Swiss Civil Defense - Cheap & Effective
Hopelessly Midwestern
population could be saved if shelters were used (given adequate warning). 7
Studies also show that shelters constructed over a few days out of commonly
available materials in home or local settings could effectively work to save
millions of lives.
Many think that building shelters is too expensive to justify. Yet on a
national scale, many countries have done it, such as Switzerland, Sweden,
Norway, and many communist (like China) or formerly communist states. China,
while quite poor compared to the US, has built several thousands of miles of
inter-connected tunnel-shelters under all of their major cities, according
to a government report.
A 1986 government study reported that blast shelters (similar to Swiss
designs) built into the basements of new construction could be constructed
for $350 to $500 per occupant space. These shelters can be used for other
purposes as well, like a normal basement room. Fallout shelters in basements
and expedient shelters built in a yard may cost from $0 to $20 per occupant,
since most of the costs are hidden in self-help labor. 6 Most families with
yards could be protected with a dual-use shelter (play area, storage space,
workshop, etc.) from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars.
Premium family shelters with nuclear, biological, and chemical protection
can be bought for less than $20,000.
Chester, C.V. and Zimmerman, G.P., Civil Defense Shelters, A
State-of-the-Art Assessment (1986) Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Swiss Civil Defense (1984/85), Federal Office of Civil Defense, Berne,
Switzerland
http://www.tacda.org/Journal%20March%2099/whyblast1.htm
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> Numerous studies show that shelters can be effective. Over 90% of the US
> population could be saved if shelters were used (given adequate warning).
Only 27 million dead? Though preferable to, say, 100 million dead it
doesn't come close to deterrence which results in 0 million dead.
Estimates of a "mere" 27 million dead though are based on a very
questionable assumption: that Russia - while launching an attack of
unprecedented savagery - nonetheless is not trying to 'deliberately'
kill civilians. The 6000 or so warheads in the current Russian arsenal
can place at least 18,000 square miles *inside* a 30 psi blast contour
(in other words be able to defeat even 30 psi blast shelters). Since
U.S. urban areas generally have population densities in excess of 3000
per square mile (I think the average is something like five thousand),
this suggests that Russia has the capacity to kill a bare minimum of 54
million even if blast shelters were universally available (and assuming
adequate warning were given).
> Studies also show that shelters constructed over a few days out of commonly
> available materials in home or local settings could effectively work to save
> millions of lives.
>
> Many think that building shelters is too expensive to justify. Yet on a
> national scale, many countries have done it, such as Switzerland, Sweden,
> Norway, and many communist (like China) or formerly communist states.
It takes a government mandated program to get widespread implementation
though, and decades for there to be significant effect on availability
if the 'easy' route of requiring shelters as part of new building
construction is taken. The obvious time for such a program would have
been 50 years ago, when the enormous expansion of suburbia was occurring
and fear of nuclear attack was at an all time high.
One of the prime reasons that this was never done was the realization of
the fact illustrated above, urban populations are so concentrated that
in a civil defense-versus-armaments race the prospective attacker easily
wins, being able to add the capability to overwhelm shelter protection
faster, at lower cost, and with less societal impact than the defender.
> A 1986 government study reported that blast shelters (similar to Swiss
> designs) built into the basements of new construction could be constructed
> for $350 to $500 per occupant space.
This seems to be a bit low. FEMA estimates for tornado rooms, which are
generally similar in construction requirements, start at $2000, which is
$500 per person for a statistically above average occupancy of four (see
http://www.fema.gov/library/ism2.pdf). The range goes up to $6000 is
predicated on integrating it into new construction, retrofits being
higher. The structural requirements for blast shelters is more stringent
though since it has to take overpressure in addition to high winds.
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern
news:38A98671...@earthlink.net...
>
> Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> >
> > Numerous studies show that shelters can be effective. Over 90% of the US
> > population could be saved if shelters were used (given adequate
warning).
>
> Only 27 million dead? Though preferable to, say, 100 million dead it
> doesn't come close to deterrence which results in 0 million dead.
That's the point Carey, fewer deaths is preferable if deterrence fails. 27M
is almost unthinkable, but the survival of the nation would be much more
secure than if 100M were killed. What's your point?
> Estimates of a "mere" 27 million dead though are based on a very
> questionable assumption: that Russia - while launching an attack of
> unprecedented savagery - nonetheless is not trying to 'deliberately'
> kill civilians.
That Russia will give first priority to knocking out our weapons and other
military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians is hardly a
questionable assumption.
>The 6000 or so warheads in the current Russian arsenal
> can place at least 18,000 square miles *inside* a 30 psi blast contour
> (in other words be able to defeat even 30 psi blast shelters). Since
> U.S. urban areas generally have population densities in excess of 3000
> per square mile (I think the average is something like five thousand),
> this suggests that Russia has the capacity to kill a bare minimum of 54
> million even if blast shelters were universally available (and assuming
> adequate warning were given).
They say there are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Your misleading
calculations are stretching the truth, knowing full well that important
military targets will be given high priority and absorb multiple hits in
small areas.
> > Studies also show that shelters constructed over a few days out of
commonly
> > available materials in home or local settings could effectively work to
save
> > millions of lives.
> >
> > Many think that building shelters is too expensive to justify. Yet on a
> > national scale, many countries have done it, such as Switzerland,
Sweden,
> > Norway, and many communist (like China) or formerly communist states.
>
> It takes a government mandated program to get widespread implementation
> though, and decades for there to be significant effect on availability
> if the 'easy' route of requiring shelters as part of new building
> construction is taken. The obvious time for such a program would have
> been 50 years ago, when the enormous expansion of suburbia was occurring
> and fear of nuclear attack was at an all time high.
Correct, it should have been done 50 yrs ago.
> One of the prime reasons that this was never done
You should clarify by adding "in the US."
> was the realization of
> the fact illustrated above, urban populations are so concentrated that
> in a civil defense-versus-armaments race the prospective attacker easily
> wins, being able to add the capability to overwhelm shelter protection
> faster, at lower cost, and with less societal impact than the defender.
Then why do other countries have civil defense? Maybe they realized more
than that.
> > A 1986 government study reported that blast shelters (similar to Swiss
> > designs) built into the basements of new construction could be
constructed
> > for $350 to $500 per occupant space.
>
> This seems to be a bit low.
Inflation might be a factor.
> FEMA estimates for tornado rooms, which are
> generally similar in construction requirements, start at $2000, which is
> $500 per person for a statistically above average occupancy of four (see
> http://www.fema.gov/library/ism2.pdf). The range goes up to $6000 is
> predicated on integrating it into new construction, retrofits being
> higher. The structural requirements for blast shelters is more stringent
> though since it has to take overpressure in addition to high winds.
What price life? $1500 doesn't cover the cost of a decent injury.
Jason Quick
[stuff snipped]
> That Russia will give first priority to knocking out our weapons and other
> military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians is hardly a
> questionable assumption.
[more snippage]
> They say there are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Your misleading
> calculations are stretching the truth, knowing full well that important
> military targets will be given high priority and absorb multiple hits in
> small areas.
Okay. But see, many many many targets of military and
strategic value are located near or IN population centres. They
weren't necessarily built that way, but cities have grown up
round them, etc. I'm sure you're aware of this. Just hitting
those targets, especially with multiple warheads, would
result in the deaths of many millions.
Take, for instance, my town - Omaha. I live 10 miles WNW
of Offutt AFB, and unless I figure out the bizness of building
a shelter, or I have warning and can get out, I expect to be a
whiff of vapor in the event of nuclear attack by the FSU.
Besides the thing w/ Offutt, Omaha is a major railroad nexus
and is the junction for a whole lotta communications. Way
too much strategic value to pass up.
Same goes for towns like Seattle, Chicago, LA, Pensacola,
pretty much anywhere on the eastern seaboard between
Boston and Norfolk, San Francisco, San Diego, Honolulu,
Kansas City, St. Louis, New Orleans...you get the picture.
Do not millions live in these areas? Wouldn't they be
similarly destroyed in a nuclear conflict?
Jason
Hopelessly Midwestern
Jason Quick <jas...@no.via.net> wrote in message
news:7ntq4.437$t8.1...@newscene.newscene.com...
> Hopelessly Midwestern <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
>
> [stuff snipped]
>
> > That Russia will give first priority to knocking out our weapons and
other
> > military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians is hardly a
> > questionable assumption.
>
> [more snippage]
>
> > They say there are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Your misleading
> > calculations are stretching the truth, knowing full well that important
> > military targets will be given high priority and absorb multiple hits in
> > small areas.
>
> Okay. But see, many many many targets of military and
> strategic value are located near or IN population centres.
Yes, I realize that. Carey's figures suppose the Russians will space their
warheads for maximum civilian damage, which is what I questioned.
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:38A98671...@earthlink.net...
> >
> > Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> > >
> > > Numerous studies show that shelters can be effective. Over 90% of the US
> > > population could be saved if shelters were used (given adequate
> warning).
> >
> > Only 27 million dead? Though preferable to, say, 100 million dead it
> > doesn't come close to deterrence which results in 0 million dead.
>
> That's the point Carey, fewer deaths is preferable if deterrence fails. 27M
> is almost unthinkable, but the survival of the nation would be much more
> secure than if 100M were killed. What's your point?
>
> > Estimates of a "mere" 27 million dead though are based on a very
> > questionable assumption: that Russia - while launching an attack of
> > unprecedented savagery - nonetheless is not trying to 'deliberately'
> > kill civilians.
