Why are there no nuclear weapons in Star Wars?

It seems to me, that the Star Wars galaxy, as advanced as it was, would have figured out how to split an atom. As such, would have figured out how to use it as a bomb. It just seems to me that having tactical nukes in your arsenal would be a wise military decision. If a bombardment of standard torpedoes can take down the shields to a Star Destroyer, wouldn't the sheer destructive power of a nuclear missile work better? Given the size of the Executor, standard attacks would have been ineffective...The EU spent a great deal of time trying to sell the idea that Super Star Destroyers were incredibly powerful, and extremely difficult to destroy. Iron Fist and Lusankya come to mind. However, perhaps instead of trying to take out Star Destroyers or Super Star Destroyers using X-Wings, smuggle a nuclear weapon on board and detonate. Instead of needing to send the Falcon in to destroy the DS II, if you could get a nuclear device inside the Death Star, shoot...send an unmanned shuttle with a nuke inside, let the Imperials take it in with their tractor beams, like they do with the Falcon in ANH, and detonate it in the hangar bay. It wouldn't destroy the entire DS, but it would remove a considerable chunk, and either significantly damage the Death Star, or cause enough havoc so the the Death Star is completely dead in space. This would apply to Trade Federation Command ships as well...Their shields are fine against the lasers from Naboo fighter, but would they hold up against a nuke? If our primitive technology allows us to destroy an entire city with one shot, there is no reason to believe that with their technology, they can't build an effective nuclear device. They can build a Death Star that can completely obliterate planets, turning them into asteroid fields, surely they can harness the power of the atom to create a weapon more powerful than a torpedo, but not quite Death Star power.

 

Our most powerful nuclear weapon ever detonated would do nothing if exploded right next to a Star Destroyer.

The turbolaser bolts have power ranges measured in gigatons per shot. It may not look like much because they do not explode in all directions. Make no mistake that the technology and power levels of the GFFA is far greater than our own my many orders of magnitude.

Think of the one sided domination the fleet of the Star Trek Federation would have against modern day Earth. The Empire could do the same to the Federation.

 

but then wouldn't a single shot from a capital ship hitting another capital ship that lost its shielding completely annihilating it, instead of doing hull damage? If a turbolaser shot is measured in gigatons, and Star Destroyer hulls are strong enough to withstand gigaton blasts, there is simply no way to explain why the A-Wing can get through the transparisteel window on the Executor. If they are that strong, the A-Wing should have bounced off, shields or not.

 

My take is they are advanced enough to realize the long term dangers of radiation.

 

Ok, but, if you are planning to destroy the object, lets say the Death Star, and everyone that is on it, what difference would radiation poisoning make? You were planning on blowing up everyone in the thing, so, you wouldn't really be concerned with the long lasting effects of radiation. Its not like having to worry about the long term effects on citizens of Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

 

But not to realise the long-term dangers of unchecked emotion.

Actually, though ..... that's a good answer, Go-Mer.

In fact, that dichotomy is quite significant, I feel -- the former circumstance heightens the latter.

There might be some "gentleman's agreement" (I'm using that term very loosely) that "weapons of mass destruction" are inhumane and out of the question. On the other hand, the Death Star is a weapon of mass destruction (quite literally), but it seems more like a perversion of the existing code -- like a loophole exploitation taken to the nth degree. Still a weapon of mass destruction, but a new kind that somehow (albeit, insidiously) obeys the existing rules . . .

The near-bloodless, highly sanitised version of struggle depicted in "Star Wars" is very interesting. Of course, Lucas has kept gore at a minimum for some very clear reasons, but that seems to have allowed more emphasis to be placed on the more pressing ideas of suffering and sacrifice and the various moral consequences, rather than the immediate, gruesome, grizzly aspect of combat itself. Some may say that the latter is important for feeding into the former; normally, I'd agree ... but SW has its own unique aesthetic. On the other hand, Lucas clearly thought differently in the beginning -- witness the charred corpses of Owen and Beru and the bloody arm on the floor of the Cantina (and Luke's bloodied face in TESB). A bit of grit goes a long way . . .

