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From: emks@uokvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Re:Expertise:Nuclear War Casualties
Message-ID: <5000122@uokvax.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 1-Dec-84 14:45:00 EST
Article-I.D.: uokvax.5000122
Posted: Sat Dec  1 14:45:00 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 4-Dec-84 09:06:07 EST
References: <328@whuxl.UUCP>
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Nf-From: uokvax!emks    Dec  1 13:45:00 1984

Tim writes:
>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. Both sides
>possess 1 1/2 million times the destructive power of those bombs.
>I think the consequences of that are quite threatening to all life on earth.
>As I pointed out in an earlier article, just the radioactive fallout from
>controlled atomic tests has spread radioisotopes all over the planet--
>including Antartica.  We all have strontium-90 in our bones from those
>atmospheric tests.  What would be the ecological effects of 50,000 bombs
> 
>tim sevener whuxl!orb

Tim, that has almost nothing to do with what I said.  I said that blatent
use of terms like "nuclear exchange" or "use of nuclear weapons" to mean
"total annihilation" is wordsmithing, order n.  I agree completely that there
would be QUITE a difference between WWII and now if we were to detonate 50K
nuclear weapons!  But, you see, that isn't my point.  I meant, and still mean,
that use of nuclear weapons doesn't necessarily imply that the world would
simply "end."

I believe nuclear weapons have kept the U.S. and the S.U. from having a
direct, worldwide conflict since WW II.  In the event of a W.P. invasion, I
also believe that use of nuclear weapons can have precisely the effect NATO
intends:  to control escalation on terms which are favorable to the Atlantic
Alliance.


		kurt