>
> That Russia will give first priority to knocking out our weapons and other
> military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians is hardly a
> questionable assumption.
>
> >The 6000 or so warheads in the current Russian arsenal
> > can place at least 18,000 square miles *inside* a 30 psi blast contour
> > (in other words be able to defeat even 30 psi blast shelters). Since
> > U.S. urban areas generally have population densities in excess of 3000
> > per square mile (I think the average is something like five thousand),
> > this suggests that Russia has the capacity to kill a bare minimum of 54
> > million even if blast shelters were universally available (and assuming
> > adequate warning were given).
>
> They say there are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Your misleading
> calculations are stretching the truth, knowing full well that important
> military targets will be given high priority and absorb multiple hits in
> small areas.
I find the story of U.S. advocacy of civil defense as a viable response
to the threat of Soviet nuclear attack to be rather amusing (in a dark
sort of way).
In the early 1960s, when the U.S. first became vulnerable to a large
scale Soviet nuclear attack, an aggressive shelter-building program was
advocated by some as a way to protect the mostly urban U.S. population
from annhilation.
Other analysts argued that the Soviet Union could - if it chose - deploy
enough extra warheads (over and above any it deemed necessary for
strictly military needs) to overwhelm any possible shelter program by
the time such a massive construction program could be completed.
So the shelter program was abandoned.
And the Soviets actually did deploy enough warheads to overwhelm such a
program if it had been built anyway.
By the 1980s the Soviets had deployed enough warheads that they could
defeat 30 psi blast protection for the 100 largest U.S. cities with only
30% of their force. Thus the Kearny treatise on shelter protection,
published in 1986, was reduced to arguing that the proposed program
would be effective simply because the Soviets wouldn't choose to attack
our cities with the intent of killing the population.
It wouldn't be *rational* you see.
The inherent irony is clearly lost on many people (like Kearny himself),
so I will spell it out.
A massive nuclear attack would in all probability be an act of national
suicide given the target's own retaliatory capacity. Actually conducting
such an attack is thus profoundly irrational.
So on what basis can one say that if such a truly irrational act were
actually carried out, that attempting to destroy the attackees
population as an objective would be out of the question?
Especially considering the fact that that actually was the targeting
plan of the U.S. in the late 50s, when the U.S. arsenal was at its peak
destructiveness with 20,000 megatons deployed.
I can put it no better than quote Matthew 23:24 -
Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel."
Carey Sublette
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:38A98671...@earthlink.net...
> >
> > in a civil defense-versus-armaments race the prospective attacker easily
> > wins, being able to add the capability to overwhelm shelter protection
> > faster, at lower cost, and with less societal impact than the defender.
>
> The "cost-effectiveness at the margin" argument had never been analyzed in
> terms of strategy. The "margin" was assumed to be a dollar-to- dollar
> comparison of offensive versus defensive weapon systems, determining that
> strategic defenses were too expensive to deploy.
Nonsense.
The cost-effectiveness of shelters versus offensive weapons was well
known and extensively discussed.
Perhaps you're unaware of it because the tradeoff is so bad, that
shelter proponents abandoned it over three decades ago (a 600 billion
dollar shelter program could be completely defeated by no more 60
billion in offensive weapons).
By the time we get to Kearny in 1986, he is reduced to arguing that a
shelter system would be effective simply because it would be irrational
for an attacker to want to defeat it - even though only a small
proportion of the then deployed Soviet arsernal would hav done so.
Carey Sublette
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> Jason Quick <jas...@no.via.net> wrote in message
> news:7ntq4.437$t8.1...@newscene.newscene.com...
> > Hopelessly Midwestern <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
> >
> > [stuff snipped]
> >
> > > That Russia will give first priority to knocking out our weapons and
> other
> > > military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians is hardly a
> > > questionable assumption.
> >
> > [more snippage]
> >
> > > They say there are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Your misleading
> > > calculations are stretching the truth, knowing full well that important
> > > military targets will be given high priority and absorb multiple hits in
> > > small areas.
> >
> > Okay. But see, many many many targets of military and
> > strategic value are located near or IN population centres.
>
> Yes, I realize that. Carey's figures suppose the Russians will space their
> warheads for maximum civilian damage, which is what I questioned.
The point is they can if they want to.
The capability already exists, and no matter how many appeals are made
to other 'requirements' for warheads that would reduce this number, they
could add back the surplus capacity if the chose by replicating the
investment.
The only reason why a urban shelter program could effective at
protecting the U.S. populaton (which is now 80% urban) is that the
Russian simply chose not to exercise this targeting option.
Funny how kindly you assume these savage attackers to be.
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> >
> > Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> > news:38A98671...@earthlink.net...
> > >
> > > in a civil defense-versus-armaments race the prospective attacker
easily
> > > wins, being able to add the capability to overwhelm shelter protection
> > > faster, at lower cost, and with less societal impact than the
defender.
> >
> > The "cost-effectiveness at the margin" argument had never been analyzed
in
> > terms of strategy. The "margin" was assumed to be a dollar-to- dollar
> > comparison of offensive versus defensive weapon systems, determining
that
> > strategic defenses were too expensive to deploy.
>
> Nonsense.
So you say...
> The cost-effectiveness of shelters versus offensive weapons was well
> known and extensively discussed.
I'm showing that the conclusions reached may well be erroneous.
> Perhaps you're unaware of it because the tradeoff is so bad, that
> shelter proponents abandoned it over three decades ago
I understand the "cost-effective" calculations and why civil defense was not
built. Unfortunately, those calculations ignored the benefits of defense as
calculated in the "The Preferred Defense Option."
>(a 600 billion
> dollar shelter program could be completely defeated by no more 60
> billion in offensive weapons).
"The Preferred Defense Option" says that only 10% of defenses to 100% of
offenses would be required to deter attack. Don't you desire that high
level of deterrence, Carey?
> By the time we get to Kearny in 1986, he is reduced to arguing that a
> shelter system would be effective simply because it would be irrational
> for an attacker to want to defeat it - even though only a small
> proportion of the then deployed Soviet arsernal would hav done so.
Although his book for laymen "Nuclear War Survival Skills" is not a
theoretical work on the subject, his brief synopsis of the strategic
situation is still valid in stating a Russian attack would give "first
priority to knocking out our weapons and other military assets that can
damage Russia and kill Russians."
You however, are reduced to reciting past Soviet arsenal strength and the
unlikely irrational use of nuclear weapons in denying the legitimate
benefits of civil defense. Fortunately for the citizens of Norway, Sweden,
Switzerland, and Russia, their scientists and policy makers seem to strongly
disagree with you -- they've got it.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> I find the story of U.S. advocacy of civil defense as a viable response
> to the threat of Soviet nuclear attack to be rather amusing (in a dark
> sort of way).
Carey is reduced to "argument by intimidation." Civil defense is just so
hilarious, who else would consider it seriously...Yeah, yeah.
> [snip simple history and anti-Kearny diatribe]
> A massive nuclear attack would in all probability be an act of national
> suicide given the target's own retaliatory capacity.
In all probability, your "national suicide" premise is faulty.
As Dr. Edward Teller points out: "Russian official policy holds that civil
defense is feasible even in a nuclear war...All this may mean that in a
nuclear exchange, which we must try to avoid or to deter, the Russian deaths
would probably not exceed ten million. Tragic as such a figure is, the
Russian nation would survive."
>Actually conducting
> such an attack is thus profoundly irrational.
Wrong. It is rational to assume Russia would risk 10 million lives,
especially considering the losses their leaders have been willing to inflict
on its own population in the past. Teller states "If they succeed in
eliminating the United States they can commandeer food, machinery and
manpower from the rest of the world. They could recover rapidly. They would
have attained their goal: world domination."
> So on what basis can one say that if such a truly irrational act were
Your premises are faulty, but lets see where it goes...
> actually carried out, that attempting to destroy the attackees
> population as an objective would be out of the question?
A simple answer: Of course, isn't out of the question. But more likely, as
Kearny points out, Russia will "give first priority to knocking out our
weapons and other military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians."
In addition, the "The Preferred Defense Option" that shows "only 10% of
defenses to 100% of offenses would be required to deter attack, and [is]
based on the logical assumption that a nuclear attacker would require a
90-95% confidence level in the success of the attack" The defender would
require only a minimum of ten percent of defenses to defeat that level of
confidence (of deliberate attack), especially if deception were employed in
deployment of the defenses."
Civil Defense (and a national missile defense) would offer a high degree of
deterrence that we don't have now. Deterrence, especially with non-risky,
non-belligerent means, is a desirable thing. Is there some reason you don't
want that, Carey?
> Especially considering the fact that actually was the targeting
> plan of the U.S. in the late 50s, when the U.S. arsenal was at its peak
> destructiveness with 20,000 megatons deployed.
US nuclear deployment has been literally decimated from that 40 yr. old
figure. There are 2320 MT deployed now. Why are you reduced to drudging up
40 year old numbers?
> I can put it no better than quote Matthew 23:24 -
> Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel."
Ditto.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> >Carey's figures suppose the Russians will space their
> > warheads for maximum civilian damage, which is what I questioned.
>
> The point is they can if they want to.
Only by increasing the risk to themselves.
> The capability already exists, and no matter how many appeals are made
> to other 'requirements' for warheads that would reduce this number, they
> could add back the surplus capacity if the chose by replicating the
> investment.
