A Random Assemblage of Scary, Startling, or Striking Facts about WMDs.

  If you have a fact about WMDs you think we should know about, email us with the information as well as the source of your information (include links if applicable).

WMDcozy only lists facts from reliable and verifiable sources. Still, should you find we have listed erroneous information please contact us at tracey@wmdcozy.com.

36 countries could make a bomb if they really wanted to since they operate nuclear power plants. According to the director of the IAEA, each of those countries has the material or means to develop nuclear weapons.

(Our source: Citizen Joe. Their source: CBS & the IAEA)

Total number of nuclear missiles built, 1951 - present: 67,500. 

Total number of nuclear bombers built, 1945 - present: 4,680.

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their source: U.S. Nuclear Weapons Cost Study Project.)

Total number and types of nuclear warheads and bombs built, 1945 - 1990:
more than 70,000/65 types.

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their sources: U.S. Department of Energy; Natural Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons Databook Project.)

Number of nuclear warheads and bombs currently in the stockpile (2002): 10,600 (7,982 deployed, 2,700 hedge/contingency stockpile).

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their sources: U.S. Department of Energy; Natural Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons Databook Project.)

Projected operational U.S strategic nuclear warheads and bombs after the enactment of the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty in 2012:

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their sources: U.S. Department of Defense; Natural Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons Databook Project)

Additional strategic and non-strategic warheads not limited by the treaty that the U.S. military wants to retain as a "hedge" against unforeseen future threats: 4,900.

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their sources: U.S. Department of Defense; Natural Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons Databook Project)

Largest and smallest nuclear bombs ever deployed:
B17/B24 (-42,000 lbs.,  10 - 15 megatons);
W54 (51 lbs., .01 kilotons, .02 kilotons - 1 kiloton).

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their sources: U.S. Department of Defense; Natural Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons Databook Project)

Peak number of operating domestic uranium mines (1955):
925.

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their source: Nineteenth Semiannual Report of the Atomic Energy Commission, January 1956, p. 31.)

Fissile material produced by domestic uranium mines: 104 metric tons of plutonium and 994 metric tons of highly-enriched uranium

Amount of plutonium still in weapons: 43 metric tons.

Number of thermometers which could be filled with mercury used to produce lithium-6 at the Oak Ridge Reservation: 11 billion.

(Our source: The Brookings Institution. Their source: U.S. Department of Energy.)

States with the largest number of nuclear weapons (in 1999):
New Mexico (2,450), Georgia (2,000), Washington (1,685), Nevada (1,350), and North Dakota (1,140).

Total known land area occupied by U.S. nuclear weapons bases and facilities:

There is no treaty or custumary international law that contains an authoritative definition of weapons of mass destruction.

(Our source: The Federation of American Scientists.)

The general categories for WMDs are nuclear, biological, chemical and radiological weapons.

Israel's official policy on nukes: We can neither confirm or deny.

South Africa developed a small nuclear arsenal in the 1980s but disassembled them in the early 1990s, making it the only country to have fully given up an independently developed nuclear weapons arsenal.

Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine inherited stockpiles of nuclear arms after the breakup of the Soviet Union. They have supposedly been turned over to the Russian Federation.

(Our source: The Federation of American Scientists.)

Countries with access to nukes through nuclear sharing agreements: Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey. 

(Our source: The Federation of American Scientists.)

North Korea has officially been identified to have nuclear weapons.

Politicians, military officials and leaders of America's nuclear weapon laboratories are gunning to develop new precision low-yield nuclear weapons. These groups feel these weapons could be used in conventional conflicts with third-world nations but the use of any nuclear weapon capable of destroying a buried target will create extensive civilian casualties. Earth-burrowing missiles cannot go deep enough into the earth to contain an explosion. "Low-yield" nuclear weapons would blow out massive craters of radioactive dirt. This dirt would naturally come back down to earth and create deadly fallout. 

(Our source: The Federation of American Scientists)

Nuclear Weapons
Six countries have the means to deliver nuclear weapons by aircraft, five countries have nuclear capable submarines and three have nuclear capable missiles that can reach global targets.

"Dirty Bombs" are explosive devices mixed with radioactive material, that can contaminate an area of a square mile or greater, depending on the size and location of the explosion.

Short, intermediate and intercontinental missiles - 24 countries possess short and intermediate range missiles capable of reaching targets across Europe, Africa and Asia and are also capable of carrying chemical and biological warheads.

"Suitcase nukes" are nuclear devices that the Soviet Union is believed to have developed during the Cold War that can literally fit inside a suitcase and could cause upwards to 100,000 deaths if detonated in a densely populated urban area. Despite Russian denial of such weapons, some analysts argue that anywhere from 12 - 100 of these weapons may exist. (Copied verbatim from Citizen Joe)

Aerosol delivery - The most effective means of delivering a chemical weapon would be in a tightly confined and poorly ventilated area or else the material would easily disperse and cause minimal to no damage. (Copied verbatim from Citizen Joe)

Aerosol delivery - Like chemical weapons, biological weapons are most effectively delivered in a tightly confined and poorly ventilated area. Because biological weapons are "alive", the trick to spreading them is to make sure they don't die or go permanently dormant before they hit their target. This is not easy.

This is the end of the list for now. More facts coming soon.