|
|
|
I would like to know who asked America to protect and control our world. The current American administration
is on some kind of conquer and domination quest. Their national security doctrines call for their nation to strike anywhere
they please and to be the first to use nuclear weapons.
When we consider the sudden killing of millions of people in
a matter of hours by nuclear weapons we shake our heads and say it's not possible. We prefer to think of our species as caring
and compassionate even in the face of an upsurge of fanatical terrorism and threats by rogue nations using weapons of mass
destruction.
What would we face if nuclear threats actually turned to reality? Imagine the destructive force unleashed
on Hiroshima that killed 135,000 people. The only problem in trying to imagine that deadly force in today's terms is that
the standard size single American or Russian nuclear weapon is 9 to 20 megatons or 600 too 1300 times the nuclear explosive
power of the bomb used on Hiroshima in 1945.
The physical results of a standard size single American or Russian nuclear
weapon detonated today would cause an enormous amount of energy to be released in an extraordinarily short interval of time.
Nearly all of this energy would be initially released in the form of fast recoiling nuclear matter that is then deposited
into the surrounding environment within a fraction of a second.
Most of the explosive power initially is in the form
of intense short wave length light that is efficiently absorbed by the air immediately surrounding the weapon, heating it
to very high temperatures creating a fireball. The early fireball is so hot it violently expands, initially moving outward
at several million miles per hour while it radiates tremendous amounts of light and heat. During the course of its expansion,
almost all of the air that originally occupied the volume within and around it is compressed into a thin shell of superheated,
glowing, high-pressure gas. This shell of gas, which continues to be driven outward by hot expanding gases in the fireball
interior, itself compresses the surrounding air forming a steeply fronted luminous shock wave of enormous extent and power.
During the period of peak energy output a single standard nuclear weapon can produce temperatures of about one hundred million
degrees Celsius at its center or about five times that which occurs at the center of the sun.
Simultaneous fires would
break out over vast areas of surrounding terrain, heating large volumes of air near the earth's surface. As this heated air
rises, cool air from regions beyond the vast burning area would rush into replace it. Winds at ground level would reach hurricane
force and air temperatures within the zone of fire would exceed that of boiling water. The violent hurricane of fire would
also be accompanied by the release of vast amounts of lethal toxic smoke and combustion gases that would create an environment
of extreme heat, high winds and toxic agents. By the time a single nuclear detonation fireball is near its maximum size, it's
a highly luminous ball between one and two miles in diameter. Its surface that masks the much hotter interior of the fireball
from its surroundings, still radiates three times more light and heat than that of a comparable area of the sun's surface.
Extensive fire ignitions would accompany such an air burst over an urban or industrial target.
A single nuclear weapon
detonation would start fire's hundreds of square kilometers in diameter with its flame convection and radioactive heat producing
an absolute hostile temperature environment within a few seconds. Extreme thermal conditions and noxious gas accumulations
would be in shelters not properly designed to diffuse or dissipate this kind of heat and poisonous air. The induced fire winds
would be drawn in from surrounding areas. Measurable velocities would be felt as far as thirty miles from the fires and significant
wind speeds may be felt as far as ten miles from the fire's edge. This inflow would feed and fan the fires and replace the
gases of the rising plume or smoke column. The smoke would mostly be contained in the lower atmosphere, although some may
be injected to higher altitudes. That's the result of a single standard nuclear bomb explosion.
Now in the event of
a nuclear war with multiple nuclear bombs exploding the effects would dramatically increase. Today there are approximately
twenty thousand warheads carrying over ten thousand megatons of explosives pointed at different targets throughout the world.
Combine only a fraction of these warheads with the abundant combustible fuels concentrated in industrial and urban areas and
we would bring about a global nuclear winter.
The physical mechanism would involve the ignition of large fires by
nuclear bursts followed by the insertion of unprecedented quantities of smoke into the atmosphere where it would divert sunlight
and trigger dramatic climatic chaos. Wilderness fire smoke would be a secondary contributor to the nuclear winter with industrial
and urban smoke being the primary contributor. A fraction of the smoke would be removed immediately by the quickly induced
black rain. The expected climatic impacts of dense smoke layers include land surface temperature decreases of up to one hundred
degrees Fahrenheit within the first week. Large amounts of carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, nitrogen, sulfur oxides, hydrochloric
acid, pyrotoxins, heavy metals, asbestos and other materials would be injected into the lower atmosphere near the surface
by the flaming and smoldering combustion of billions of tons of fuel products and wind blown debris. Numerous toxic chemical
compounds would be released directly into the environment by blast and spillage which in turn would contaminate all water
and soil. Precipitation scavenging of nitrogen, sulfur, and chlorine compounds dispersed by the fire plumes throughout the
troposphere would increase rainfall acidity tenfold over large regions throughout the world for several months. Rapid smoke
induced cooling of the surface under dense smoke clouds would cause the formation of shallow, stable cold layers that would
trap chemical emissions from prolonged smoldering fires near the ground.