You ignore the fact that a good civil defense program includes evacuation to
less risky areas. Of course, this is convenient for your "straw-man"
calculations.
> The only reason why a urban shelter program could effective at
> protecting the U.S. populaton (which is now 80% urban) is that the
> Russian simply chose not to exercise this targeting option.
Your straw-man scenario assumes an attacker *absolutely will* use this more
risky targeting option without warning in a massive Pearl Harbor style
nuclear strike. While this is possible, and would certainly negate much of
the life-saving effectiveness of any civil defense, there are other more
likely scenarios in which civil defense would deter an attack or preserve
many lives in the event of one.
For instance, if the Russians in a crisis situation started evacuating their
population in preparation for a possible attack, a plan to evacuate US
citizens to shelters in less risky areas would have both a deterrence
effect, and may well mean the difference between survival and annihilation
of our country.
> Funny how kindly you assume these savage attackers to be.
Knee-slapping to you perhaps, but you make a grave error. I do not assume
savage attackers to be kindly.
I expect, as Kearny does, that if an attacker uses nuclear weapons, they
will use them first to reduce risk to themselves.
I expect that if we had civil defense that an attacker would be more wary of
risking at attack on a protected population than on a vulnerable population.
Noah Simoneaux
<care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
(snip)
>A massive nuclear attack would in all probability be an act of national
>suicide given the target's own retaliatory capacity. Actually conducting
>such an attack is thus profoundly irrational.
Not necessarily, if one side developed a weapon which they figured
gave them enough of an advantage where they figured they could hit the
other side with a pre-emptive strike and catch them sleeping. If you
could hit the other side before they could even launch you wouldn't
have much to worry about from their retaliation. Having subs and
bombers in addition to missiles would make that much more risky,
though.
Another possibility is one side finding out that the other side was
beginning to gain a strong advantage over the other. The side being
left behind might consider a strike now to be better than waiting
until the disparity was even worse.
Noah Simoneaux
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Carey Sublette
yoss...@cyberdude.com says...
> >
> > Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> > >
> > > Numerous studies show that shelters can be effective. Over 90% of the US
> > > population could be saved if shelters were used (given adequate
> warning).
> >
> > Only 27 million dead? Though preferable to, say, 100 million dead it
> > doesn't come close to deterrence which results in 0 million dead.
>
> That's the point Carey, fewer deaths is preferable if deterrence fails. 27M
> is almost unthinkable, but the survival of the nation would be much more
> secure than if 100M were killed. What's your point?
>
> > Estimates of a "mere" 27 million dead though are based on a very
> > questionable assumption: that Russia - while launching an attack of
> > unprecedented savagery - nonetheless is not trying to 'deliberately'
> > kill civilians.
>
> military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians is hardly a
> questionable assumption.
>
> > can place at least 18,000 square miles *inside* a 30 psi blast contour
> > (in other words be able to defeat even 30 psi blast shelters). Since
> > U.S. urban areas generally have population densities in excess of 3000
> > per square mile (I think the average is something like five thousand),
> > this suggests that Russia has the capacity to kill a bare minimum of 54
> > million even if blast shelters were universally available (and assuming
> > adequate warning were given).
>
> calculations are stretching the truth, knowing full well that important
> military targets will be given high priority and absorb multiple hits in
> small areas.
Then there is foolishness, foolishness, and more foolishness.
Many people seem unable or unwilling to absorb the fact of just how
destructive and cost-effective as agents of anhillation nuclear weapons
really are.
People advocating the effectiveness of civil defense for protecting urban
populations have to to assume that no one would deliberately attack
cities with the purpose of killing its inhabitants, even though this was
actually the strategy of the U.S. in the mid 50s. Implicitly these
advocates have to assume the attacker will COOPERATE with them to make
their plan effective - a bad idea given the inherent assumption of an
apocalyptically murderous foe.
Learn this arithmetic.
The above calculation is based ONLY on Russia's current, reduced arsenal
and shows that it would defeat a civil defense plan far larger and more
ambitious than any ever seriously proposed.
The ICBM force that Russia has RETIRED since 1991 had sufficient
destructive power to do the same.
Even if every single warhead in the current Russian arsenal is 'required'
for essential military targets located far from urban centers and can't
be spared, the 1990 Soviet force could still have accomplished the above
shelter defeating attack with the force left over.
Implementing a 30 psi blast shelter for every urban inhabitant would cost
hundreds of billions of dollars and take at least a decade or two to
complete. A mere 50% increase in its ICBM force investment, costing less
than 1/10 as much and completed in a shorter period of time, would have
enabled the Soviet Union to completely nullify it.
True, Russia today would be hard pressed to deploy such a new force --
but even in its current sad shape it probably still could if it made it
its top national priority, and it has a large force to defeat this
fanciful shelter program in place right now.
A civil defense program that requires the attacker to cooperate to make
it effective has a fundamental conceptual flaw.
> > > Studies also show that shelters constructed over a few days out of
> commonly
> > > available materials in home or local settings could effectively work to
> save
> > > millions of lives.
> > >
> > > Many think that building shelters is too expensive to justify. Yet on a
> > > national scale, many countries have done it, such as Switzerland,
> Sweden,
> > > Norway, and many communist (like China) or formerly communist states.
...
> > One of the prime reasons that this was never done
>
> You should clarify by adding "in the US."
Or on the necessary scale in Russia or China to provide meaningful
protection to their cities. There is a tendency among some groups to
greatly exaggerate the actual degree of blast protection built by either
nation. The U.S. - if it chose - has the force in place to massacre the
entire urban population of either nation (in fact both nations) even with
their civil defense programs.
> > was the realization of
> > the fact illustrated above, urban populations are so concentrated that
> > in a civil defense-versus-armaments race the prospective attacker easily
> > wins, being able to add the capability to overwhelm shelter protection
> > faster, at lower cost, and with less societal impact than the defender.
>
> Then why do other countries have civil defense? Maybe they realized more
> than that.
As noted above, the extent of the real scale of civil defense efforts is
often grossly, even fancifully, exaggerated.
Like the much smaller U.S. civil defense program, such program were
largely of placative nature - giving people the limited reassurance that
"something was being done".
Switzerland's civil defense culture is of long standing and long predates
nuclear weapons. Their strategy is predicated on making themselves
unattractive targets for CONVENTIONAL military invasion. Though I am
less familar with it, the same is true of Sweden. It would be useless to
protect their population against a nuclear attack if an opponent chose to
carry one out. One of the reasons both nations abandoned their own
nuclear weapons programs was the realization that it might make them more
likely targets of nuclear attack.
> > > A 1986 government study reported that blast shelters (similar to Swiss
> > > designs) built into the basements of new construction could be
> constructed
> > > for $350 to $500 per occupant space.
> >
> > This seems to be a bit low.
>
> Inflation might be a factor.
It seems low by a factor of 3 or 4, inflation hasn't been nearly that
high.
Carey Sublette
Carey Sublette
says...
> On Wed, 16 Feb 2000 17:25:08 GMT, Carey Sublette
> <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> (snip)
>
> >A massive nuclear attack would in all probability be an act of national
> >suicide given the target's own retaliatory capacity. Actually conducting
> >such an attack is thus profoundly irrational.
>
> Not necessarily, if one side developed a weapon which they figured
> gave them enough of an advantage where they figured they could hit the
> other side with a pre-emptive strike and catch them sleeping. If you
> could hit the other side before they could even launch you wouldn't
> have much to worry about from their retaliation.
This is a purely hypothetical situation which does not exist in the real
world.
> Having subs and
> bombers in addition to missiles would make that much more risky,
> though.
Exactly why this scenario has no relevance.
> Another possibility is one side finding out that the other side was
> beginning to gain a strong advantage over the other. The side being
> left behind might consider a strike now to be better than waiting
> until the disparity was even worse.
This is a situation of some historical interest, being how some in the
U.S. perceived the situation in the early 50s, prior to the deployment of
the hydrogen bomb. This was referred to as the "window of maximum danger"
when it was thought that the Soviet Union might provoke war.
The size of U.S and Russian strategic arsenals is so large now, relative
to what is required to level all significant urban and industrial areas,
that this sort of reasoning is meaningless. A worse disparity simply
means the rubble will bounce more on one side than the other, the net
effect though on the two societies would be literally physically
indistinguishable.
Carey Sublette
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:38AAE04E...@earthlink.net...
> >
> > Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> >
> > >Carey's figures suppose the Russians will space their
> > > warheads for maximum civilian damage, which is what I questioned.
> >
> > The point is they can if they want to.
>
> Only by increasing the risk to themselves.
>
> > The capability already exists, and no matter how many appeals are made
> > to other 'requirements' for warheads that would reduce this number, they
> > could add back the surplus capacity if the chose by replicating the
> > investment.
>
> You ignore the fact that a good civil defense program includes evacuation to
> less risky areas. Of course, this is convenient for your "straw-man"
> calculations.
Ah, then - a shelter program by itself WOULDN'T be sufficient after all!
Thanks for conceding this! They also have to be located distant for the
cities where people actually live and work! This sort of makes whole
low-ball cost estimates from including shelter cost in new construction
irrelevant doesn't it?
