Limited Nuclear Engagement

Starvaion Problem

One difficulty is that nuclear winter is likely (per physicists) even in a limited India-Pakistan exchange. Such an exchange was in preparation (without the knowledge of chief executives in either country) during yet another Kashmir crisis in the late 90s. It took all of Clinton's bluster to get it shut down.

That exchange, the most likely to occur, would not mean the end of humanity. It would however result in starvation to the point of "body piles" and consequent secondary effects -- pandemics.

The evolutionary bottle-neck of several tens of thousands of years ago show we can survive as a species and reproduce from a base level of 10,000 fertile, so we would get through it. And it's hard to look at Donald Trump, the Kardashian hegemony, Miley Virus, or other examples of how uselessly anti-human modern social converse is, and not wonder if a punch restart (not the one Hillary mis-spelled for Putin a few years ago) would not be perhaps a necessary evolutionary side-step putting us on track for a higher level civilization (on the energy to achievement ratio outlined by the Pentagon report) in another five or seven hundred years.

Just saying .....
 
One difficulty is that nuclear winter is likely (per physicists) even in a limited India-Pakistan exchange. Such an exchange was in preparation (without the knowledge of chief executives in either country) during yet another Kashmir crisis in the late 90s. It took all of Clinton's bluster to get it shut down.

That exchange, the most likely to occur, would not mean the end of humanity. It would however result in starvation to the point of "body piles" and consequent secondary effects -- pandemics.

The evolutionary bottle-neck of several tens of thousands of years ago show we can survive as a species and reproduce from a base level of 10,000 fertile, so we would get through it. And it's hard to look at Donald Trump, the Kardashian hegemony, Miley Virus, or other examples of how uselessly anti-human modern social converse is, and not wonder if a punch restart (not the one Hillary mis-spelled for Putin a few years ago) would not be perhaps a necessary evolutionary side-step putting us on track for a higher level civilization (on the energy to achievement ratio outlined by the Pentagon report) in another five or seven hundred years.

Just saying .....

Nuclear winter has long since been discredited has it not? Even Sagan and his fellow "nuclear winterists" backed off of it before Sagan died.
 
Remember that the meteorite impact that created the Great Meteor Crater in the Arizona IIRC, hit with an estimated force of 800 megatons.

Equivalent to 2,400 330 kiloton warheads (a typical sized strategic nuclear weapon) detonating all at once.

And as far as we know, no nuclear winter resulted from that. Not even a nuclear "autumn".
 
And if by any small chance nuclear winter actually happened we just fixed global warming.

You laugh, but creating an artificial "nuclear winter" by spraying sulfates in the upper atmosphere is a serious proposal for how to deal with climate change.

Remember that the meteorite impact that created the Great Meteor Crater in the Arizona IIRC, hit with an estimated force of 800 megatons.

Equivalent to 2,400 330 kiloton warheads (a typical sized strategic nuclear weapon) detonating all at once.

And as far as we know, no nuclear winter resulted from that. Not even a nuclear "autumn".

Not really the same thing. The nuclear winter effect is supposed to be created by ash from burning cities being lofted into the upper atmosphere, not just raw megatonnage.

Is nuclear winter real? I dunno. I've read some of the modern papers, and I'm not really convinced by them, but I'm not sure. All I really know is that I'd rather not find out the hard way.
 
You laugh, but creating an artificial "nuclear winter" by spraying sulfates in the upper atmosphere is a serious proposal for how to deal with climate change.



Not really the same thing. The nuclear winter effect is supposed to be created by ash from burning cities being lofted into the upper atmosphere, not just raw megatonnage.

Is nuclear winter real? I dunno. I've read some of the modern papers, and I'm not really convinced by them, but I'm not sure. All I really know is that I'd rather not find out the hard way.

That assumes a nuclear war involves two things that are contradictory.

Ground bursts that thrown large amounts of particulates into the atmosphere

And ash from cities burning

But cities are more likely to be attacked by airbursts which do not throw nearly as much particulate matter into the atmosphere and do not always produce firestorms (there was no firestorm at Nagasaki for example)
 
That assumes a nuclear war involves two things that are contradictory.

Ground bursts that thrown large amounts of particulates into the atmosphere

And ash from cities burning

But cities are more likely to be attacked by airbursts which do not throw nearly as much particulate matter into the atmosphere and do not always produce firestorms (there was no firestorm at Nagasaki for example)

The modern papers assume that the ash will be lofted by columns of hot air created by burning cities, not by the force of the explosion itself.
 
