From: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!C70:arms-d Newsgroups: fa.arms-d Title: Arms-Discussion Digest V0 #143 Article-I.D.: ucb.1533 Posted: Fri Jul 16 22:47:00 1982 Received: Sat Jul 17 05:49:27 1982 >From HGA@MIT-MC Fri Jul 16 22:40:34 1982 Arms-Discussion Digest Volume 0 : Issue 143 Today's Topics: Firepower vs. Manpower Disarmies Subsidiary effects of Nuclear Wars Iran in Iraq End of the world ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 15 July 1982 09:28-EDT From: Zigurd R. MednieksSubject: firepower vs. manpower Eric is very correct in stating that the quality of manpower is probably *the* most important factor in winning wars. However, how is our rather bloated officer corps fostering such quality? Eric, if you had your druthers, what fraction of the officer corps would you pension off? 1/10? 1/2? More? The argument of firepower vs. manpower is, admittedly, a mechanistic one. Resolving the issue won't guarentee winning the next war. So what *can* we do to improve the armed forces that we aren't doing already? Re: blasting all our topsoil into the atmosphere: How many tons TNT equivalent were dropped on North Viet Nam? I recall the amount as being quite staggering. Cheers, Zig ------------------------------ Date: Thursday, 15 July 1982 10:35-EDT From: Jon Webb Subject: disarmies I understand that the Israeli army at one time did use women in a combat role, but they stopped; the reason I heard, probably male chauvinist propaganda, is that the other side fought harder in order to avoid being killed by a woman. Jon ------------------------------ Date: 15 Jul 82 19:51:30-EDT (Thu) From: J C Pistritto Subject: Subsidiary effects of Nuclear Wars Actually, the long-term effects of a nuclear war might not be as devastating as a lot of people would think. While the superpowers would expend vast amounts of firepower, almost all of it would be directed at each other. Both superpowers are Northern hemisphere countries, the USSR particularly so. (This is true for the US as well, as almost all Russian weapons would arrive via the polar route, and would tend to be distributed over the northern half of the US. (look where our military bases are)) One class of strike that would spread the damage around a bit would be nuclear strikes at Ballistic Missile Submarines. These would be far out at sea, evening out the fallout quite a bit. Countries in the Southern Hemisphere would probably be least affected, (I remember a US Gov't study which pinpointed Australia and the southern areas of Argentina and Chile, (and the Falklands, for that matter) as the safest areas). Countries in the equatorial belt would suffer mostly residual fallout, (> 10 days) and of course, any UV related effects. A country in the Northern Hemisphere might escape serious damage if sielded by mountain ranges, (such as India, which has the highest mountains in the world between it and China, andthe various ranges east of Afghanistan) Southeast Asia would probably be similarly shielded. If the strike happened in monsoon season, I suspect even the fallout wouldn't be too bad, as a LOT of these areas are flooded at that time). -JCP- ------------------------------ Date: 15 Jul 82 19:55:27-EDT (Thu) From: J C Pistritto Subject: Iran in Iraq The Iranians seem to be giving the Iraqis a rough time of it near Basra, I suspect that they will take it within a week or two. Actually, I suspect the Iranians are more interested in cutting off Iraq's oil industries, and the strangling her. I would suspect the likely next target to be a Shiite takeover of Kuwait. Kuwait is small enough so that US wouldn't send in the marines to save her, but it WOULD make the Saudis very nervous... Fortunately, that part of Saudi Arabia is pretty undeveloped, most of the oil industry is further down the gulf. Anyone taking bets on how long Saddam Hussein lasts? -JCP- ------------------------------ Date: 16 July 1982 06:21-EDT From: Robert Elton Maas Subject: End of the world [SIC; End of the human race] Your combination of scenerios is something I've never heard before and hadn't thought of myself until you suggested it. Indeed if we believe anything our government tells us about how we're so wonderful as peacekeepers in the world, about how our MADness is preventing war around the world... then with us out of the way after WWIII, no longer providing this wonderful deterrent to war around the world, and no longer being the foodbasket for half the starving nations around the world, all hell will break loose. If we think our squabbling for scarce resources is causing wars now, just wait until the main breadbasket and the main peacekeeping influence is/are gone! ------------------------------ End of Arms-D Digest ********************