The health effects of prompt ionizing radiation
from strategic nuclear warheads would be overshadowed by the effects of the blast and thermal radiation. However, because
nuclear explosions create highly radioactive fission products and the emitted neutrons may also induce radioactivity in initially
inert material near each detonation site, radiological doses would be delivered to survivors globally. Local fallout of relatively
large radioactive particles lofted by multiple surface explosions would lead to lethal external gamma ray doses during the
first few days. Survivors outside of the lethal fallout zones would still receive debilitating radiation doses.
Nuclear
war would modify the physical environment in ways that would impact agriculture, ecosystems, essential air, water resources
and other important elements of the global biosphere.
The primary mechanism for human fatalities would not be from
the initial nuclear blast effects, thermal radiation burns or ionizing radiation but from mass starvation. Whereas the direct
effects of such a nuclear war would result in several hundred million human fatalities, the indirect effects would lead to
the loss of four to five billion lives. This would be primarily due to the vulnerabilities of ecological and agricultural
systems.
The vast majority of the survivors around the world would have less than one year of food if they could reach
it. They would be living for months in darkened days and subfreezing temperatures. Most cities world wide would become toxic
waste dumps. Most people exposed to radiation from a nuclear war would be dead within sixty days or less after exposure. At
very high dose's death may occur within hours. At lower doses where the hemopoietic syndrome is relevant, there is a slight
chance of survival. As the sooty smoke is slowly removed from the atmosphere the sunshine would begin to break through with
highly enriched ultraviolet radiation causing serious debilitating skin and eye damage.
The destruction of sanitation,
refrigeration and food processing methods, especially in the remaining urban areas or population centers would result in the
contamination of food by bacteria that would cause deadly diseases. Spoiled meat, dead putrefying flesh of domestic animals
and even human corpses will be eaten by starving people as has happened in major famines in the past. Disease carrying insects
and rodents would proliferate in the aftermath of a nuclear war. It is necessary to stress that radiation exposure does not
induce any specific radiation type of cancer but just enhances the incidence of spontaneous malignant tumors in organs and
tissues. Genetic defects will appear trivial in comparison with the enormity of the catastrophic development of survivors
overall health and the environment. Among the children born to survivors some 4 to 8 months after exposure to bomb radiation,
mental retardation should be expected. To the extent that protracted irradiation is equally efficient in this respect, even
those exposed to fallout radiation and contamination may show this type of damage. Under these circumstances the radiation
and genetic load would threaten the abilities of the survivors and a number of practices would have to be instituted to conserve
the material resources available. These practices would range from selective breeding, infanticide, euthanasia and compulsory
breeding by those individuals showing indications of least genetic damage.
NUCLEAR TERMS YOU SHOULD KNOW:
Blast
Lung: lesion caused when a shock wave compresses the chest wall against the spinal column and then suddenly releases it. Death
can occur immediately from the sudden propagation of air emboli into cerebral and cardiac circulation, or later, from pulmonary
hemorrhage and pulmonary edema.
Flash Burns: resemble first and second degree burns, although with slightly less tissue
swelling and fluid loss, and may occur on exposed surfaces as a result of direct thermal radiation.
Fallout: particles
of radio actively contaminated material which are dispersed in the atmosphere following a nuclear explosion and which subsequently
settle to the earth's surface.
Fireball: luminous sphere of hot gases that is formed by a nuclear explosion.
Firestorm:
a large area fire in which heated air and gases rise rapidly, drawing in cooler air from surrounding areas, thus generating
surface temperatures of 1000°C, winds up to 90 mph, and convection patterns with a relatively static boundary.
Fission:
the splitting of heavy nucleus into two approximately equal parts, accompanied by the release of energy and neutrons.
Fusion:
a nuclear reaction characterized by the joining together of light nuclei to form heavier nuclei.
Gamma Radiation:
high energy, short wavelength electromagnetic emissions from the nucleus, frequently accompanying alpha and beta emissions
and always accompanying fission. Gamma rays are very penetrating and are best shielded against by dense materials such as
lead.
Hematopietic Syndrome: following nuclear blast exposure, a victim may experience anorexia, apathy, nausea, and
vomiting. Symptoms may subside after two days, but lymph nodes, spleen, and bone marrow begin to atrophy, leading to abnormally
low numbers of all formed elements in the blood.
Prodromal Syndrome: the early acute effects of exposure to radiation.
Radiation Sickness: the complex of symptoms characterizing the disease known as radiation injury, resulting from excessive
exposure of the body to ionizing radiation. Earliest symptoms are nausea, fatigue, vomiting, and diarrhea, which may be followed
by loss of hair, hemorrhage, inflammation of the mouth and throat, and loss of energy. Death is usually within one to four
weeks.
NOTE:
This article is based on a full range of relevant information, statistics, studies, simulation
models and expert judgment of approximately 150 physical and atmospheric scientists and 250 agricultural and ecological scientists
from more than 40 countries.
Closing Thoughts
The endless talk about war and terrorism is wearing down the
human spirit, causing anguish and depression of hundreds of millions of people around the world. There is no answer which
can separate America from its oil economics, profit requirements of arms trade or distorted notions of empire building but
a path of building peace institutes not war machines can ensure economic structures are affirmative of human needs and restorative
of human values. Thank you.
World Peace Please
|
|
|
|
|
|
|