This is also massively undermines the plausiblity of civil defense as an
effective response to the threat of nuclear attack. Evacuating 80% of
the U.S. population (the fraction that is urban) is a staggering
undertaking, requiring weeks to execute, and a collosal infrastructure
to maintain them (food, water, shelter). It also completely shuts down
the U.S. economy, and the nation couldn't afford to stay in such a
mobilized state for long. And it only provides protection if the
attacker cooperates by refraining from attacking until mobilization is
complete, but not so long that the population is forced to return to
their homes.
An interesting analogy is the situation Israel has with its largely
reservist army. Full mobilization of the Israeli military doesn't
completely shut down the economy (as urban evacuation would) but it deos
cripple it, and Israel cannot afford to maintain full mobilization for
long. Historically, when Israel has mobilized is has gone to war in
short order if not already at war when mobilization begins.
>
> > The only reason why a urban shelter program could effective at
> > protecting the U.S. populaton (which is now 80% urban) is that the
> > Russian simply chose not to exercise this targeting option.
>
> Your straw-man scenario assumes an attacker *absolutely will* use this more
> risky targeting option without warning in a massive Pearl Harbor style
> nuclear strike. While this is possible, and would certainly negate much of
> the life-saving effectiveness of any civil defense, there are other more
> likely scenarios in which civil defense would deter an attack or preserve
> many lives in the event of one.
What are you saying? A "Pearl Harbor style" attack would presumably be
one without any advance warning. The Japanese solely attacked military
facilities. This has nothing to do with my argument.
I was outlining the situation where the enemy deliberately attacked
cities (as the U.S did in WWII, and planned to do in the 50s) with or
without warning. In fact, for the sake of argument I was assuming that
warning was given so that the population would have the opportunity to
take full cover.
As it happens, I also consider a "bolt from the blue" attack to be the
least likely candidate among a field of unlikely scenarios (I do note
though that at other times you have seemed quite enamored with these
surprise attack scenarios).
But even granting all kinds of geopolitical advance warning - an
extended period of deteriorating relations, a Cuban Missile style
pre-attack crisis period, the fact is that the attack if and when it
comes would likely give a maximum of 30 minutes warning (the flight time
of ICBMs, actually submarines place the vast bulk of the U.S. population
at risk with flight times of only a few minutes). An extended state of
high strategic alert actually prevents any immediate pre-attack warning
since the enemy is already fully buttoned-up and ready to fire. This
require everyone to be within a few minutes of their shelter at all
times. If the shelters are built into homes, then crisis alert would
shut down the econmy as effectively as evacuation would. If the crisis
stretched out, people would have to go back to work, and much of the
shelter protection would be entirely lost.
>
> For instance, if the Russians in a crisis situation started evacuating their
> population in preparation for a possible attack, a plan to evacuate US
> citizens to shelters in less risky areas would have both a deterrence
> effect, and may well mean the difference between survival and annihilation
> of our country.
>
> > Funny how kindly you assume these savage attackers to be.
>
> Knee-slapping to you perhaps, but you make a grave error. I do not assume
> savage attackers to be kindly.
>
> I expect, as Kearny does, that if an attacker uses nuclear weapons, they
> will use them first to reduce risk to themselves.
The problem is nuclear weapons are so numerous, and are sufficiently
cheap, that the attacker doesn't have to make a choice. He can do both.
Seeking protection in this is simply wishful thinking.
No matter how many are needed for "risk reduction" targets, the cities
can still be covered at moderate incremental cost. In fact the Soviets
actually did deploy enough warheads to do this, so although the shelter
scheme is hypothetical the capability to defeat is not.
Expensive civil defense program lose a lot of their appeal when it is
pointed out that simply by swithcing to a different targeting plan,
their claimed effectiveness can be wiped out.
And I'm just scratching the surface here with the problems that civil
defense proponents have with justifying "mere" a fatality level of 27
million. For example, even if all the claims for the effectiveness for
sheltering were granted (and I'm not) the claiming fatality level is
what they call the "one week level" - the number that would get through
an initial attack but before the inevitable effects of starvation,
disease, exposure, and follow-up attacks take their toll. A massive
nuclear attack would destroy the U.S food supply infrastructure, and
people don't last long without it. A large part of U.S. food stocks
would be lost, reestablishing food production (heavily dependent on
industrial inputs) and distribution would be time consuming.
Of course one could postulate huge investments in stockpiled food, fuel,
farming chemicals, equipment, and so on, but the more additional items
like this that get added into the program the farther we get from the
"cheap" program claim I originally took a shot at.
> I expect that if we had civil defense that an attacker would be more wary of
> risking at attack on a protected population than on a vulnerable population.
He would be wary due to his own vulnerabilities. Even the most
"optimistic" assessment of the consequences a large nuclear war are so
bad that they safetly keep this option out of the realm of rational
behavior. And if we assume *irrational* behavior, then all bets are off.
Carey Sublette
...
> > > A 1986 government study reported that blast shelters (similar to Swiss
> > > designs) built into the basements of new construction could be
> constructed
> > > for $350 to $500 per occupant space.
> >
> > This seems to be a bit low.
>
> Inflation might be a factor.
>
> > generally similar in construction requirements, start at $2000, which is
> > $500 per person for a statistically above average occupancy of four (see
> > http://www.fema.gov/library/ism2.pdf). The range goes up to $6000 is
> > predicated on integrating it into new construction, retrofits being
> > higher. The structural requirements for blast shelters is more stringent
> > though since it has to take overpressure in addition to high winds.
Let me put a bit more of a point on this.
I cite the FEMA tornado room figures to show that the *high* cost
estimate for a blast shelter is at the *bottom* end of the FEMA
estimate. Even allowing for inflation, the cost range is much lower than
the range for tornado rooms. I thus suspect the shelter study of
low-balling.
Further, tornado rooms are not really up to the standards of protection
required for an effective blast shelter since they don't take any
overpressure loads, just wind. The 30 psi shelter, the strongest one
discussed in Kearny's document and the one I have been using on this
thread to show the inherent problems of sheltering, would cost a lot
more than any of the FEMA tornado rooms. Looking at Kearny's specs, and
having some familiarity with construcition costs, it looks to me like at
least a $20,000 project for a family shelter - or something like $5000
per person.
> What price life? $1500 doesn't cover the cost of a decent injury.
Well, at $5000 person for a pretty strong blast shelter we are looking
at a nationwide program for 220 million urban residents of around one
trillion dollars. This is not what most people would call "cheap", and
is far higher than the figures you have been circulating.
As you say, "what price life"? The U.S. could certainly afford a one
trillion dollar program, especially since construction would probably
take 15-20 years, and if it really did save 50 million lives it would be
quite worthwhile - but it does so only in the event of an actual attack.
If deterrence can forestall such an attack - and to all appearances it
can - then it is not saving any lives at all even though the expense is
huge.
The fundamental reason why such a trillion dollar program has never and
never will get approved by congress as that before it gets signed into
law, the fact that an attacker can nullify its effectiveness at a small
fraction of its cost will come to light. In the halls of Civil Defense
where the converted preach to each other, this inconvenience can be
swept under the rug and be politiely ignored, but fortunately public
policy has to get past its critics.
Hopelessly Midwestern
news:38aba537...@news.preferred.com...
>
> [snip] If you
> could hit the other side before they could even launch you wouldn't
> have much to worry about from their retaliation.
Clinton's new PDD-60 rejects the old "launch-on-warning" stance. Nuclear
detonations must be detected now before the US will launch a retaliatory
strike. Of course, it will be too late to launch an ICBM once those nuclear
detonations have destroyed it.
PDD-60 just begs for a massive pre-emptive strike.
> Having subs and bombers in addition to missiles would make
> that much more risky, though.
The bombers will be destroyed along with the nuclear weapons locked in their
bunkers.
The only tool with which to retaliate would be the Trident sub force. There
are 2 interesting things to note that Clinton has done with the Trident
force:
(1) A new launch code protocol now requires authorization from land. (If
the missile attack takes out command authority and communication, they'll be
useless.)
(2) The Tridents are now being underloaded. There can be 8 warheads per
missile, but the average loading is now only 5. Of course, not all the subs
are sailing at one time, so some subs would be destroyed in a missile
attack.
Noah Simoneaux
<care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
(snip)
>Then there is foolishness, foolishness, and more foolishness.
>
>Many people seem unable or unwilling to absorb the fact of just how
>destructive and cost-effective as agents of anhillation nuclear weapons
>really are.
Many other people have bought into the propaganda, too. Nuclear
weapons aren't "agents of annihilation". They are explosives. They are
much more effective at destroying equipment and property than killing
people.
>
>People advocating the effectiveness of civil defense for protecting urban
>populations have to to assume that no one would deliberately attack
>cities with the purpose of killing its inhabitants, even though this was
>actually the strategy of the U.S. in the mid 50s. Implicitly these
>advocates have to assume the attacker will COOPERATE with them to make
>their plan effective - a bad idea given the inherent assumption of an
>apocalyptically murderous foe.
An attack on civilians was only ONE of the strategies the US had
considered. A web search on SIOP might help you see some of the many
other options.
(snip)
Noah Simoneaux
<care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
(snip)
>This is a purely hypothetical situation which does not exist in the real
>world.
In the real world it doesn't matter whether a situation is purely
hypothetical or not. If a situation exists in the mind of one side or
the other, its status in reality doesn't matter.
>
>> Having subs and
>> bombers in addition to missiles would make that much more risky,
>> though.
>
>Exactly why this scenario has no relevance.
>
>> Another possibility is one side finding out that the other side was
>> beginning to gain a strong advantage over the other. The side being
>> left behind might consider a strike now to be better than waiting
>> until the disparity was even worse.
