X-Nico

Violet Club

One track led to an intermediate design, the so-called Type A thermonuclear design, similar to the Alarm Clock and layer cake hybrid designs of other nuclear powers; although these designs are now regarded as large boosted fission weapons, and no longer regarded as thermonuclear weapons that derive a very large part of their energy from a fusion reaction, designated by the British as Type B, but as hybrids.

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In 1953, shortly after the Americans tested a thermonuclear weapon in 1952, followed by the Soviets with Joe 4, and before the UK government took a decision in July 1954 to develop a thermonuclear weapon, the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston was asked about the possibilities for a very large pure fission bomb with a yield of one megaton.

see also