h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A577541

A military technology piece. All comments very welcome.

Cestus

Hi Cestus - nice piece.

Wonder if it will be one of those 'controversial' articles?

Anyway, I spotted a mistake

In the topic on hand grenades you state...the sheer number of fragments produced has a terrifyingly maiming impact

replace terrifyingly with terrifying

Maybe you should explain (in a footnote) what ogive means.

A bit nitpicky maybe but aren't A-bombs' power measured in Kiltonnes - I think tactical nuclear weapons are not on the scale of Megatonnes. I think (but I'm not sure) that only H-bombs can achieve the Megatonne power and these are used in the intercontinental style bombs.

Apart from that I can't fault it really.

Orcus

"Chemical Warheads" and "Bilogical warheads" - the sentence after these captions describes the weapon, not the warhead. Does the nature of the weapon dictate special requirements for the warhead? I would imagine (but I don't know very much about it) that a biological weapon warhead is required to disperse the agent without killing it in the process - hence no explosives?

But that's just nitpicking. The whole is a polished and comprehensive guide entry.

Thankyou for the comments.

Orcus,

Now that you mention it..... I've decided I don't like the sentence with 'terrifyingly maiming' in it. I'll change it somewhat.

Kilotons vs. Megatons. It's true that most single-stage weapons are measured in kilotons so perhaps I ought to add such a comment, after all I work in IT where a kilobyte isn't a thousand bytes Not everything is as clear as it first appears.

Duncan,

Er... Yes, you have a point. Perhaps it would be easier to define warhead as it applies to such things, I'll have another crack at it.

Cheers,

Cestus

You wrote that atomic bombs were used "in anger" by the US against Japan. I think "anger" is to personal a word to describe a wartime military motive. Perhaps "agressively" or "in war" would be better suited? Anger is more like one person against another, not nations against each other.

A good article
Just one comment: In your 'Design Parameters' section, the small list of specifications could be put into a bulleted list using the and GuideML tags. That's me getting picky over presentation though.
Other than that it's really detailed and worthy Guide material.
Nice one,

Kenrick

Il viaggiatore,

Entirely valid, I'll add it to my list of changes. I really didn't mean to personalise it, I neither believe that the US action was unwarranted, nor that it led to Japanese surrender. I will make appropriate changes.

Kenrick,

I thought of doing that but lack of confidence in my abilities with GML led me to chicken out at the last moment, I will look at the pages indicating how things should be done and update accordingly.

Thank you both for your kindnesses, I know Guide guidelines suggest such things but as a relative newcomer I have found the regulars both helpful and positive. I fondly hope that all my future entries will be as well received

All my warmest regards,

Cestus

Good entry. Should be a sure thing for Edited Guide.

What a nice comment Cestus
It is good to know that we are appreciated.

For an unnumbered list (bulleted list) use this format

First item
Second item
Third item


Ie. every bullet point must be between the and tags but the whole list must be between the and </UL tags.

Hope that helps.

Orcus

Even better use this code


How to hit the target
How to destroy the target
How to do all this without becoming unwieldy

Everyone's being very kind at the moment!
Thanks Cestus (and Orcus).
Kenrick

Cestus,
I'm glad you understood my comment the way I intended it. I rewrote that post about a dozen time to make it clear that your wording, and only that, needed to be changed, rather than any latent political sentiment. It is such a sensitive issue (that has been prodded lately by the release of a certain unnamed blockbuster film) that it needs to be treated as clinically as possible in places like these to avoid arousing the furor of the masses.
I'm not much of a veteran here, with barely an edited entry to my name, but let me welcome you. This place is addicting...

IV

Well done, Cestus. This should shape up into a nice Guide entry.

I do have a couple of suggestions for improvement...

The bit where you talk about chaff and flares is a bit misleading. It reads as though both are countermeasures for radar. Flares do not deceive radar systems. They affect infrared tracking systems.