>
>This is a situation of some historical interest, being how some in the
>U.S. perceived the situation in the early 50s, prior to the deployment of
>the hydrogen bomb. This was referred to as the "window of maximum danger"
>when it was thought that the Soviet Union might provoke war.
>
>The size of U.S and Russian strategic arsenals is so large now, relative
>to what is required to level all significant urban and industrial areas,
>that this sort of reasoning is meaningless. A worse disparity simply
>means the rubble will bounce more on one side than the other, the net
>effect though on the two societies would be literally physically
>indistinguishable.
Not quite true. Neither side would be so foolish as to launch ALL
their weapons at once. Very bad strategy. What happens if your attack
doesn't achieve the desired aims? You leave yourself nothing to defend
yourself with. Making the rubble bounce isn't the only reason a
country would have extra weapons available. In fact, making the rubble
bounce is a waste of weapons.
Darcy Hildebrand
From Hopelessly Midwestern:
> As Dr. Edward Teller points out: "Russian official policy holds that civil
> defense is feasible even in a nuclear war...All this may mean that in a
> nuclear exchange, which we must try to avoid or to deter, the Russian
deaths
> would probably not exceed ten million. Tragic as such a figure is, the
> Russian nation would survive."
> especially considering the losses their leaders have been willing to
inflict
> on its own population in the past. Teller states "If they succeed in
> eliminating the United States they can commandeer food, machinery and
> manpower from the rest of the world. They could recover rapidly. They
would
> have attained their goal: world domination."
What food, machinery, and manpower would be left for the Rooskies to
commandeer?
Carey Sublette
Noah Simoneaux wrote:
>
> On Thu, 17 Feb 2000 13:36:36 GMT, Carey Sublette
> <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
...
> >The size of U.S and Russian strategic arsenals is so large now, relative
> >to what is required to level all significant urban and industrial areas,
> >that this sort of reasoning is meaningless. A worse disparity simply
> >means the rubble will bounce more on one side than the other, the net
> >effect though on the two societies would be literally physically
> >indistinguishable.
>
> Not quite true. Neither side would be so foolish as to launch ALL
> their weapons at once. Very bad strategy. What happens if your attack
> doesn't achieve the desired aims? You leave yourself nothing to defend
> yourself with. Making the rubble bounce isn't the only reason a
> country would have extra weapons available. In fact, making the rubble
> bounce is a waste of weapons.
No need to launch all weapons.
There's an idea that seems to keep coming up on this thread - that
nuclear warheads are in such short supply that an attacker couldn't
afford to target cities directly.
Leveling all urban and industrial areas in Russia or the U.S. only
requires 10-15% of current standing arsenals. Its just noise.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
>Implicitly these
> advocates have to assume the attacker will COOPERATE with them to make
> their plan effective - a bad idea given the inherent assumption of an
> apocalyptically murderous foe.
Incorrect. One can assume that an attacker will give priority to destroying
military targets that could be used against them. That is hardly
cooperation.
> Learn this arithmetic.
You should yourself.
> The above calculation is based ONLY on Russia's current, reduced arsenal
Your straw-man calculations ignore two things:
(1) Civil Defense includes evacuation.
(2) That an attacker will give priority to destroying military targets that
could be used against them.
Carey Sublette
Noah Simoneaux wrote:
>
> On Thu, 17 Feb 2000 13:26:24 GMT, Carey Sublette
> <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> (snip)
>
> >Then there is foolishness, foolishness, and more foolishness.
> >
> >Many people seem unable or unwilling to absorb the fact of just how
> >destructive and cost-effective as agents of anhillation nuclear weapons
> >really are.
>
> Many other people have bought into the propaganda, too. Nuclear
> weapons aren't "agents of annihilation". They are explosives.
I would say that if you exploded a nuclear device in the middle of a
city it is both acting as your agent, and it is annhilating the
population.
> They are
> much more effective at destroying equipment and property than killing
> people.
Please explain. Most "equipment" - industrial machinery say - is
actually rather hard to damage directly (see pictures of intact factory
equipment in the ruins of Hiroshima in "The Effects of Nuclear
Weapons"). "Property" in the sense of land is of course impervious to
damage. But the destruction of property in the sense of building and
homes, and their contents, is for all practical purposes equivalent to
destroying the inhabitants of said buildings. People in concentrated
areas are very easy to kill with nuclear weapons.
> >People advocating the effectiveness of civil defense for protecting urban
> >populations have to to assume that no one would deliberately attack
> >cities with the purpose of killing its inhabitants, even though this was
> >actually the strategy of the U.S. in the mid 50s. Implicitly these
> >advocates have to assume the attacker will COOPERATE with them to make
> >their plan effective - a bad idea given the inherent assumption of an
> >apocalyptically murderous foe.
>
> An attack on civilians was only ONE of the strategies the US had
> considered. A web search on SIOP might help you see some of the many
> other options.
The first generation thermonuclear arsenal of 10-15 megaton weapons was
not good for anything else but wholesale slaughter (same with the later
25 Mt follow-on). I suppose you could argue that the slaughter was just
"collateral damage", but nonetheless the US actually planned and trained
for the killing of essentially the entire urban population of the USSR.
Whether other SIOP plans existed (or exist) is irrelevant. The fact that
such an attack was ever part of the SIOP demolishes the airy dismissal
of such an attack as a possible scenario.
True enough. But the fact that the "genocide attack" strategy was on the
SIOP at all
Hopelessly Midwestern
> Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> > You ignore the fact that a good civil defense program includes
evacuation to
> > less risky areas. Of course, this is convenient for your "straw-man"
> > calculations.
>
> Ah, then - a shelter program by itself WOULDN'T be sufficient after all!
> Thanks for conceding this!
I didn't concede anything. I advocate civil defense, which includes
evacuation by definition. Are you so uninformed as to what civil defense
is? It seems so. You need to read and learn.
>They also have to be located distant for the
> cities where people actually live and work! This sort of makes whole
> low-ball cost estimates from including shelter cost in new construction
> irrelevant doesn't it?
No.
> This is also massively undermines the plausiblity of civil defense as an
> effective response to the threat of nuclear attack. Evacuating 80% of
> the U.S. population (the fraction that is urban) is a staggering
> undertaking, requiring weeks to execute,
Is that so? Weeks??? Do you have references, or are you just building
another strawman?
> and a collosal infrastructure
> to maintain them (food, water, shelter).
Yeah, Carey, use big words like "collosal" and ignore what Norway, Sweden,
Switzerland, China, and Russia are doing. Cheaply.
> It also completely shuts down
> the U.S. economy, and the nation couldn't afford to stay in such a
> mobilized state for long.
It also saves the viability of the nation in an attack. What do you want:
Metallica CDs and a Sable, or a chance at life?
>And it only provides protection if the
> attacker cooperates by refraining from attacking until mobilization is
> complete, but not so long that the population is forced to return to
> their homes.
The evacuated Russian population would be in the same situation, with the
advantage of having prepared for it and being able to outlast the US. Is
that what you want?
> An interesting analogy is the situation Israel has with its largely
> reservist army. Full mobilization of the Israeli military doesn't
> completely shut down the economy (as urban evacuation would) but it deos
> cripple it, and Israel cannot afford to maintain full mobilization for
> long. Historically, when Israel has mobilized is has gone to war in
> short order if not already at war when mobilization begins.
Good analogy. To carry the analogy further, you advocate doing away with
the reservist army because of some mobilization problems.
> > > The only reason why a urban shelter program could effective at
> > > protecting the U.S. populaton (which is now 80% urban) is that the
> > > Russian simply chose not to exercise this targeting option.
> >
> > Your straw-man scenario assumes an attacker *absolutely will* use this
more
> > risky targeting option without warning in a massive Pearl Harbor style
> > nuclear strike. While this is possible, and would certainly negate much
of
> > the life-saving effectiveness of any civil defense, there are other more
> > likely scenarios in which civil defense would deter an attack or
preserve
> > many lives in the event of one.
>
> What are you saying? A "Pearl Harbor style" attack would presumably be
> one without any advance warning. The Japanese solely attacked military
> facilities. This has nothing to do with my argument.
You may take it to mean "suprise" as you stated. It has everything to do
with your argument.
> I was outlining the situation where the enemy deliberately attacked
> [snip] everyone to be within a few minutes of their shelter at all
> times. If the shelters are built into homes, then crisis alert would
> shut down the econmy as effectively as evacuation would. If the crisis
> stretched out, people would have to go back to work, and much of the
> shelter protection would be entirely lost.
The Russians would be evacuated also. And, because they have prepared for
it, they would be at an advantage to wait us out.
> > I expect, as Kearny does, that if an attacker uses nuclear weapons, they
> > will use them first to reduce risk to themselves.
>
> The problem is nuclear weapons are so numerous, and are sufficiently
> cheap, that the attacker doesn't have to make a choice. He can do both.
Not with total certainty. Civil defense takes away that certainty and adds
another layer of deterrence.
> Seeking protection in this is simply wishful thinking.
No, its good sense.
> Expensive civil defense program lose a lot of their appeal when it is
> pointed out that simply by swithcing to a different targeting plan,
> their claimed effectiveness can be wiped out.
With your targetting plan using old larger weapons numbers, of course.
> And I'm just scratching the surface here with the problems that civil
> defense proponents have with justifying "mere" a fatality level of 27
> million.
