Calculating Technological Regression from Global Thermonuclear War

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Willy

Sorry that is completely wrong for several reasons. First there where a lot of bombs to that times, and it´s likely that a most of them where used. That would lead to a mayor contamination with radioactivity worldwide. Just a hint how bad it would be, Gorbatschow said in several meetings that tchernobyl and the aftermath alone had killed over 100K people. They concluded this from rising cancer numbers and a far higher mortality rate the years after in all areas that where exposed to radiation.

The radiation and the fallout will polute over time through the weather patterns the whole planet, just remember DDT is still found in the south polar region.
As for food production the top soil is saturated with fallout, that means, that the food is also radioactive, you could poison you with it. In earlier times the remove of the top soil was advised. I want bother you with the results, but without top soil you can throw your seeds away.

Nuclear bombs and nuclear plant accidents produce different kinds of fallout. I doubt that fallout from the exchange is going to be that lethal to crops and those who consume them. My mother's family comes from southern utah ie. downwind of 100 above ground nuclear tests in Nevada. Grandpa and his brother both got cancer as young men (both survived, though one lost a leg). But there was no mass die-off of livestock from soil contamination of the grass, and the area today has little sign of the fallout. In light of that, I have a hard time believing 3,000 or so warheads going off in the northern hemisphere is going to fatally poison Brazilian agriculture.

[Willy]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Nuclear bombs and nuclear plant accidents produce different kinds of fallout. I doubt that fallout from the exchange is going to be that lethal to crops and those who consume them. My mother's family comes from southern utah ie. downwind of 100 above ground nuclear tests in Nevada. Grandpa and his brother both got cancer as young men (both survived, though one lost a leg). But there was no mass die-off of livestock from soil contamination of the grass, and the area today has little sign of the fallout. In light of that, I have a hard time believing 3,000 or so warheads going off in the northern hemisphere is going to fatally poison Brazilian agriculture.

For how long do you think a Nuclear Power Plant, would work after the bombs fell? They need crew hightech parts constant cooling and so on, you can lock them down, but this doesn´t reduce the fact that they nneed cooling for years before they can be dosmanteled. Every last one is going to blow up in the aftermath not early after but in spite of heartbreaking trys by the survivors sooner or later all we be there own tchernobyl.
As for your position, it depends how far they where away from the tests areas, the dose makes allways the poison, and there are a lot of bombs. The USA were not a part as recklees than the sowjets, the did testing and yes monitored the population and radioactivity afterwards, but they never field tested on purpose to polute highly popluted areas with radiation.
brasilien agriculture may be have more problems with UV then with radiation.
Every state worldwide will try to the nuclear dust in the air raining down, as the russians did after tchernobyl.
The relative low radiation can be also a follow of the half-life of nuclear material, I´m by no means a nuclear expert, I just read a lot because I have a liking for after the end scenarios among others.

[AlexanderHowl]

In 1983, I believe there were probably 24,000 nukes averaging 200 kilotons in the US arsenal and 36,000 nukes averaging 800 kilotons in the USSR arsenal (the Russians had poorer accuracy, so they needed more and large bombs for the same strategic effect). That is 4.8 gigatons on the US side and 28.8 gigatons on the USSR side. By comparison, Krakatoa was 13,000 times the Hiroshima bomb (~195 megatons) and Mount Tambora, the largest eruption in the last 10,000 years was 4-10 times Krakatoa (~780 megatons to ~1.95 gigatons). The combined arsenals of the USA and the USSR would have been 33.6 gigatons, so an all out exchange would have been a minimum of 170 times as bad as Krakota, which means that an exchange would have been the equivalent of a VEI-8 eruption.

At that point, agriculture fails globally for a minimum of a year as the temperatures drop an average of 10 degrees C. The nukes have likely devestated the major cities, destroyed the communication and transportation networks (airports, landports, seaports, etc.), and destroyed the power plants, so people start going hungry after a few days and starve after a few weeks. Ninety to ninety-nine percent of the population would be dead by the time that the nuclear winter ended, and then the survivors would have do deal with the long term side effects of radiation while they were rebuilding the infrastructure from scratch.