I'm aware of another type of warhead that is missing here, but I don't know enough about it to go into detail. I don't know what it's proper name was, but they called it a "starburst." They are apparently lobbed high overhead to provide illumination for advancing ground units. They reach a certain elevation and begin floating down, burning with an intensely bright light (I suspect they burn magnesium oxide). I suppose these things will see increasingly less use as night vision technology becomes used more widely, but there you have it. A nighttime engagement can be carried out under the full light of day under a few of these things.

A fine text, Cestus.
It probably covers most of what can be done to destroy a target, except maybe a pure kinetic energy weapon. But that is probably outside the scope of 'warhead'.
I think its a shame how much ingenuity we humans use for finding ways to destroy people and material. But that's the way it is.
What I am missing in this article is the way a warhead or whatever you use is launched and delivered to its target, but probably that's enough for one or more completely separate articles.

Wow, this has caused a lot of interest

Orcus,

Thanks for the code, changes now made. You'd think that a C++ programmer wouldn't have this much difficulty with a markup language, wouldn't you ..........

Oh, yes, you are all much appreciated

Kenrick,

Am I the only person to find it ironic that everyone is being so spectacularly friendly on a thread about weapons, I've seen some less civilised exchanges on threads about more civilised topics!

IV,

Cheers, yes I did understand. I too am prone to furor; I bent the ear of everyone at work for days when 'U571' was released.

Colonel,

I have just reread the chaff and flares bit and you're quite right, I have changed it accordingly.

As to 'artillery flares', 'starshell' and all the other names given to these things, I did consider including them but I finally felt that since they are fundamentally not harmful in themselves (though personally I don't feel a strong inclination to experience the effect of ten kilos of burning magnesium land on me) they probably fall outside the definition of a warhead. I don't have enormously strong feelings on the matter one way or the other though so I'm open to argument.

Marijn,

We humans are astounding aren't we?

Delivery systems, I sense that such a thing could be the work of months, sadly I'm not sure I have that kind of time. 'Warheads' was knocked up in my lunch hour

Many thanks all,

Cestus

Hi Cestus, sorry but couldn't resist this post

*Orcus,

Thanks for the code, changes now made. You'd think that a C++ programmer wouldn't have this much difficulty with a markup language, wouldn't you ..........*

You make me feel less mortal.
Is C++ easier then?

*Kenrick,

Am I the only person to find it ironic that everyone is being so spectacularly friendly on a thread about weapons, I've seen some less civilised exchanges on threads about more civilised topics!*

What could you mean?

*'Warheads' was knocked up in my lunch hour*

I look forward to a well thought out entry from you then

Orcus

Hi Orcus,

_ Is C++ easier then? _

I didn't used to think so, I do find it logical to write, but debugging is a nightmare unless you normally speak Martian (mine's a bit rusty)

_ I look forward to a well thought out entry from you then _

53 minutes, while eating a sandwich and a bag of crisps. I don't think they give prizes for speed though. I'll try and do a well thought out one for you sometime, actually I wrote one on the Celestial Sphere for the UOL, I can't remember the A number offhand but it is supposed to form part of the 'Stars' project. That took over two hours.

All the best,

Cestus

Cestus: my 1/30 of a euro's worth -
"As to 'artillery flares', ... I did consider including them .... I don't have enormously strong feelings ...I'm open to argument."
My "argument" (suggestion) would be... I've always thought of a warhead as being "the pointy bit". Now, the pointy bit might be designed to explode, cause a fire, make a hole, provide bright light, or whatever. But if the intention is to use the thing in a war, and it's on the head of something that gets fired, that's a warhead. Of course, this is only my "man in the street" definition, not technical, and of course including all that stuff probably means at least another lunch hour!

About everyone being so friendly: It seems that everyone this weekend is being too friendly. Even the in-house team at the Towers were wishing everyone a 'nice weekend'. So just watch your back everyone!

Honestly though, enjoy it while it lasts as things can get a bit harsh down here at times.

Kenrick

Hoovooloo,

Well, I did say I was amenable to argument

I think you make a fair point, I'll have a crack at it when I get a moment.

Kenrick,

I will enjoy it while I can.........

Cestus