The statement of Russian President Vladimir Putin about putting the nuclear deterrent forces on alert drew the attention of the whole world, and everyone knows that it is a direct attempt to put political pressure on his opponents in the West, whether Europe or the United States of America. Standing, albeit far away.

At some point in the history of human civilization, the probability is extremely low, essentially, because of the magnitude of the expected effects. In his 1984 book Causes and Persons, British philosopher Derek Parfit asks: “Worse, the transition from peace to peace.” A nuclear war that kills 90% of people, or moving from a nuclear war that kills 90% of people to a nuclear war that kills 100% of people?” You might say that the first case, of course, is worse, but the second case does not mean killing 10% of people only, but rather It means the extinction of mankind, which in itself would be much worse, because it prevents the existence of all future generations, this latter possibility is less than the first, but so worse that it is important to take it into account.

In this context, the term "Doomsday Hour" (1) emerges, a symbolic term for a watch that indicates a few minutes before midnight. This idea was invented in 1947 by the Board of Directors of the Journal of Atomic Scientists of the University of Chicago, and it heralds the imminence of the end of the world Because of the ongoing race between nuclear states.

During the years 2015-2020, scientists updated the clock data and moved it forward 100 seconds, which means that there is a greater possibility of a nuclear disaster. The researchers pointed out that despite awareness of nuclear dangers, every country that possesses a nuclear weapon is currently updating its nuclear arsenal, and accelerating.

As we speak, the world contains 15-18 thousand nuclear warheads, several thousand of which could be ready to launch in 5-15 minutes.

In a poll of experts at the World Conference on Catastrophic Risks at Oxford University in 2008, the probability of (2) complete human extinction by nuclear weapons was estimated at 1% within a century.

Of course, these results reflect the average opinions of a group of experts, and are not a probabilistic analytical model based on research work, but the possibility - again - still exists, no matter how weak it seems.

It starts with one bomb

Well, let's enter a little into what could happen in the world of possibilities, let's start, for example, with a simple possibility that says that Russia or any of the nuclear countries of NATO began by launching a single nuclear intercontinental missile, and hitting a medium or perhaps large city the size of Cairo, for example, what will happen in Is this the case? (3) This is a possibility that we have seen previously in the cases of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

If the bomb fell on a street in the city center, in less than a second a ball of very hot plasma (more than the sun) would appear and vaporize everything within 2-3 kilometers from the center of the explosion, when we use the term "evaporate" we use the most accurate description of what will happen Everything will evaporate from people, things, houses, cars, trees, etc.

Then, less than 20 seconds later, a massive heat wave will blast into a 25-30 kilometer circle. Here nothing will evaporate, but everything that is combustible will burn, including people, trees, houses, plastics and clothes.

This also includes a shock wave capable of demolishing most homes in the area, the impact of that wave will be greater than passing through a massive fifth category hurricane.

The death toll in this strike may reach 500,000 people, with twice that number of injured who will not be treated because the infrastructure was destroyed, but that is not all, we have not yet talked about the radioactive contamination that will extend to a range of several additional kilometers after the previous cycle fatal of 50 -90% of the population during the following hours to days, with higher odds of developing sporadic types of cancer in the next generations of those who remain.

This is followed by a wide spread of the so-called nuclear dust (4), which is the remaining radioactive ash that was pushed into the atmosphere after the explosion.

And this dust can spread for several hundred kilometers from the site of the explosion.

While most of the particles carried by nuclear dust decay rapidly, some radioactive particles will have a lingering effect ranging from seconds to a few months.

As for some radioactive isotopes, such as strontium-90 and caesium-137, their effect is very long-lasting, perhaps up to 5 years after the initial explosion.

In the event of a nuclear explosion, experts advise hiding for 72 hours in tunnels for fear of exposure to nuclear dust (communication sites)

But it does not stop at just one

In conclusion, there is not a single country in the entire world that can withstand the effects of a nuclear strike on just one city.

But the matter, as you know, does not stop at just one blow. Whoever receives the first blow must respond with another blow in order to take revenge and settle the conflict in his favour.

To see the development of this possibility, researchers from Princeton University in the United States built a simulation (5) in which a conventional war between Russia and NATO develops into a nuclear war, by introducing a huge amount of available and intelligence data into the simulation, and assuming that the first strike will be from Russia.

The simulation begins with the strike of a nuclear ballistic missile coming from a base in the Russian city of Kaliningrad, located between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic coast, targeting a military base located on the Polish-German border.

In response to this strike, the simulation assumes that NATO will not be silent, and will launch a single tactical strike at a military base on the western Russian border, which will be launched by a bomber traveling from a base located on the border between Germany and France.

The above were only limited warning nuclear strikes directed at military bases that are usually remote, the death toll will not be large, but the simulation expects that Russia within a few hours will launch the first real nuclear strike on NATO countries, the simulation assumes that this will include bombers carrying 300 warheads Nuclear warheads directed at military sites scattered all over Europe.