Technology would likely drop to TL5 in the USA, as there would be enough survivors in communication with each other to sustain that level of technology. Places like Australia, New Zealand, etc. would likely drop to TL4 because of their isolation. Enough books would have likely survived though that the survivors could build back up to TL8 in sixty years.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Willy

Sorry that is completely wrong for several reasons. First there where a lot of bombs to that times, and it´s likely that a most of them where used. That would lead to a mayor contamination with radioactivity worldwide.

The global increase in radioactivity would shorten life expectancy for generations. Yes. But the subject is technological regression not life expectancy.

mortality rate the years after in all areas that where exposed to radiation.
The UV shield a such massive deployment of nuclear weapons is likely to damage the ozone shield. The result is that while animals and human can hide from this and go nocturnal, a lot of plants cope not well with a rising UV level including several important food plants. Anyway other plants are harmed to the result may be a disruption of food chaines in the ocean for example.

There is no reason to believe that nuclear explosions on the ground, which would be all or almost all of them, would have an impact on the ozone layer.

The radiation and the fallout will polute over time through the weather patterns the whole planet, just remember DDT is still found in the south polar region.

You know there's a reason why they call "fallout" that. It falls out. The vast majority of it ends up back on the ground within a hundred miles of the original explosion. Some of it would travel farther having made it into the jet streams, but once again that boils down to generations of shorter life expectancies.

Then there is the EMP any non hardened electronic equipment, besides the most primitve will say good bye. Satellites are most surely also damaged.
Some early bomb tests showed that the radius of an EMP even if the bomb explodes on ground level be rather large, not to speak if anyone, and the effect is to well known to be missed, uses some bombs to explode in high altitudes. In this case several books, including some popular fiction say 3 - 8 are enough for mainland USA.

EMPs from a ground level nuclear explosion are negligible as close as five miles away from the event. High altitude EMPs are much more widespread, but high altitude nukes are pointless when you are nuking all of the major population centers anyway. And EMPs in the northern hemisphere aren't going to have an effect on the southern hemisphere even at high altitudes.

[Willy]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

In 1983, I believe there were probably 24,000 nukes averaging 200 kilotons in the US arsenal and 36,000 nukes averaging 800 kilotons in the USSR arsenal (the Russians had poorer accuracy, so they needed more and large bombs for the same strategic effect). That is 4.8 gigatons on the US side and 28.8 gigatons on the USSR side. By comparison, Krakatoa was 13,000 times the Hiroshima bomb (~195 megatons) and Mount Tambora, the largest eruption in the last 10,000 years was 4-10 times Krakatoa (~780 megatons to ~1.95 gigatons). The combined arsenals of the USA and the USSR would have been 33.6 gigatons, so an all out exchange would have been a minimum of 170 times as bad as Krakota, which means that an exchange would have been the equivalent of a VEI-8 eruption.

I hadn´t wrote much about nuclear winter, because of the fact that their is a distinction between airburst mode for bombs, which brings more damage and the impact, which is necessary to bust bunkers, it also is a question in which year you let the war take place because a lot of bombs at the earlier date had only impact mode. This makes calculating the amount of dust which rises into the atmosphere difficult. Anyway you are right, a good deal of the people who survived the bombs and radiation would simply starve. I may add just one fact, healthy people take a lot of time longer to starve. After WWII in my country the winter was called Hungerwinter for obvious reasons, but even after spring most people including steel workers carried on getting only half rations. Complete without food not calculating in other factors and enough water a healthy human can stand 50-60 days, month or years on heavily reduced rations. I speak from own experience, I needed once over a long time a very restricted diet, I wasn´t feeling happy with it but was nevertheless able to ride my bike 10 km and after a break go home.

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

The global increase in radioactivity would shorten life expectancy for generations. Yes. But the subject is technological regression not life expectancy.

