Does the prospect of nuclear disaster still frighten anyone these days?

[robvalue]

Sorry, it was only a joke. It wasn't meant to be serious.

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I thought you guys knew me well enough to see when I'm making a joke, I'll try and be clearer in future.

[JuliaL]

The early cold war threats of a nuclear exchange as part of a conventional war between major powers have declined. We think different now. It is hard to judge the minds of the decision makers of 60 years ago. We cannot un-learn what is now common wisdom regarding nuclear winter and the long term effects of widespread high level fallout. The 1950s was a time when above ground testing was considered reasonable, high level nuclear waste disposal was a problem we would solve when necessary. There were fewer nukes and they were smaller. And lots of the generals had gotten their combat medals from fighting the Japs(sic) hand to hand in the pacific. A magic bullet to easily win what would otherwise be protracted and widespread slaughter was tempting. Stalin owned eastern Europe and was at the peak of a total war buildup of material looking at western Europe. Mao had taken China.

Then we learned better and sane people prevailed. In a major nuclear exchange, we all know what happens. So I don't worry about the status quo.

But I still fear lesser risks:
Minor local wars could go nuclear: India vs Pakistan, Israel vs Iran.
US gets cocky and enters a land war in Asia to "fix" a problem like Ukraine and worse yet, starts to win.
Some lunatic decides to make history by putting their one and only probably working warhead onto a Walmart container and sails it into San Francisco.
Some religious nut decides that the best way to assure themselves that they will be there for Armageddon is to start it.

I doubt these scenarios (other than the US vs Russia) would lead to large enough exchanges to destroy technological civilization, but I still fear them.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Sorry, it was only a joke. It wasn't meant to be serious.

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I thought you guys knew me well enough to see when I'm making a joke, I'll try and be clearer in future.

I knew that it was a joke, that was perfectly clear.

If you want to discuss it any further, feel free to PM me. I don't want to shit up this thread with irrelevancy.

[abaris]

It is hard to judge the minds of the decision makers of 60 years ago. We cannot un-learn what is now common wisdom regarding nuclear winter and the long term effects of widespread high level fallout. The 1950s was a time when above ground testing was considered reasonable, high level nuclear waste disposal was a problem we would solve when necessary.

Oh, they knew enough to willingly expose their own soldiers to the nuclear fallout. To test what it did to their organisms. Both super powers did that in the 50ies.

And then there were turds like Edward Teller, who never grew tired of demanding a first strike against the Russians, even if it meant widespread destruction.

[robvalue]

I've popped back just to say I'm sorry if my joke offended anyone else. It was just meant to be a funny image I had in my mind, a throwaway joke. There was no menace behind it.

I'll see you guys in a few days or so.

[Aoi Magi]

I am much more scared of biological warfare than nuclear ones

[Anomalocaris]

I am much more scared of biological warfare than nuclear ones

I think any serious act of biological warfare could easily escalate into the use of nuclear weapons in retaliation, if only to take out the weapon facilities with a degree of overkill to reduce chances of contamination.

[abaris]

I think any serious act of biological warfare could easily escalate into the use of nuclear weapons in retaliation, if only to take out the weapon facilities with a degree of overkill to reduce chances of contamination.

Which probably would achieve the opposite effect.

[Anomalocaris]

I think any serious act of biological warfare could easily escalate into the use of nuclear weapons in retaliation, if only to take out the weapon facilities with a degree of overkill to reduce chances of contamination.

Which probably would achieve the opposite effect.

If the targeting is accurate and precise, it would achieve the desired effect by securely both irradiating and incinerating biological warfare agent.

Depending on the design of the bio warfare facility, there may be no other practical way to destroy the facility remotely without risking releasing some of the stored biological warfare agents.

Nuclear retaliation against biological or chemical warfare use has always been an largely unspoken tenant of American nuclear posture. During first Gulpf war, the U.S. made it explicit to Iraq.

That said, I think the threat of serious biological warfare use by non-state actors is slim. Weaponizing microbes is more difficult than commonly realized. There are probably fewer states that can successfully weaponize a really lethal biological agent than there are than can build an atomic bomb. So chance of successfuly theft of useable biological warfare munition is probably also less than the chance of theft of nuclear weapons.

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I think the nuclear threat with the highest chance of actual occurrence within foreseeable future would be from the catastrophic failure of another nuclear power plant. Although state of the art of nuclear safety has greatly improved, and sketchy early generation nuclear reactors are being retired, the diminution in risk is being counterbalanced of proliferation of nuclear power plants to countries with sketchy industrial safety records and relatively little experience running nuclear power plants, as well as to those countries with relatively weak infrastructure for civil defence and emergency evacuations. There are more nuclear plants being built in third world countries than there are being retired in developed countries.

I think next major nuclear accident would likely occur in emerging nuclear states.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I've popped back just to say I'm sorry if my joke offended anyone else. It was just meant to be a funny image I had in my mind, a throwaway joke. There was no menace behind it.

I'll see you guys in a few days or so.

It pains me that you felt the need to block me over such a minor matter, and I hope you reconsider. I harbor no ill will towards you, Rob.