Dear Readers, You may be aware that I occasionally have written about the causes of war and the need for peace. This may be tiresome or repetitive for some, although the state of the world demands that something changes before disaster strikes. Thus I take the liberty of delving further into this topic. I understand that not all readers will be able to consider the message herein, as the possibility of a nuclear holocaust is too disturbing. However, my intention is not to inflame emotions but rather to initiate consideration of what can be done.
~ DM
I speak of peace because of the new face of war. Total war makes no sense in an age when great powers can maintain large and relatively invulnerable nuclear forces and refuse to surrender without resort to those forces. It makes no sense in an age when a single nuclear weapon contains almost ten times the explosive force delivered by all the allied air forces in the Second World War. It makes no sense in an age when the deadly poisons produced by a nuclear exchange would be carried by wind and water and soil and seed to the far corners of the globe and to generations yet unborn.
President John F. Kennedy, June 1963
Sixty years ago, as the cold war divided the United States and the Soviet Union, an appropriate response to the nuclear arms race began to emerge. There were some leaders and many people who openly suggested that the direction of humanity was self-destructive; that war served no purpose but to vent aggression, line the pockets of the arms industry, and destroy all semblance of civilization.
This effort was overtly repressed, symbolized by the assassination of a President who reversed his previous support of nuclear weapons and dared to discuss disarmament seriously. He also threatened to destroy an intelligence community immersed in seditious and incendiary tactics that only fueled the cold war.
Eventually, the senselessness of the war in Viet Nam initiated a movement for peace, but it was eclipsed as the United States government applied its military, often subversively to avoid domestic complaints, toward expanding its economic footprint. Within a few decades, the armed services and their missions were once again glorified.
Since the fall of the Soviet Union, a lineup of enemies has been imagined or created to support a Pentagon budget that includes major support for a huge nuclear arsenal. The Russian government has justified modernizing its strategic weaponry based on this continuing escalation.
The Russia-Ukraine war, the increasing conflict between China and the U.S., and the tensions between India and Pakistan are major flash points that could intensify at any moment. Regional violence and civil wars, backed by nuclear powers, have a growing potential to incite greater hostilities. The impact of an international economic crisis will exacerbate this fragile predicament.
Despite some attempts to diminish the possibility of a global nuclear war, a hopeless sense of its inevitability persists. Divisive rhetoric continues to repress the sanity needed to reverse the momentum toward annihilation.
While trillions are spent on fueling conflicts, the daily focus of most individuals continues to be on basic needs; finding affordable housing, paying for food, and worrying about the next disease that might afflict them.
Although these are vital interests, they also serve to distract from the wasting of resources applied to hostilities, and an impending global war that will dramatically impact all aspects of life on the planet.
It is simpler to face today’s basic concerns than seriously consider the firestorm on the horizon. While lesser crises dominate agendas, those who recognize the growing threat of an unprecedented catastrophe are repressed and marginalized.
The unwillingness to face the reality of war is engendered by trance-like divisive thinking.
We are also numbed into assuming that there are entire countries of hostile people who are all our enemies and sub-human. Governments and angry fanatics create an illusion of monolithic adversaries. Just as there is no single political mindset or type of American, it is completely inappropriate to stereotype the Russians, the Chinese, the French, the English, etc.
Yet for those who thrive on divisiveness, it is necessary to paint a picture in black and white; an entire nation must be viewed as a foe. And it is this delusion that allows toleration of possibly exterminating millions of non-combatants with nuclear bombs.
There may be times when we need to protect ourselves from hostility, but when a military defense is only a ruse for offensive action, particularly with nuclear weapons, there are no justifiable grounds for aggression.
This irrational behavior parallels the futility of wars that have risen and fallen like tides throughout history. Yet with the immense power of nuclear weapons, the next gigantic wave of destruction will leave a ruinous landscape around the globe.
In the next great war, violence will be met with violence within minutes.
We somnambulate with blinders on, ignoring the growing prospect of the ultimate battle; refusing to consider the effects.
Wars about borders, wealth, and beliefs that governments deem worthy of fighting, have little to do with the daily lives of individuals. In the regions of the world where armed conflict has become the only approved recourse to resolving diversity and adversity, people’s lives have only degraded further.
For those who don’t live in a war zone, it is much simpler and easier to live in denial and not to consider the likelihood and destructiveness of a Third World War.
The physical and emotional shock of this conflict will end all acquiescence. The effects of nuclear weapons would serve as the final confirmation that war has no value, but this lesson would come too late.
In 2015, The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists published an article about the effect of a single nuclear bomb being detonated. The following is an updated adaptation of this scenario, describing what would happen if such a weapon is used. It is presented here to remind ourselves what could be on the event horizon.