Civil defense proponents are NOT "justifying" that fatality level. They are
saying less death is better than more.
>For example, even if all the claims for the effectiveness for
> sheltering were granted (and I'm not) the claiming fatality level is
> what they call the "one week level" - the number that would get through
> an initial attack but before the inevitable effects of starvation,
> disease, exposure, and follow-up attacks take their toll.
Civil defense would save lives beyond the one week level.
>A massive
> nuclear attack would destroy the U.S food supply infrastructure, and
> people don't last long without it. A large part of U.S. food stocks
> would be lost, reestablishing food production (heavily dependent on
> industrial inputs) and distribution would be time consuming.
Living is time-consuming. And you're willing to just roll over and give up?
I think we're getting to the psychological roots of your problem with CD.
> Of course one could postulate huge investments in stockpiled food, fuel,
> farming chemicals, equipment, and so on, but the more additional items
> like this that get added into the program the farther we get from the
> "cheap" program claim I originally took a shot at.
Survival foods are cheap. You don't need Twinkies and Coke to survive.
> > I expect that if we had civil defense that an attacker would be more
wary of
> > risking at attack on a protected population than on a vulnerable
population.
>
> He would be wary due to his own vulnerabilities.
Thank you for agreeing.
>Even the most
> "optimistic" assessment of the consequences a large nuclear war are so
> bad that they safetly keep this option out of the realm of rational
> behavior.
This is your constant mantra. Unfortunately, Russian war doctrine doesn't
agree.
Hopelessly Midwestern
> Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> ...
> > What price life? $1500 doesn't cover the cost of a decent injury.
>
> Well, at $5000 person for a pretty strong blast shelter we are looking
> at a nationwide program for 220 million urban residents of around one
Remember, Civil Defense includes evacuation non-essential workers from high
risk areas. Fallout shelters in these evacuation areas would be much
cheaper than the blast shelters needed to give the essential workers a
chance to live.
The facts are Switzerland has excellent Civil Defense for much less than
your fevered calculations show.
Hopelessly Midwestern
news:88hecn$tva$1...@hardcore.ivn.net...
>
> What food, machinery, and manpower would be left for the Rooskies to
> commandeer?
The rest of the world's - unaffected by the attack and blackmailed into
submission.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
>The fact that
> such an attack was ever part of the SIOP demolishes the airy dismissal
> of such an attack as a possible scenario.
I don't see anybody dismissing the possibility. You, however, are touting
it as the only possibility.
Gregory Walker
>> ...
>> > What price life? $1500 doesn't cover the cost of a decent injury.
>>
>> Well, at $5000 person for a pretty strong blast shelter we are looking
>> at a nationwide program for 220 million urban residents of around one
>
>
>The facts are Switzerland has excellent Civil Defense for much less than
>your fevered calculations show.
The only "facts" you have presented is a short excerpt from an article
titled "Why We Built a Neighborhood Blast Shelter." The author refers
to Civil Defense documents from the U.S. and other countries to
justify his decision. The article presents conclusions without the
kind of detailed analysis that Carey has provided to this newsgroup.
These "facts" look more like conclusions without the facts from whic
they were taken. The look decidedly less substantial than Carey's
analysis. Why not take the next step and get copies of the Oak Ridge
and other government reports? Show us some real numbers for Swedish,
Swiss, and Chinese Civil Defense.
Gregory Walker gwa...@jump.net
Trinity Atomic Web Site --
<http://www.enviroweb.org/issues/nuketesting/>
<http://www.fas.org/nuke/trinity/>
Hopelessly Midwestern
news:38acb0e9....@news.jump.net...
> >
> >The facts are Switzerland has excellent Civil Defense for much less than
> >your fevered calculations show.
>
> The only "facts" you have presented is a short excerpt from an article
> titled "Why We Built a Neighborhood Blast Shelter." The author refers
> to Civil Defense documents from the U.S. and other countries to
> justify his decision.
Do you deny the validity of the documents listed as reference?
>The article presents conclusions without the
> kind of detailed analysis that Carey has provided to this newsgroup.
Detailed analysis? More like propaganda to assauge his concious. And
apparently yours.
> These "facts" look more like conclusions without the facts from whic
> they were taken. The look decidedly less substantial than Carey's
> analysis.
I thought they looked decidely more substantial than Carey's "analysis."
>Why not take the next step and get copies of the Oak Ridge
> and other government reports? Show us some real numbers for Swedish,
> Swiss, and Chinese Civil Defense.
Well, for starters, The Swedes and Swiss weren't bankrupted like Carey
purports Civil Defense costs will do to a nation. That's pretty simple.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> ...to assauge his concious.
Correction: conscience.
lar...@ozemail.com.au
<yoss...@cyberdude.com> , using a stream of recycled electrons,
wrote:
>Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
>news:38AC2616...@earthlink.net...
>> Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>> ...
>> > What price life? $1500 doesn't cover the cost of a decent injury.
>>
>> Well, at $5000 person for a pretty strong blast shelter we are looking
>> at a nationwide program for 220 million urban residents of around one
>
>Remember, Civil Defense includes evacuation non-essential workers from high
>risk areas. Fallout shelters in these evacuation areas would be much
>cheaper than the blast shelters needed to give the essential workers a
>chance to live.
>
>The facts are Switzerland has excellent Civil Defense for much less than
>your fevered calculations show.
>
1==> I could be wrong, but was under the impression that the Swiss
shelters are primarily fallout shelters, not blast shelters, and were
designed to save Swiss lives in the event of nuclear war elsewhere in
Europe, not a direct attack on Switzerland itself.
2==> Switzerland has maintained an armed neutrality since 1815 and has
not been involved in a foreign war since 1515. It is the seat for
many UN agencies.
3==> A cynic might say that due to the fact that it has such popular
banks no one is going to bother it. Note that even the Nazis didn't
bother the Swiss. A country that nuked Switzerland and destroyed the
banks and banking records would be terribly unpopular with most other
world countries. :-)
..larryn
"/ Simul Justus et Peccator / "
lar...@ozemail.com.au
<care...@earthlink.net> , using a stream of recycled electrons,
wrote:
>
>
>Noah Simoneaux wrote:
>>
>> On Thu, 17 Feb 2000 13:36:36 GMT, Carey Sublette
>> <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>...
>> >The size of U.S and Russian strategic arsenals is so large now, relative
>> >to what is required to level all significant urban and industrial areas,
>> >that this sort of reasoning is meaningless. A worse disparity simply
>> >means the rubble will bounce more on one side than the other, the net
>> >effect though on the two societies would be literally physically
>> >indistinguishable.
>>
>> Not quite true. Neither side would be so foolish as to launch ALL
>> their weapons at once. Very bad strategy. What happens if your attack
>> doesn't achieve the desired aims? You leave yourself nothing to defend
>> yourself with. Making the rubble bounce isn't the only reason a
>> country would have extra weapons available. In fact, making the rubble
>> bounce is a waste of weapons.
>
>No need to launch all weapons.
>
1==> There may be no actual need, but there is the concept of "use
them or lose them". A potential enemy knows exactly where the missile
silos are located, so that if don't launch the missiles there is a
chance that they will be destroyed.
>There's an idea that seems to keep coming up on this thread - that
>nuclear warheads are in such short supply that an attacker couldn't
>afford to target cities directly.
>
>Leveling all urban and industrial areas in Russia or the U.S. only
>requires 10-15% of current standing arsenals. Its just noise.
2==> A single nuclear sub carries the equivalent of all munitions
expended in WW2, and with MIRVed warheads can probably take out the
sixty largest enemy cities.
Will agree that both sides are capable of killing the other 6 or 7
times over. ...But don't ask me why anyone felt the need for this
capability. The most logical possibility is that the military may
assume that if want to be sure if getting a target it is better to hit
it with 7 missiles in case the first six malfunction or are destroyed.
3==> I don't believe in the concept of limited nuclear war. I don't
believe there is much of a chance now that Russia and the US will ever
get into a nuclear exchange, but if it happened I think that both
sides would throw everything they had at each other. If this
happened, neither country would survive as a world power, and it would
be pretty damn tough on other countries as well.
Drew Stowers
<yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
>
>I've done some rough calculations myself. Given that the average Russian
>warhead is 500kT (and with an airburst at 0.2 miles altitude that a18 miles
>square area is subjected to >5 psi) I figure 889 weapons.
>
And how many die from the firestorm?
The heat itself and the high winds that come along with it are very
dangerous. Just ask the survivors of Hamburg, Dresden, Tokoyo,
Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
At Hamburg, those in shelters at the center of the storm either burned
to death or died from carbon monoxide poisoning.
David Naugler
news:38ae0870...@news1.wolfenet.com...
Even 1000 Centigrade heat will not penetrate far into an underground shelter. At
Dresden, they died of carbon monoxide poisoning or straight asphyxiation as the
fire storm above consumed all the oxygen.
Provision for alternative oxygen in a self contained ventilation system is not a
major problem. For good protection against radioactive fallout it might be a
requirement. IIRC, nuclear bunkers built for the political leadership have all
these provisions.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> I just added up the total area of the 100 largest cities in the U.S.,
> and it comes to 16,000 square miles. This remarkably small number is
> still rather inflated since several cities have legal boundaries that
> extend far beyond the actual urbanized area (the small city of
> Anchorage, Alaska - pop 250,000 - is more than 10% of this total area).
> A mere 310 1 Mt bombs will suffice to subject this entire area to
> overpressures of greater than 5.5 psi - enough to kill nearly all
> inhabitants.