Sorry to keep the a high TL you need 2 things a population base to support it, which is heavily reduced, and learned experts, learning takes time and a reduced life expectancy means shorter active time, also most people inevitable will have several medical issues all not good for learning. The result is that the TL will be reduced.

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

There is no reason to believe that nuclear explosions on the ground, which would be all or almost all of them, would have an impact on the ozone layer.

I´ve read otherwise, and a nuclear physic I met once was also concerned about it. Of course the effect may be larger for high altitude explosions.

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

You know there's a reason why they call "fallout" that. It falls out. The vast majority of it ends up back on the ground within a hundred miles of the original explosion. Some of it would travel farther having made it into the jet streams, but once again that boils down to generations of shorter life expectancies.

According to the big amount bombs and the resulting amount of Fallout, even if 95% would drop dead next to the bombs, the whole planet would be covered in toxic doses of fallout. Back to tchernobyl even areas upwind in certain areas of europe have a high radiation, in fact the radiation is so high that hunting or collecting fungi is forbidden. Yes you can life inside but don´t dare to argue if you get cancer. And the sowjets did a lot to reduce fallout, including doting clouds with solver iodid. There are wonderfull maps published by the US department of defense from that time that show everybody what happens to downwind areas after a bomb explodes. Just take a look at them and you see you are wrong, its not the question of reduced life expectation, it´s a question of pure survival. But even if your position is true, it would make overland travel and trade near impossible.

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

EMPs from a ground level nuclear explosion are negligible as close as five miles away from the event. High altitude EMPs are much more widespread, but high altitude nukes are pointless when you are nuking all of the major population centers anyway. And EMPs in the northern hemisphere aren't going to have an effect on the southern hemisphere even at high altitudes.

Anotherthing in which you are wrong, during the tests in the pacific, by the french for example, depending on the weather pattern, in areas over several 100 km radio didn´t work for hours. In nearer areas never again, it isn´t only so often cited because the majority of people never noticed that. The pacific is without the islands a empty desert of water. In the point, that the area hit by EMP rises with altitude you are right.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Willy

For how long do you think a Nuclear Power Plant, would work after the bombs fell? They need crew hightech parts constant cooling and so on, you can lock them down, but this doesn´t reduce the fact that they nneed cooling for years before they can be dosmanteled. Every last one is going to blow up in the aftermath not early after but in spite of heartbreaking trys by the survivors sooner or later all we be there own tchernobyl.

It doesn't take years to shut down a nuclear power plant. If the reaction is kept under control, they can be shut down relatively quickly. Its basic reactor design. The most dangerous aspect would be plants failing from the bombs coming in. That would contribute to fallout, but there will be far fewer failed reactors than bombs, and they will have different effects. And Chernobyl had an area denial effect on less than 1% of Ukraine.

As for your position, it depends how far they where away from the tests areas, the dose makes allways the poison, and there are a lot of bombs. The USA were not a part as recklees than the sowjets, the did testing and yes monitored the population and radioactivity afterwards, but they never field tested on purpose to polute highly popluted areas with radiation.
brasilien agriculture may be have more problems with UV then with radiation.

true, but you don't need to hit large amounts of people to test how effectively nuclear weapons poison the soil. Sheep grazing are a perfectly adequate test of that, and large areas of the world will be untouched by all but long-distance fallout.

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

In 1983, I believe there were probably 24,000 nukes averaging 200 kilotons in the US arsenal and 36,000 nukes averaging 800 kilotons in the USSR arsenal

I think the number of bombs outstripped the ability of the nations to deliver them. The SALT talks, in place by 1983, would have restricted the number of warheads quickly deliverable on both sides. The total number of bombers and Mirv missiles for each side was capped at around 2,400. The soviets average warhead size on rapidly deployable missiles tended to stay at or under under 500 kt. The soviets did manufacture 10 warhead mirv missiles, but looking at the numbers leads me to believe as much as half of their MIRV arsenal was using 4 warheads. The US functional arsenel I think you've got about the right average yeild (maybe a touch small), but they've only got about three or four warheads on each of their 2400 missiles.



