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Originally Posted by PTTG
Nuclear blasts in space are extremely limited in effective radius, especially if the surface of the target has even light armor.
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That's not really so. The energy that would go into the shockwave and a portion of the thermal pulse in an atmosphere remain as a very powerful x-ray pulse in space. X-rays have fairly good penetration and those that don't penetrate any armour will heat it greatly and very rapidly, quite possibly causing it to vaporise or turn into plasma. Given the extremely short time in which that will happen, that will cause a powerful shock to the ship.
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Neutron bombs bypass that armor effectively, and therefore increase the effective radius of the warhead.
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Neutron shielding is fairly easy to install, and fuel tanks of hydrogen, etc., are quite effective neutron barriers.