Yes, I watched the video. Bix Weir is an absolute fool.
The scientists wanted and specified copper. It couldn't be had. It was being used to make wires for airplanes and battleships and shells for firearms and cannon. Nothing to do with electrical properties. Silver was acceptable and available, and suggested by the government. (How else were they going to get bomb material? The only other approach was breeding and separating plutonium and perfecting the implosion bomb, which they were also following. As it was, they were able to obtain only enough enriched uranium to make ONE bomb.)
The silver was still in government custody, so the accounting was not strictly dishonest. The fact that it was being used for purposes other than financial was a legitimate war secret.
The calutrons were mass spectrometers, and represented a highly involving and inefficient process for enriching uranium to bomb-grade material. Subsequently to World War II the gaseous diffusion process was perfected, thus making the calutron approach OBSOLETE. Nobody bothers with it any more.
The last silver-wound calutron was dismantled in the late 1960s and the silver restored to the Treasury in 1970. The copper-wound calutrons remained in service until the 1990s. Mr. Weir didn't even pay attention to the documentary he cites, which explained this fact.
Why were they kept in service? They were still mass spectrometers and were capable of separating other nuclear elements such as neptunium, californium, and americium for research purposes and nuclear characterization studies. These elements would not have been available from the gaseous diffusion process. (And it is a good question how we might obtain more supplies today.)
The USGS table is nothing but a canvas for his fantasy-making. Secondary production perked up in the 1990s and remained very high thereafter. Part of that, I expect, was from the salvage processing of photographic film, since chemical photography was falling out of favor. His theory is purely imaginary.
Is there any more silver? Beats me, but if you look up the production statistics, the 2021 world mine production of silver was 822.6 Million troy ounces of silver. I kind of think that means there is a lot of silver being pulled out of the ground, and the idea there is a fundamental silver shortage is just nonsense.
This collection of misunderstandings, sheer ignorance, arrogant fancy ("Oh, they would never have taken those calutrons apart"), and contrived conclusions just goes to show that the uneducated and uncritical will swallow nonsense.
Nonsense like Trump is a Russian spy, Hunter Biden is a talented artist, there is no evidence of fraud in the 2020 election, and oh yeah don't forget that Hillary selling 60% of America's Uranium to the Russians is just a savvy business move with America's best interests at heart. Wake up, Brother
You don't have a single response to the factual points I made. You get up on your rhetorical High Horse and double-down on stupid---preferring to live inside a cozy paranoid dream mythology, because it confirms your world view. No room for reality.
This nitwit goes so far as to document that only a few calutrons were made with silver windings and that THE REST were made with copper windings. It was the copper-wound ones that were still in service from 1970 to 1999. His whole story hangs on a stupid ignorance of what was going on. It all falls apart upon close examination by someone who understands the history (which he didn't...and you didn't).
I'm sorry to be so cross, but this is my specialty. I had a Critical Nuclear Weapon Design information (CNWDI) clearance for my 40 years in industry working on nuclear strategic defense. This "story" is a nothingburger. You should dust off your hands and walk away. This guy, Weir, is not an expert and if you take him at face value, you will just be walking on banana peels.
Yes, I watched the video. Bix Weir is an absolute fool.
This collection of misunderstandings, sheer ignorance, arrogant fancy ("Oh, they would never have taken those calutrons apart"), and contrived conclusions just goes to show that the uneducated and uncritical will swallow nonsense.
Nonsense like Trump is a Russian spy, Hunter Biden is a talented artist, there is no evidence of fraud in the 2020 election, and oh yeah don't forget that Hillary selling 60% of America's Uranium to the Russians is just a savvy business move with America's best interests at heart. Wake up, Brother
They educated you.
You don't have a single response to the factual points I made. You get up on your rhetorical High Horse and double-down on stupid---preferring to live inside a cozy paranoid dream mythology, because it confirms your world view. No room for reality.
This nitwit goes so far as to document that only a few calutrons were made with silver windings and that THE REST were made with copper windings. It was the copper-wound ones that were still in service from 1970 to 1999. His whole story hangs on a stupid ignorance of what was going on. It all falls apart upon close examination by someone who understands the history (which he didn't...and you didn't).
I'm sorry to be so cross, but this is my specialty. I had a Critical Nuclear Weapon Design information (CNWDI) clearance for my 40 years in industry working on nuclear strategic defense. This "story" is a nothingburger. You should dust off your hands and walk away. This guy, Weir, is not an expert and if you take him at face value, you will just be walking on banana peels.