Which is more than enough to do the job, only only drops your estimate to around 8 gigatons.


The real question for me is not how the northern hemisphere fares, but how the southern hemisphere does. Will Australia and brazil each loose 90% of their population to famine?

[TGLS]

Nuclear winter relies on cities burning like crazy, the level of soot that stays in the atmosphere, and how much light would be absorbed by the soot. An oil fire was considered one of a small-scale examples, but then Kuwait happened and it wasn't that big a deal.

The fallout effects can be expected to be relatively minimal, considering most of the attacks can be expected to be airbursts. In the 1983 scenario, for example, Petrov would have reported a first strike by the Americans. There would be no need for attacks on counter-force targets. Counter-value targets, such as military bases and cities could be prioritized, many of which are more easily dealt with by airbursts. The smaller tactical weapons may not actually be used at all.

In the 1962 scenario, after firing the nuclear torpedoes, the Russians could still plausibly back down (though it would be completely humiliating.) This would probably have more surface bursts, but would likely have fewer detonations.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

In which means that an exchange would have been the equivalent of a VEI-8 eruption.

I believe this requires that the nuclear explosion mechanisms be equally efficient as the super-volcanic ones at lifting dust into the upper atmosphere.

With one consisting of a single very large explosion taking place under a mountain or mountain range in a single location and the other having many comparatively small explosions taking place at the surface or in the lower atmosphere these are not very similar mechanisms even if you can make the numbers add up to rough equivalency.

The Dinosaur Killer asteroid is fairly similar the super-volcanic one except probably even better at dust lifting and spreading due to column of near-vacuum in the asteroids wake when it hits. Also much more powerful than all the nukes put together (200 billion ton rock exploding like c. 100x its' mass in TNT).

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by ericthered

It doesn't take years to shut down a nuclear power plant. If the reaction is kept under control, they can be shut down relatively quickly. Its basic reactor design. The most dangerous aspect would be plants failing from the bombs coming in. That would contribute to fallout, but there will be far fewer failed reactors than bombs, and they will have different effects. And Chernobyl had an area denial effect on less than 1% of Ukraine.

And even that is out of overabundance of caution. The vast majority of the exclusion zone is not very radioactive and radiation levels are quite patchy even in the "dangerous" areas. It won't be lasting "generations" either. Really dangerous stuff has a fairly short half-life - that's what makes it dangerous, the short half life lets even small amounts emit enough energy fast enough to do real damage.

Planets are *big*, spread out all the radioisotopes in every bomb and reactor on the planet evenly over the surface and there just isn't enough at any one place to matter much. Or possibly at all - our estimates of how bad low levels of radiation are are all based on questionable extrapolations from the much higher doses where we can reliably detect the harm. TL6 to 8 civilizations *can* inflict some damage on a global scale, but it takes decades or centuries of sustained effects from major sectors of the economy (like agriculture or energy). A nuclear war is just too minor and short term a blip to have much ecological or environmental impact. If you ramped the war up enough to actually kill enough humans to drop the world a TL or two for more than a generation it might come close, but that's not very realistic. You probably couldn't kill off half the humans on Earth even if you deliberately set out to do so, and you'd need to do more than that to actually knock technology back for more than a generation.

Stories of falling technology in the post-apocalypse seem to draw on very short term experiences (places bombed flat a few months ago in World War II) or strained analogies to now pretty discredited theories about what happened in the aftermath of the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

[AlexanderHowl]

60,000 nuclear weapons with an average yield of 560 kilotons would kill off a massive number of people, especially since any that targeted infrastructure would be a surface blast. For example, one of the most effective strikes is to target power plants because a nation without electricity is a nation that is not coming back for a couple of generations. In addition, targeting natural gas processors and terminals and oil refineries and terminals will cause additional difficulty for recovery, as the nation will not be able to pipe or process oil and natural gas. Around 1500 nukes would destroy the US energy infrastructure in 1983, and I do not know how any nation can sustain anything above TL5 without electricity, natural gas, or oil. In addition, the craters and fallout would cause additional complications for recovery.