The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Speedy Keep #1 - Bluerasberry is only asking for the contents of this article to be merged not deleted and no one else has put forward a deletion reason. Merge discussions should take place on one of the article talk pages of the involved articles ~ GB fan 10:14, 28 March 2017 (UTC).[reply]

Salted bomb (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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I could be mistaken about this nomination but I think this concept is another name for "dirty bomb". I see two claims here which suggest a distinction from "dirty bomb" - perhaps the manufacturing process includes some Salt (chemistry) ingredient that merits the name, and perhaps the bomb refers to "salting the earth". I do not see any sources cited about the chemistry of salting, so I think that is dubious. The "salting the earth" part might be correct, but a dirty bomb does that also, so that makes me think these are the same concept.

There are not many sources cited here, and not all of them talk about "salted bombs". Some sources do, and I agree that "salted bomb" is a term for describing something. I only disagree that it is a distinct concept from dirty bomb. The base concept is a bomb which is designed both to explode, and also to poison a region for years or centuries or longer with radioactive contamination.

I think all of the content here should be merged to dirty bomb but I thought that I would seek comments from others. Thoughts? Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:02, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. The contents of the two articles make it clear that they are distinct types of weapons. A dirty bomb is a conventional explosive device in which some type of radioactive material is added. A salted bomb is a nuclear weapon that has been designed to produce extra radioactive fallout. Even though there is some overlap in the intended consequences of using these two different types of weapons, I think they are clearly distinct enough to warrant two separate articles. Edgeweyes (talk) 21:02, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Edgeweyes Do you have any comment on whether the sources cited make a distinction? I confirm that the contents of the Wikipedia articles assert a distinction. I fail to identify cited sources which distinguish the two concepts, and am wondering if this is a second name for the same concept despite the assertion in Wikipedia. Ideally, I would like to see a source mentioning both concepts and distinguishing them, if in fact they are different concepts. Blue Rasberry (talk) 21:20, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think the fact that the references describe one as a nuclear weapon (e.g. nuclearweaponarchive.org ref) and the other as a conventional explosive (nrc.gov ref) is more than sufficient distinction to indicate that one is not a second name for the other. Edgeweyes (talk) 22:23, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I understand. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:42, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. These are two speculative weapon concepts that are substantially different both by operating principle (nuclear explosion vs conventional explosion or even a crop duster) and impact (possible end of human civilization vs hundreds of casualties). The fact that they stand so far apart makes it rather hard to find a source that mentions both. Typically, the "dirty bomb" concept is associated with terrorism (example) while the "salted bomb" seems to be far out of reach for any terrorist organization and is only relevant at the state level (example). Probably this clear distinction in a given context contributed to the naming confusion in some sources where either type of weapon can be called "dirty" or "salted". This may raise a question whether these articles are named correctly in Wikipedia, but so far it seems that they're in agreement with most of the sources. Regardless or article names though, I don't see any reasons to merge them since concepts behind them are clearly different. Salmin (talk) 05:52, 28 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.