Just to back up what others have said a "suitcase nuke" is so unlikely as to be pretty much ruled out.

Even if such things were actually made by the USSR, they would have had be constantly maintained to just keep them viable due to the natural breakdown of the fissile material. Unless the Russians still have some from the Soviet-era, have been maintaining them all this time, and just gave one to North Korea within like a year ago, I think it's impossible.

Of course old units could still be sold to terrorists for use in dirty bombs.

djohnsto77
Suitcase nukes are very rare and it's questionable are there any operational examples left, there were, i'm sure about that... seen some old 80's intel reports on them

How about a 152mm nuclear artillery shell? It's a very compact weapon, does anyone have any info how long those can be maintained?

Originally posted by djohnsto77

"suitcase nuke"

they would have had be constantly maintained to just keep them viable due to the natural breakdown of the fissile material.

Why would they have to maintain them constantly? Wouldn't it be possible (and cheaper) to just add the polonium later, when they needed to use them?

I've heard rumours that the polonium which killed Litvinenko was meant to be used to arm some suitcase nuke(s) in the UK. Maybe to be used as a terror weapon. I hope this is not true, of course...

According to Richard Marcinko who claims to have handled suitcase nukes on a few occasions has described them being about 40LBs can fit in a backpack look like (the older ones) a thick baseball bat sized rod about 18 inches long. on one side is the warhead which looks like a stack of weights. On the other end is something about the size of an oil filter that I guess holds the detonator. they need to be assembled on sight but that it only takes a few seconds to do that. He says that the things were strong enough to take out major highway interchanges or level a block or so.

It's coming from Richard Marcinko (good or bad) so for what it's worth.

Yeah the guy talked about how he infiltrated a nuclear weapons facility with his team on the east coast by simply walking in using the rail road track that went ungaurded with no fencing right through the middle of the base.

Snuck onto nuclear missile subs by either stealing at the local hangout bar the night before a drunk tech worker's ID card for the docking facility, walked right in holding his thumb over the picture and flashed the ID. he said if anybody challenged him he told them that he worked for general electric or any one of the other contractor companies that worked on the subs. It worked he got everything he needed from the inside of the sub to make the CO of the base look like an idiot.

"Blew Up" Air Force One in a mock terrorist assult at Point Magu, outwitting the Naval Police, Local Police, Feds, The Secret Service, Renta Cops, various other base security, and the local fire department. Even snuck in a Mock terrorist on Camp David 3 LBs of C4 within 15 feet of President Ronald Regan personal cabin there.

Says that decades later the security at just about every base including the nuclear ones are every bit just as vulnerable as it was when he tested it. Including the exact same faults he found way back in the day. He thinks our homeland security really sucks.

Apparently we hid secret caches of portable nukes all through out eastern europe. Our plan was to have some SF guys from unknown departments or detachments live simple alter ego lives in the respective country where the US hid one of their secret caches, and in the event of WW3 or a Warsaw invasion of nato territory, blow up the nukes.

the plan was to let the first invasion force come through into eastern europe from the then USSR. once they got through blow the nukes to destroy the chosen highways interchanges bridges etc so that they would be cut off from the main force. NATO allies could then surround the initial invasion force and take them out while cutting off the USSR from invading anything any further than that point.

I'm explaining this quick so hopefully it makes sense if not I'll reexplain. But basically we still have those caches. the ussr had a similar strategy and have similar hidden caches. according to some , a few of those caches have been found raided and portable nukes have shown up missing. where they are now and who took them is another issue all together.

If Aleksandr Lebed was right, there might be more than 100 Russian suitcase nukes on the loose. These nukes were originally ordered by the KGB, are now allegedly missing and probably for sale on the black market. Al Qaeda no.2, Zawahiri, said that such devices can be bought on the black market by anyone with $10 million. For some reason, I believe him. And consider this: Litvinenko's assassination with Polonium might have been a clear message to those who know, that such portable nuke devices might have been armed with Polonium and are now ready for use, if they are to blackmail someone. Otherwise, no such message or warnings would be given. The blackmail could i.e. be something like: "Pull your troops out of Iraq, or we'll blow up a couple of suitcase nukes in your city!". They might have already tested and verified that these devices work, in North Korea. It's amazing what some people (like Mogilevich) would do for money. Do such people expect to live forever or something? What's the point having unlimited amounts of money on your bank account if/when you're dead? Nobody lives forever. I can't see the point of having more money than you can spend in a lifetime. But what do I know? Nothing at all. Just connecting the dots and speculate. I hope I'm wrong.

The suitcase bombs have long since been accepted as being genuine.
Many Russian defectors who had access to them and had obvious knowkedge due to their command positions verified it.
Whats remained unclear is whether they would still be useable (which most observers thought not ) and exactly who had them.
I remember this subject being discussed here quite deeply about 3 years ago but have been unable to find the thread.
Since then of course more information has come to light and more people have confirmed their existence.
Moscow has continued not to get drawn into discussions about them and even claim they were never made.....but they are hardly likely to admit that they had them and now they dont know where they are.
Just the same as they claim their Yam evil mountain projects are a figment of everyones immagination.
Their possible reason for remaining their calm is maybe because they know exactly who has them and that they dont pose a threat to Russia.
These babies are destined for the West......just as they were originally designed for back in the old days.