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From: orb@whuxl.UUCP (SEVENER)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Nuclear War casualties
Message-ID: <288@whuxl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 15-Oct-84 11:22:10 EDT
Article-I.D.: whuxl.288
Posted: Mon Oct 15 11:22:10 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 16-Oct-84 06:37:55 EDT
References: <394@wucs.UUCP> <90@whuxk.UUCP> <2730@ucbcad.UUCP> <284@whuxl.UUCP> <2522@ucbvax.ARPA>
Organization: Bell Labs
Lines: 37

> Ok Tim, I have just about had it.  All this talk that a nuclear war
> would not leave survivors is pure BS!  You talk about Reagan stating
> thatover 50% of Soviet population would survive and you say this
> is ludicrous.  You are dead wrong.  Please show me some figures to support
> your claim!!! 
> I want to see FACTS and NUMBERS!!!
> 
> 
> 					Milo

I'll give you some facts and numbers--currently the Soviet Union and
the United States have one million six hundred thousand times the
destructive power of the Hiroshima bomb.  Both sides have enough bombs
to target towns with a population of 15,000 people--these are NOT
big cities.  Even the smallest bombs in both arsenals are bigger than
the bomb dropped on Hiroshima (13 kilotons)--which did quite an effective
job of destroying a city of several hundred thousand. The Hiroshima bomb
would vaporize the typical town of 15,000 people.
Please face reality--this is no myth-yes, we CAN literally blow up the
world.  Whether this would definitely lead to extinction or not is open
to question--perhaps a few humans could somehow survive.  But most would not.
There are more effects than the Nuclear Winter effect to contend with--
a National Academy of Sciences study several years ago predicted that
full scale nuclear war would be very likely to destroy the ozone layer
which protects all life on this planet from damaging ultraviolet rays.
This is all documented in "The Fate of the Earth" by Jonathan Schell.
I would highly recommend reading this book if you have not already.
It is very difficult to read-it gets VERY depressing. Plus one gets the feeling
of overkill reading over and over just how destructive nuclear war would
actually be, based upon the studies by the Office of Technology Assessment,
the National Academy of Sciences , and other studies.
The first response of people with fatal illnesses is almost always to deny
that they will really die--such is the natural response of people like
yourself--to deny that extinction is possible. Unfortunately it is possible
and probable in an allout nuclear war.  Now what do we do about it?
Tim Sevener
whuxl!orb  Bell Labs, Whippany