The warhead refers to the explosive (nuclear in this case) that the missile carries to the target.

For its part, NATO will respond with 180 nuclear warheads to border military areas and deep into the Russian state. The simulation predicts that the number of deaths will reach 2.6 million people within only three hours of this maneuver. This number is small, by the way, for one reason, which is that the war is now still Targeting military sites only, in the meantime most of the European military sites will have been destroyed, here NATO will strike a major blow consisting of 600 nuclear warheads coming from submarines carrying nuclear missiles in the vicinity of the United States of America.

Because Russia is aware that this strike will destroy its infrastructure militarily, it will launch a number of nuclear warheads soon before the arrival of those strikes. Those nuclear missiles will be launched from moving vehicles (those carrying missiles such as Yaris and Topol), from submarines and from fixed centers on the ground towards Europe and the states United.

Because the strikes are still military and target military centers, the death toll will reach 3.4 million people in this case, but according to the simulation, it will not continue at this pace.

At some point, the response will be to target the densest cities in each country involved in the war.

The final form of the simulation after completing the last stage by killing only 85.3 million people in 45 minutes (communication sites)

The simulation assumes that it will start with targeting the 30 most populous cities on each side (Russia, NATO and any other country that will participate) with 10-15 nuclear warheads per city, here the death toll will escalate to 85.3 million people in just three quarters of an hour from the moment The beating, with twice that number of injured, is the same fatal scenario that we explained a while ago when we imagined the moment a nuclear bomb fell in a crowded city.

Nuclear war..and more

But the matter does not stop there. To understand this idea, a team of researchers from the National Center for Climate Studies in Colorado, USA, assumed that a “small” regional nuclear war had arisen between the two nuclear neighbors: India and Pakistan. Scientists (6,7) put a model For a war that uses only 100 nuclear warheads each equal to a small nuclear bomb (equivalent to the ones that hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki).

The results revealed that this could harm the global climate for at least a decade, with the erasure of the ozone layer, as the resulting energy will release about 5.5 million tons of black carbon high into the atmosphere, which will lower average Earth surface temperatures. Suddenly 1.5 degrees Celsius, the lowest in more than a thousand years.

The study assumes that such a war will push most regions of North America, Asia, Europe and the Middle East to experience winters with average temperatures of 2.5 to 6 degrees Celsius.

With deadly frosts all over the world it will completely hit the growing seasons of agricultural crops for 10 to 40 days per year for several years.

On the other hand, the carbon ash on top will absorb heat from the sun, which will lead to heating the stratosphere, which will destroy the ozone layer over time, and this allows much greater amounts of ultraviolet rays to reach the surface of the Earth, which poses a direct threat to human health, agriculture and ecosystems On both land and water.

In another study(8) published by the American Geophysical Union, results predicted that current nuclear arsenals that might be used in the war between the United States and Russia could pump 150 Tg of soot (clouds of carbon particles), from fires ignited by nuclear explosions, into the troposphere. The upper and lower stratosphere, to produce a nuclear winter, with temperatures below freezing in most parts of the northern hemisphere during the summer, with the highest expected temperature during the summer equal to 2.5 below zero, for example!

All of this, of course, will cause a global famine.

In a 2013 report, researchers9 from the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) concluded that more than two billion people, about a third of the world's population, would be at risk of starvation in the event of a regional nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan. Or even by using a small percentage of America's and Russia's nuclear weapons, food prices would rise, affecting hundreds of millions of vulnerable people in the world's poorest countries.

After a nuclear war, temperatures will be below zero all the time.

The above was not an attempt to frighten you, as we said from the beginning, the possibilities remain slim, but just being present with all this expected impact, which is actually threatening a massive extinction case similar to the one that occurred due to a fallen comet 65 million years ago and ended the existence of dinosaurs, leads us to ask: Why does this possibility persist in the first place?

Why have we not been able to completely erase it in the 70-80 years since the beginning of the nuclear age, despite our knowledge of the catastrophes that are to come?

Why should we, in every war, be afraid of its existence?

We do not imagine that an ordinary citizen, in a developed or middle country, would like this possibility to continue, even if only a small amount.

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sources:

  • At doom's doorstep: It is 100 seconds to midnight

  • GLOBAL CATASTROPHIC RISKS SURVEY

  • 3The Effects of Nuclear Weapons

  •  Russia's attack on Ukraine raises a harrowing question: How widespread would it fallout from a nuclear bomb be?

  •  PLAN A

  • 'Small' Nuclear War Could Trigger Catastrophic Cooling

  • Rapidly expanding nuclear arsenals in Pakistan and India portend regional and global catastrophe

  • Nuclear Winter Responses to Nuclear War between the United States and Russia in the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model Version 4 and the Goddard Institute for Space Studies ModelE

  • Nuclear Famine: climate effects of regional nuclear war