The short answer in all of this -- and the one I was tempted to post and leave at that -- is that "Star Wars" is a fantasy. But to be slightly deeper: in some ways, the Death Star itself represents the A-Bomb and the worst possible outcome of nuclear conflict .... utter annihilation. Trying to "real world-ize" the saga doesn't work too well. The issue that has come up more than once is: why don't they orbitally bombard planets / bases into submission? It's best to avoid trying to twist and skew the existing logic of the films into something that would result in the grip of death for all art and fantasy.

 

I'm going to have to agree that the technology in GFFA is far superior and beyond the use of nuclear weapons. I've never heard anyone say that any ship's deflectors were completely down. I believe that the ship's shields would protect them from a nuclear weapon.

As for nuke's taking out the Death Star, look at the DSII when the Executor crashed into it. A Star Destroyer has several fusion reactors and the damage (though a pretty big fireball) was minimal. It wasn't until flying into the super structure and blowing the main reactor that the Death Star was destroyed.

The real question is why we're debating technology from a fictional series of movies. They have fireballs and sound in space.

 

Fireballs in space are reasonable because there's air inside the ships that provide fuel for the fire. Sound in space is merely for the benefit of the audience. There's no indictation that the characters on screen can hear the sounds.

 

I imagine that when a Star destroyer flew into the DS2, that it was felt throughout the entire station..

If a nuke was set off inside the DS2 where the main reactor was, it might cause a sort of destablisation or even a significant uncontrolled reaction. Whatever the reactor was using for fuel could "enhance" the fusion properties of the nuke's radioactive ingrediants, thus turning the Death Star into a "real" star for a little while.

 

The Wook has a very brief history on the use of nuclear weaponry in the GFFA.



http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Nuclear_bomb

 

From what I've seen, they have moved waaaaay beyond the use of nuclear weapons.Nukes may be primative next to their weapons. Effective but still primative.

Besides, their tech may be able to withstand nukes. Shields, & maybe even their alloys.

As to poisioning the crew of the Death Star with radiation: that mode of death is not instant. They'll still be able to take out a planet before they die. Even sick.

 

Perhaps they've moved past nivlear weapons, or perhaps they skipped it, it looks like they stumbled across technologies a long time ago that we've never come across. Or maybe its a fantasy film, and Nukes would be stupid in a fantasy film.

 

Nuclear weapons are Earth-based.

Remember, this is fantasy, not sci-fi. Not everything we have, they have, and vice-versa. They also don't have the internet there. Or hamburgers. Or the ****** boring NFL.

 

The Holonet is like the Internet... See?

 

So are you suggesting that the Star Wars galaxy doesn't use fundamental elements that make material matter, such as atoms? If not, are you suggesting that a galaxy in which they have figured out how to travel faster than the speed of light, that they never scientifically examined those atoms, and figured out that there is an incredible amount of energy that can be obtained from splitting it? Atoms are everywhere, and splitting them will generate the same nuclear explosion on Earth, or Coruscant. Atomic energy is not limited to Earth.

 

That's right, they went far beyond us in all areas. Their internet spans an entire galaxy and in a 3D format as well. They went beyond nuclear energy and found hypermatter. Fission and fusion and even antimatter may be used in smaller devices, but hypermatter powers the big things. They can clone millions of troops and have them ready in less than a lifetime; travel the galaxy like we travel our own planet; they don;t need nuclear weapons because such weapons would be many, many steps backwards.

 

Star Wars is science fiction ... and the anti-matter bombs are "futuristic" nukes.

 

I've wondered the same thing, Darth_Davi, but it occurred to me that it would be an interuption to the story-telling. Having one massive super weapon in a world with lots of cool technology, but no real weapons of mass destructions, works better in terms of building suspense.

