Experimental data from several performance and sensitivity tests have been combined after normalization to define a single performance and a security characteristic term, respectively. This allows to evaluate pure compounds and special formulations with regard to a well balanced ratio of performance and sensitivity. A graph shows an imaginary border line what has to be interpreted in the sense that-in the praxis of explosive charges-high performance is accompanied by an enhanced sensitivity and that an insensitive explosive will not exhibit a top performance. As this result cannot be proved by theory one should imagine that there are also exceptions, i.e. explosives which approach the ideal high explosive (with high performance and high security) what is exemplified.