>
> The existing fielded Russian force has enough firepower to overwhelm
> blast shelters in all medium or large U.S. cities [snip]
Well, well...
Do you remember making the accusation that civil defense community "deals
itself nothing but favorable hands"? Let's examine the favorable hand
you've just dealt yourself.
FATALITIES
> overpressures of greater than 5.5 psi -
> enough to kill nearly all inhabitants.
Your casualty figures are exaggerated.
FEMA information claims 12 psi and over is required to kill 98%, 5-12 psi
will kill 50% (injure 40%) and 2-5 psi kills 5% and injures 45%.
Your own Nuclear Weapons FAQ (at http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/index.html )
lists 20 psi - fatalities approach 100%, 10 psi - most people are killed, 5
psi - injuries are universal, fatalities are widespread.
Another list (at http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/Library/Damage ) lists 98%
fatalities at 25 psi, 90% fatalities at 17 psi, 65% fatalities (30%
injured) at 9 psi, and 50% fatalities (45% injured) at 6 psi.
WEAPON SIZE
>A mere 310 1 Mt bombs will suffice
Your NWFAQ (at http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/Nwfaq/Nfaq7-2.html#russia ) lists
the Russian Strategic Force's most frequently deployed warheads at 500 to
550 kT, with a total force average of ("a mere") 460 kT.
I think using a 500kT figure is more accurate with reality.
WARHEAD QUANTITY
(Note: My sofware came up with 352 1 MT bombs compared to your 310 1 MT
bombs needed to achieve 5.5 psi.)
>A mere 310 1 Mt bombs will suffice to subject this entire area to
>overpressures of greater than 5.5 psi - enough to kill nearly all
>inhabitants. > The existing fielded Russian force has enough
>firepower to overwhelm blast shelters in all medium or large
>U.S. cities
This very low quantity of weapons generating relatively low overpressures is
NOT sufficient to "overwhelm blast shelters." Kearny successfully
blast-tested his shelters to over 50 psi in the Dice Throw event, so let's
be honest and calculate the weapons needed for destroying them with 30 psi
overpressure. (IIRC, 30 psi is a figure palatable to you.)
Even with your "biggie-sized" 1 MT yield, it now takes 3540 bombs at 30 psi.
Ten times as many.
Using my more realistic 500 kT yield, it requires 5890 bombs to "overwhelm
blast shelters" in the area. (As an aside, it would take 10,400 bombs to
destroy 50 psi shelters.) It takes almost 20 times the number of weapons
you claim will "overwhelm blast shelters."
I reckon we'll have to maintain a close eye on you in this card game!
Hopelessly Midwestern
Drew Stowers <dsto...@wolfenet.com> wrote in message
news:38ae0870...@news1.wolfenet.com...
> On Fri, 18 Feb 2000 18:46:04 GMT, "Hopelessly Midwestern"
> <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
>
>
> >
> >I've done some rough calculations myself. Given that the average Russian
> >warhead is 500kT (and with an airburst at 0.2 miles altitude that a18
miles
> >square area is subjected to >5 psi) I figure 889 weapons.
> >
>
> And how many die from the firestorm?
You can ask Carey the same thing. I just did the rough figures using the
same parameters.
Hopelessly Midwestern
Well, well...
FATALITIES
WEAPON SIZE
WARHEAD QUANTITY
you claim to "overwhelm blast shelters."
Noah Simoneaux
wrote:
>On Fri, 18 Feb 2000 18:46:04 GMT, "Hopelessly Midwestern"
><yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
>
>
>>
>>I've done some rough calculations myself. Given that the average Russian
>>warhead is 500kT (and with an airburst at 0.2 miles altitude that a18 miles
>>square area is subjected to >5 psi) I figure 889 weapons.
>>
>
>And how many die from the firestorm?
What firestorm? Firestorms aren't a byproduct of nuclear weapons
usage.
>The heat itself and the high winds that come along with it are very
>dangerous. Just ask the survivors of Hamburg, Dresden, Tokoyo,
>Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Survivors? You mean some people survived? I guess that means some
could survive these hypothetical firestorms, too.
>
>At Hamburg, those in shelters at the center of the storm either burned
>to death or died from carbon monoxide poisoning.
And those outside the center of the storm survived, for the most part.
David Naugler
> On Sun, 20 Feb 2000 00:55:55 GMT, dsto...@wolfenet.com (Drew Stowers)
> wrote:
> (snip)
>
> >At Hamburg, people survivied the intial bombing in shelters only to
> >die in the firestorm.
>
> And many people survived both.
>
> A shelter that protects only against the blast
> >effects of a nuke without protecting against a firestorm (ie stored
> >oxygen or CO2 scrubbers) protects against only 1/3 of the danger.
>
> Most people wouldn't have to worry about firestorm. Unless there's an
> attack with incendiary weapons, or unless the buildings are made
> mostly of wood and paper as in Japan, a firestorm is probably
> relatively unlikely. Fires are possible, even likely in many cases,
> but a firestorm is different.
But I thought the whole nuclear winter scenario was predicated upon nuclear
effects which generated massive widespread firestorms throughout the northern
hemisphere. Has that scenario been canceled? By whom? Could I be put on the
mailing list please?
Noah Simoneaux
>At Hamburg, people survivied the intial bombing in shelters only to
>die in the firestorm.
And many people survived both.
A shelter that protects only against the blast
>effects of a nuke without protecting against a firestorm (ie stored
>oxygen or CO2 scrubbers) protects against only 1/3 of the danger.
Most people wouldn't have to worry about firestorm. Unless there's an
attack with incendiary weapons, or unless the buildings are made
mostly of wood and paper as in Japan, a firestorm is probably
relatively unlikely. Fires are possible, even likely in many cases,
but a firestorm is different.
(snip)
Noah Simoneaux
(snip)
>But I thought the whole nuclear winter scenario was predicated upon nuclear
>effects which generated massive widespread firestorms throughout the northern
>hemisphere. Has that scenario been canceled? By whom? Could I be put on the
>mailing list please?
>
Nah, hold your horses there. No need for firestorms to put massive
amounts of smoke and ash into the atmosphere. Nuclear winter was never
predicated on firestorms, just questionable physics. Other physicists
have suggested that instead of nuclear winter, we'd have a nuclear
summer. Neither side has conclusively proven their side, so I'll wait
and see(if it happens).
d_st...@my-deja.com
no...@yournet.com (Noah Simoneaux) wrote:
> On Sun, 20 Feb 2000 00:55:55 GMT, dsto...@wolfenet.com (Drew Stowers)
> wrote:
> (snip)
>
> >At Hamburg, people survivied the intial bombing in shelters only to
> >die in the firestorm.
>
> And many people survived both.
>
> A shelter that protects only against the blast
> >effects of a nuke without protecting against a firestorm (ie stored
> >oxygen or CO2 scrubbers) protects against only 1/3 of the danger.
>
> Most people wouldn't have to worry about firestorm. Unless there's an
> attack with incendiary weapons, or unless the buildings are made
> mostly of wood and paper as in Japan, a firestorm is probably
> relatively unlikely. Fires are possible, even likely in many cases,
> but a firestorm is different.
>
Firestorms were one of the orignial purposes for developing A-bombs in
WWII. Firestorms start when you start a lot of fires in a area of
around 3x4 miles. The fires hopefully start convection currents that
pull more and more air into the area, flaring the fire higher. If you
look at a A-bomb explosion, this is what they do.
They start a lot of fires in the area neccessay and start the
convection currents going. Though people may think otherwise, highrise
towers burn very well indeed.
> (snip)
>
> Noah Simoneaux
>
> -----= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =-----
> http://www.newsfeeds.com - The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World!
> -----== Over 80,000 Newsgroups - 16 Different Servers! =-----
>
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
offb...@my-deja.com
d_st...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> Firestorms were one of the orignial purposes for developing A-bombs in
> WWII. Firestorms start when you start a lot of fires in a area of
> around 3x4 miles. The fires hopefully start convection currents that
> pull more and more air into the area, flaring the fire higher. If you
> look at a A-bomb explosion, this is what they do.
That reminds me of something I'd wondered about. The dino killer was
supposed to have sent a shockwave/heat blast across the US that set
fires to hundreds of square miles at once. People claim a firestorm
started, but where could the fresh oxygen and wind come from? Ringworld-
type vertical cyclons?
lar...@ozemail.com.au
using a stream of recycled electrons, wrote:
>Noah Simoneaux <no...@yournet.com> wrote in message
>news:38b00f66...@news.preferred.com...
>> On Sun, 20 Feb 2000 00:55:55 GMT, dsto...@wolfenet.com (Drew Stowers)
>> wrote:
>> (snip)
>>
>> >At Hamburg, people survivied the intial bombing in shelters only to
>> >die in the firestorm.
>>
>> And many people survived both.
>>
>> A shelter that protects only against the blast
>> >effects of a nuke without protecting against a firestorm (ie stored
>> >oxygen or CO2 scrubbers) protects against only 1/3 of the danger.
>>
>> Most people wouldn't have to worry about firestorm. Unless there's an
>> attack with incendiary weapons, or unless the buildings are made
>> mostly of wood and paper as in Japan, a firestorm is probably
>> relatively unlikely. Fires are possible, even likely in many cases,
>> but a firestorm is different.
