred, though you missed a few. The point was we were never on a wartime economic footing in the same way were were in WW II.
LordKano 10y ago
Russia developed nuclear weapons in peace-time as well, if you consider the cold war peaceful. Much of their advancement on that front was due to espionage against the US.
- gozur88 10y ago
  Hard to say for sure. The way the Russians tell it, their program was already too far along to benefit from successful espionage beyond confirming they were on the right track.
dragonwriter 10y ago
> Russia developed nuclear weapons in peace-time as well, if you consider the cold war peaceful. Parts of the Cold War were peaceful for some countries (including the USSR), but the period in which the Soviets developed nuclear weapons (1943-1949) was a period during which the USSR was constantly involved in international armed conflict, and was absolutely not peacetime for the USSR.