 

Perhaps in comparison to the DS the rest of the weapons seem minor, but as pointed out the numerous bolts of energy seen thrown about individually release more energy than anything we have on modern Earth; at least the ones coming from capital ships I should say.

Millenium Falcon Vs Modern Earth = victory for Han Solo. It'd take awhile because Han's weapons are not nearly as powerful as a SD's, but nothing we have is getting through those shields.

 

You think the Falcon shields could withstand a nuclear blast?

 

That is exactly why I created the thread, Darth-Stryphe. I tend to think a ship that size having shields capable of deflecting a multi-ton nuclear detonation rather...unlikely. If you detonated a nuclear weapon right next to the Falcon, with shields up, the Falcon would be obliterated, just like everything else would.

In terms of Star Wars technology, a nuclear device would be primitive, but even primitive technology can also be highly effective. If an A-Wing can penetrate the bridge of the Executor, the hull can hardly be strong enough to withstand a nuclear blast. A nuclear bomb, brought into the hangar bay by a tractor beam, such as how the Falcon ended up on the Death Star, and then detonated, would be an extremely effective way to kill a Star Destroyer. Even if the shields were strong enough, all you have to do is get the nuclear device inside the shields. Dummying up a freighter and tricking the Imperials into tractoring it in seems to be an effective mode of delivery. A nuclear bomb would completely destroy a Star Destroyer, from the inside. I also don't buy the argument that Star Destroyer lasers are stronger than a nuclear explosion. There is nothing in the films to support that, nor does the EU support such a theory. In fact, the EU suggests you would need to fire multiple shots from a Star Destroyer to destroy a city.

I reject the notion that hulls were strong enough to absorb the energy created from a nuclear weapon, and I also reject the idea that Star Destroyer laser bolts are stronger than a nuclear blast as well. I have seen no proof whatsoever that those ideas are valid, nor has anyone provided any proof from an official source. Jawas_Poodoo provided a link to Wookiepedia, but that only confirmed that the GFFA had the ability to create nuclear weapons, and that they were highly effective. That link only strengthened my original notion that nuclear weapons would be an effective way to take out your enemy. Nobody has provided any proof that nuclear weapons wouldn't be effective.

 

You can check the SW Tech Commentaries, SD.net, Turbolasers commentaries, and various other pages where someone with education and some equipment decided to do some mathf or us and show that SD turbolaser bolts put out far more energy than our most powerful nuclear weapons.

 

and yet the link which Jawas_Poodoo provided says that they did have their versions of nukes, and they were used as effective weapons. If you know of specific sources that contradict the wookiepedia entry, by all means, post links to them, so that I might see the error in my thinking. So far the only link I have seen seems to support my position. If the data proves otherwise, fine...so prove it. And, considering the link Jawas_Poodoo gave us tells you where the information came from...namely, official Star Wars sources, I suggest you provide a very reputable source to contradict it.

 

Reputable source? How about math given by people with PhDs? Not good enough because it's real? Turbolasers > nuclear weapons. An author using nuclear weapons as we define them here on Earth as something superior has not done their homework on the subject.

 

So, in other words, you got nothing. You can't demonstrate that turbolaser blasts are stronger than a nuclear explosion, so you refer to completely unnamed authors, mathematical concepts that you haven't actually listed, and vague concepts without actually being able to contradict the concept. Officially, per multiple official Star Wars sources, they have unlocked the ability to split the atom and use it as a weapon. Nobody has shown a single bit of evidence that suggests that turbolasers are stronger. It has been alluded to, however nobody has actually linked to anything confirming it. Until I see proof, its just speculation, and an assumption that is without merit. Again, all I ask is for proof. Instead of just saying there are sources, tell me what those sources are. If you have a Star Wars technical manual that specifically contradicts the idea of nuclear weapons, despite those nuclear weapons already being canonical, instead of just saying its in a manual, tell me which manual. Its one thing to claim you have evidence, and completely another to actually show that evidence. You can tell me you have evidence all day long, until you actually produce that evidence, its worthless.