The modern papers assume that the ash will be lofted by columns of hot air created by burning cities, not by the force of the explosion itself.

Which IIRC assumes firestorms which do not occur all the time.

IIRC, it is very difficult for a firestorm to form over cities that are hilly like San Francisco or Pittsburgh
 
Which IIRC assumes firestorms which do not occur all the time.

IIRC, it is very difficult for a firestorm to form over cities that are hilly like San Francisco or Pittsburgh

So, I haven't read all the papers. But the ones I did read, one of my big problems with them actually was that they didn't explain how the ash got lofted at all - whether there was a firestorm or what. They just assumed it all got into the stratosphere, then calculated what would happen once it was there. It's only real evidence in support of this is that some ash from forest fires got into the stratosphere... Though in very small amounts, I would note.

My own opinion, for what it's worth, is that - in the absence of a substantial research effort that does not appear to be forthcoming - we just can't know if nuclear winter is real, or how severe it would be if it is. I think this is another example of the many uncertainties around nuclear war.
 
Remember that the meteorite impact that created the Great Meteor Crater in the Arizona IIRC, hit with an estimated force of 800 megatons.

Equivalent to 2,400 330 kiloton warheads (a typical sized strategic nuclear weapon) detonating all at once.

And as far as we know, no nuclear winter resulted from that. Not even a nuclear "autumn".

So what? That is a single point source. The nuclear winter issue compes up because hundreds of cities are buring in firestorms, not because of one large ground burst anywhere.

A better example is look at the year without a summer in 1815 caused by the Tambora volcano. Compare the estimated ash levels to the amounts expected from a nuclear war. For that matter, you also have to try and determine what kind of nuclear war you are fighting. A counterforce attack will cause a lot of fallout from groundbursts at ICBM silos, but would have a lower nuclear winter risk because few cities are being targeted.

All in all, this is one of the many uncertainties about nuclear war that I would rather see stay theoretical.
 
So what? That is a single point source. The nuclear winter issue compes up because hundreds of cities are buring in firestorms, not because of one large ground burst anywhere.
Except they aren't, because firestorms are rather difficult to start. Despite deliberate efforts to start them in WW2, there were only three definite and two possible firestorms out of all the cities bombed. Quite a lot needs to go exactly right to get a firestorm going - any significant wind at the target, for instance, breaks it up. Hills disrupt it. If the target has been sufficiently flattened by blast, the weapon just made its' own firebreak and there's no firestorm.

Personally, I buy the idea that there would be some cooling - it's hard to see why there wouldn't - but more a 'nuclear autumn' than a 'nuclear winter'. That said, debating the aftermath of a nuclear exchange is a little like arguing over whether being hit in the balls with a brick or a cricket bat is worse.
 
That would depend on the number and size of weapons used. There was a study done where if Pakistan and India used 100 Hiroshima sized nukes, it would be enough to cause global cooling, border line ice age and thin the atmosphere to the point that marine life can be affected by the ultraviolet rays. Sun burn would be more prominent as well as skin cancer.

http://www.nucleardarkness.org/warconsequences/fivemilliontonsofsmoke/

now that I am looking back at the other posts, it looks like I am late in bringing this link up.
 
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The evolutionary bottle-neck of several tens of thousands of years ago show we can survive as a species and reproduce from a base level of 10,000 fertile, so we would get through it. And it's hard to look at Donald Trump, the Kardashian hegemony, Miley Virus, or other examples of how uselessly anti-human modern social converse is, and not wonder if a punch restart (not the one Hillary mis-spelled for Putin a few years ago) would not be perhaps a necessary evolutionary side-step putting us on track for a higher level civilization (on the energy to achievement ratio outlined by the Pentagon report) in another five or seven hundred years.

Just saying .....

Personally, I think a colony in space 30-40 years from now would be a more humane option.
 
Except they aren't, because firestorms are rather difficult to start. Despite deliberate efforts to start them in WW2, there were only three definite and two possible firestorms out of all the cities bombed. Quite a lot needs to go exactly right to get a firestorm going - any significant wind at the target, for instance, breaks it up. Hills disrupt it. If the target has been sufficiently flattened by blast, the weapon just made its' own firebreak and there's no firestorm.

Personally, I buy the idea that there would be some cooling - it's hard to see why there wouldn't - but more a 'nuclear autumn' than a 'nuclear winter'. That said, debating the aftermath of a nuclear exchange is a little like arguing over whether being hit in the balls with a brick or a cricket bat is worse.

Neither of which are likely to cause death, long term injury or depending on the situation that much pain in real life.
 
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