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Bulletins and News Discussion from June 12th to June 18th - Hex(anitrohexaazaisowurtzitane)bear

Image is a ball-and-stick model of a molecule of CL-20, alternatively known as hexanitrohexaazaisowurtzitane, taken from Wikipedia.

Much of this preamble is taken from this article.

CL-20 is the most deadly non-nuclear explosive that humanity has yet discovered, capable of generating detonation velocities and pressures higher than other military explosives like TNT, RDX, and HMX. If you have a more powerful explosive, you can make your missiles travel further and/or make them smaller. It also helps the creation of nuclear missiles, as to start the nuclear chain reaction, you need a powerful shockwave to get all the atoms in there to mingle. The problem is that it's a little too explosive, making it exceedingly difficult to not only manufacture, but transport. I mean, America can hardly transport some chemicals across the country without poisoning entire towns. Thus, it isn't really used in many known military applications.

In 1994, in China, Professor Yu Yongzhong synthesized the first CL-20 compound in his laboratory. America came along and said 'Actually, we did it first, in 1987.' The US team said that despite it being such a powerful explosive, the cost of making and testing it was too high, and the collapse of the Soviet Union meant that there wasn't really much interest in that kind of weapons arms race anymore. Production therefore fell to the wayside, while China kept at it, investing in its production and testing.

China has recently found a way to synthesize it to make it five times as shock-resistant. This shock resistance is essentially measured by dropping an object onto it and measuring the height you need to drop it from to make it explode. The previous record was 13 cm / 5 inches, whereas now it is 68 cm, or about 27 inches. US military experts already fear that China has designed its weaponry to use CL-20 and thus this will give them an advantage in missile technology.

(Also, fun fact, CL-20 is called that because it was developed in the China Lake facility in California.)

Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Here is the archive of important pieces of analysis from throughout the war that we've collected.

This week's first update is here in the comments.

This week's second update is here in the comments.

This week's third update is here in the comments.

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704 comments

  • Big Serge speculates that with the Kakhovka reservoir now essentially turned into a big mud flat, the intention behind the dam bursting - if it was intentionally done, which the jury is still out on - might have been to simplify the amphibious assault on the ZNPP by making it, well, less amphibious. Ukraine initially released a ton of water seemingly to exacerbate the flooding downstream, but is now totally holding it back, leading the reservoir to dry out.

    I think I'm swinging back in the direction of that Ukraine burst the dam. As Big Serge explains, it would make a lot of sense to have this situation be in place if the Ukrainian assault from Orikhiv towards Tokmak had been successful and they were currently setting up shop in the first or second defense lines, because you could do a pincer attack on the ZNPP. The time scale is just lining up too well. I think they're still holding out hope that a breakthrough can be made and are continuing to hold back the water, which correlates well if reports are true that they're amassing forces on the Orikhiv axis once again. But without that breakthrough, they'd have to drive and run across a mud flat - areas with a distinct lack of cover to put it mildly - in the face of dominant Russian artillery and aviation.

    It is a fascinatingly ambitious plan if it did/does work, but then I'm always fascinated when militaries bend and even break the environment to their advantage.

704 comments