Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/3/84; site talcott.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!zehntel!hplabs!hao!seismo!harvard!wjh12!talcott!gjk From: gjk@talcott.UUCP (Greg J Kuperberg) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re:Expertise:Nuclear War Casualties Message-ID: <148@talcott.UUCP> Date: Fri, 30-Nov-84 13:20:38 EST Article-I.D.: talcott.148 Posted: Fri Nov 30 13:20:38 1984 Date-Received: Tue, 4-Dec-84 05:11:07 EST References: <328@whuxl.UUCP> <5000116@uokvax.UUCP> <372@whuxl.UUCP> Organization: Harvard Lines: 19 > There would be quite a difference between two atomic bombs and 50,000 > bombs don't you think, Kurt? Also the bombs dropped on Hiroshima > and Nagasaki were miniscule in comparison to those we have now. ... > tim sevener whuxl!orb That's a pretty liberal estimate (in more than one sense). First, most of our bombs are merely three to ten times as large as the Hiroshima bombs (ex: Pershing II's are 150 kilotons). Second, in any nuclear scenario, at most a quarter of our nuclear stockpile would be used (because the more missiles we send, the more get destroyed in the silos, and also because missiles in general have a high failure rate). Thus only half the world will get destroyed instead of all of it. That's still nothing to cheer about, though... --- Greg Kuperberg harvard!talcott!gjk "Eureka!" -Archimedes