What is the difference between nuclear and thermonuclear weapon?

Question

What is the difference between nuclear and thermonuclear weapon?

In: 205

Answer 1

Both refer to nuclear weapons but “thermonuclear” specifically refers to weapons that use nuclear fusion of low-weight atoms (typically hydrogen, hence, hydrogen bomb or H-bomb). Nuclear fission (of uranium or plutonium) can be initiated at any temperature, but fusion only begins to occur at very high temperatures; hence the ‘thermo’ part. But typically with weapons that high temperature is created by first detonating a fission bomb.