Russian intercontinental ballistic missiles are believed to carry a total of approximately 1,000 strategic nuclear warheads that can hit the United States less than 30 minutes after being launched. What follows is a description of the consequences of the detonation of a standard 800 kiloton warhead over any developed area in the world.
—
Within a tiny fraction of a second, the center of the warhead detonated at one mile above the surface reached a temperature of roughly 200 million degrees, or about four to five times the temperature at the center of the sun.
After one second, the explosion was roughly a mile in diameter. The enormous heat and light from the fireball almost instantly ignited everything over a total area of about 100 square miles, eliminating all forms of life.
The blast vaporized the structures and anyone in them directly below it and produced an immense wave and high-speed winds, crushing even heavily built concrete structures within a couple miles of ground zero; fires were spread by ignitable surfaces, releasing and dispersing flammable materials.
The fireball melted asphalt in the streets, burnt paint off walls, and destroyed metal surfaces within a half second of the detonation. The interiors of vehicles and buildings in line of sight of the fireball - and those inside them - immediately exploded into flames.
Two and half miles from ground zero, the fireball appeared 2,700 times brighter than a desert sun at noon. There, thermal radiation initially melted and warped metal surfaces, ignited the tires of autos, and turned exposed skin to charcoal; then seconds later, the immense blast wave arrived and ripped apart all structures.
Three miles from ground zero, the fireball was as bright as 1,900 suns. At this distance, people’s clothing burst into flames or melted, and uncovered skin was charred, causing third-degree and fourth-degree burns.
It took 12 to 14 seconds for the wind of the blast wave to travel three miles after the fireball’s initial flash of light. This wave lasted for about three seconds, accompanied by winds of 200 to 300 miles per hour. Residential structures were all destroyed; high-rises were heavily damaged.
Buildings of heavy construction suffered little structural damage, but all exterior windows were shattered, and non-supporting interior walls and doors were severely damaged or blown down. Black smoke effused from wooden houses; paint burned off surfaces and furnishings ignited.
Six to seven miles from ground zero, the fireball appeared 300 times brighter than the desert sun at noon. Those in the direct light of the fireball suffered third degree burns to their exposed skin. The firestorm engulfed neighborhoods as far as seven miles away from ground zero.
Within tens of minutes, everything within approximately five to seven miles of ground zero was engulfed by the gigantic firestorm. The fire zone covered a total area of 150 square miles. It raged for six hours. Air temperatures in the fire zone averaged 400 to 500 degrees Fahrenheit.
Those who tried to escape through the streets were incinerated by the hurricane-force winds filled with flames. Even those able to find shelter in the lower-level sub-basements of massive buildings suffocated from fire-generated gases or were cooked alive as their shelters heated to oven-like conditions.
The fire extinguished all life and destroyed almost everything else. Downwind of the area of immediate destruction, immense levels of radioactive fallout arrived within a few hours of the detonation.
For those who survived the initial blast beyond the perimeter of the explosion, the agony from exposure to radiation lasted days or weeks before death, depending on exposure levels; suffering certainly was compounded by complete lack of basic needs, community infrastructure and emergency services.
The probability of this scenario happening in multiple locations caused by the outbreak of global war is only increasing.
Experts have predicted that the accidental deployment of nuclear weapons is just as likely as intentional use; particularly now as sophisticated computers with artificial intelligence replace humans in determining if a threat is actual or a technical failure.
All countries with nuclear weapons have systems that are designed to respond in full force if an attack is detected. Mutually assured destruction on the planet will end life as we know it.
Toleration of war-mongering and weaponizing adversaries only fuel the possibility of the demise of humans on Earth.
A massive awakening to the probability of this disaster is the only means of ending the mad march toward self-destruction. Overcoming this impasse requires awareness of the potential cataclysm and ending the sense of helplessness about the inevitability of war.
The vast majority of people on the planet do not want this devastation and can change the course of events with their cognizance of the threat. The commonality of a peaceful vision of the future throughout all countries and cultures is the foundation for this change.
Awakening will engender outrage that needs to be focused on changing the course of events. Leaders must be forced to end war — before war ends everything.
All wars are bankers wars, without exception. No normal human being ever wants war. War benefits nobody other than banks and corporations
I'm not worried about the so called nuclear threat though
First of all, how do we know that these things actually exist? None have been used since 1945 and we rely entirely on known liars for our evidence. Such evidence is purely theoretical too. What real empirical evidence do we have? None whatsoever! It's all old videos [many of which look very fake] assertion, official stories and BS "science" from inveterate and pathological liars
Second, even if they do exist, which I doubt then, if some nutcase ever launches a full on nuclear exchange we are all done for. The only thing certain in life is your ultimate death, we are all going to die and most us don't get any choice over the timing
So there is no point in worrying about this at all. there's nothing that any of us can do about it. And as my missus always says "no point in worrying about something that you can't effect, it's futile"