> Khrushchev wanted a 100 megaton weapon and to achieve such size, the engineers added a third stage on the thermonuclear warhead. Normal hydrogen bombs compris

> Khrushchev wanted a 100 megaton weapon and to achieve such size, the engineers added a third stage on the thermonuclear warhead. Normal hydrogen bombs comprise two stages. Understanding the extreme radiation releases, the engineers, and among them Andrei Sakharov, decided to reduce the actual yield of 100 megatons to around half.