>
>But I thought the whole nuclear winter scenario was predicated upon nuclear
>effects which generated massive widespread firestorms throughout the northern
>hemisphere. Has that scenario been canceled? By whom? Could I be put on the
>mailing list please?
1==> Firestorms don't only occur in cities. You still have forests in
the US don't you? Any forest fire, even a small one, will eventually
grow large enough to become a firestorm, often within a day or so,
depending on weather conditions. Any nuclear attack will start
forest fires.
Do you think that forest service crews and volunteers are going to
come out of their shelters on day two and stand there in the fallout
fighting forest fires for you? ...Yeah, I know, "Forest fires
prevent bears", but old Smokey the Bear is just going to have to do
without help, eh? [Yep, the old Smokey the Bear cartoons even reach
Australia]
2==> From memory, though, the "nuclear winter" scenario was cancelled.
The computer modelling was criticised and apparently didn't stand up
too well.
...larryn
Noah Simoneaux
(snip)
>Firestorms were one of the orignial purposes for developing A-bombs in
>WWII. Firestorms start when you start a lot of fires in a area of
>around 3x4 miles. The fires hopefully start convection currents that
>pull more and more air into the area, flaring the fire higher. If you
>look at a A-bomb explosion, this is what they do.
They also extinguish a lot of fires. Not much record of firestorms
starting because of nuclear weapons, even in the tests.
>
>They start a lot of fires in the area neccessay and start the
>convection currents going. Though people may think otherwise, highrise
>towers burn very well indeed.
Yes, but a highrise tower is a small fire compared to the size needed
for a firestorm.
Roger P Williams
> >Firestorms were one of the orignial purposes for developing A-bombs in
> >WWII. Firestorms start when you start a lot of fires in a area of
> >around 3x4 miles. The fires hopefully start convection currents that
> >pull more and more air into the area, flaring the fire higher. If you
> >look at a A-bomb explosion, this is what they do.
> They also extinguish a lot of fires. Not much record of firestorms
> starting because of nuclear weapons, even in the tests.
From Richard Rhodes _Making of the Atomic Bomb_ p.719:
"The thermal flash and the blast started fires and very quickly the fires
became a firestorm from which those who could ambulate ran away, and those
who sustained fractures or were pinned under houses could not; two months
later Liebow's group found the incidence of fractures among Hiroshima
survivors to be less than 4.5 percent. 'It was not that injuries were
few,' the American physicians note; 'rather, almost none who lost the
capacity to move escaped the flames.'"
The two major tests, the ones we staged over Japan, did in fact start
firestorms. You need a city to provide fuel, which is why the tests
didn't start coalescing fires. Statistics of 2 out of 2 make the
incidence of a firestorm after a nuclear attack look pretty certain.
--Roger
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What will people of the future think of us? Will they say, as
Roger Williams said of some of the Massachusetts Indians, that
we were wolves with the minds of men? That we resigned our humanity?
They will have the right. -- C.P. Snow
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Noah Simoneaux
>From Richard Rhodes _Making of the Atomic Bomb_ p.719:
>
>"The thermal flash and the blast started fires and very quickly the fires
>became a firestorm from which those who could ambulate ran away, and those
>who sustained fractures or were pinned under houses could not; two months
>later Liebow's group found the incidence of fractures among Hiroshima
>survivors to be less than 4.5 percent. 'It was not that injuries were
>few,' the American physicians note; 'rather, almost none who lost the
>capacity to move escaped the flames.'"
>
>The two major tests, the ones we staged over Japan, did in fact start
>firestorms. You need a city to provide fuel, which is why the tests
>didn't start coalescing fires. Statistics of 2 out of 2 make the
>incidence of a firestorm after a nuclear attack look pretty certain.
Don't forget the minor detail of typical construction of Japanese
buildings(wooden frames and rice paper partitions). It would have
some impact on whether a firestorm was started. 2 out of 2 is nice,
but hardly a valid sample when the 2 both happen to be similar
targets.
Drew Stowers
wrote:
>Don't forget the minor detail of typical construction of Japanese
>buildings(wooden frames and rice paper partitions). It would have
>some impact on whether a firestorm was started. 2 out of 2 is nice,
>but hardly a valid sample when the 2 both happen to be similar
>targets.
>
>Noah Simoneaux
>
Noah,
Regardless of anything else, planning a fallout shelter without taking
into account a firestorm is foolish. A-bombs blasts set almost
everything on fire and sucks in tremendous amounts of oxygen into a
central core. That is how firestorms start.
Why do you think civil defense became such a joke? In most cities you
can locate buildings that can survive the blast damage from a nuke.
Its is harder to find buildings that won't burn down and then stocking
them with equipment that will protect people from a firestorm. It
also makes cheap basement fallout shelters impossible.
Carey Sublette
Noah Simoneaux wrote:
>
> On Fri, 18 Feb 2000 17:10:09 GMT, Carey Sublette
> <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> (snip)
>
> >In truth I am VERY extensively informed on civil defense - far more than
> >I suspect you are - having been much enamored with it myself during the
> >60s and 70s. The problem is eventually I began to realize the tremendous
> >problems that civil defense proponents were ignoring. Its a community
> >that talks to itself, and deals itself nothing but favorable hands.
>
> Yeah, unlike the "survivors will envy the dead" group in which people
> only use rational arguments and verify all their facts. ;)
> >
> >
> >> >They also have to be located distant for the
> >> > cities where people actually live and work! This sort of makes whole
> >> > low-ball cost estimates from including shelter cost in new construction
> >> > irrelevant doesn't it?
>
> Since you are so well versed in the subject, maybe you could tell us
> HOW distant they need to be located to be in the 5 pound overpressure
> ring for a 1 Mt weapon airburst at 6,000 feet.
4 miles. If the burst height were extended to 10,000 feet this ring
would reach out to 4.4 miles.
>
> >If evacuation is a necessary part of the picture then you are
> >envisioning building "shelter cities" outside existing cities. "Cheap"
> >shelter proposals don't include these costs at all.
>
> Evacuation isn't a necessary part of the picture. It's an added factor
> that would increase the efficiency of the plan.
It is a measure that radically changes the nature of the plan. If the
objective is to have readily available shelter, for which the cost is
largely underwritten by including within the structure (and possible
serving as part of its living/utility space) - the basis of the low-ball
"cheap" claim then evacuation to markedly reduce population
concentration is out of the question.
Or if evacuation is used then an entirely different dispersed shelter
system must be set up at much greater expense.
>
> >
> >> > This is also massively undermines the plausiblity of civil defense as an
> >> > effective response to the threat of nuclear attack. Evacuating 80% of
> >> > the U.S. population (the fraction that is urban) is a staggering
> >> > undertaking, requiring weeks to execute,
>
> (snip)
>
> >Any CD effort that is cheap is not greatly effective.
> >Any CD effort that is greatly effective is not cheap.
>
> Slogans trump logical arguments, don't they? ;)
You don't like me to summarize my argument pithily?
Too bad.
I find brief (re)statements of my position to be essential in most
lengthy newsgroup threads since the more extensive discussion seem to
escape some people.
> >
> >The Swiss have an enormous investment in their defense infrastructure
> >accumulated over decades - perhaps the fact that it is financed through
> >mandates to private builders rather than appropraited though tax funds
> >you think it doesn't count? Even so this infrastructure would not spare
> >Switzerland many lives if an attacker decided to clobber them with
> >nuclear weapons on a scale proportionate to what the U.S would receive
> >in an large scal attack.
> >
> >Your just repeating CD propaganda claims you read.
> >
> >
> >> > It also completely shuts down
> >> > the U.S. economy, and the nation couldn't afford to stay in such a
> >> > mobilized state for long.
> >>
> >> It also saves the viability of the nation in an attack. What do you want:
> >> Metallica CDs and a Sable, or a chance at life?
> >
> >A nation without industry, housing or other infrastructure is not what I
> >would call viable.
> >
> >You think the economy is all about luxury goods? If so, you're a fool.
> >
> >The point is you can't remain mobilized for long. All an attacker has to
> >do is wait it out, then attack. Result - total nullification of CD
> >efforts.
>
> Total nullification? If even ONE life is saved, CD isn't totally
> nullified. Of course, it would be easy to save more than one life.
Alright - I'll reduce that to "effective nullification".
A trillion dollar nationwide effort that saves one life wouldn't be
considered a good national investment.
The biggest savings in lives comes from maintaining effective deterrence
- no nuclear war at all.
> >
> >> >And it only provides protection if the
> >> > attacker cooperates by refraining from attacking until mobilization is
> >> > complete, but not so long that the population is forced to return to
> >> > their homes.
>
> Hmmm, why is that? Once they relocate one time, they can't do it
> again? Must be some new rule there.
>
> (snip)
> >> > Expensive civil defense program lose a lot of their appeal when it is
> >> > pointed out that simply by swithcing to a different targeting plan,
> >> > their claimed effectiveness can be wiped out.
>
> No, their claimed effectiveness can be reduced, but that doesn't sound
> as good as saying they were "wiped out".
True. Lets say "dramatically reduced".
>
> >>
> >> With your targetting plan using old larger weapons numbers, of course.
> >
> >This is weak stuff. You really are grasping at straws! I pointed out
> >that enough of Russian weapons are deployed *right now* to defeat an
> >imaginary shelter program.
>
> Pointing something out and proving it are not the same thing.
> >
> >A huge shelter program takes many, many years to put into place, and
> >must last for decades to be justifiable. You think that you only need to
> >worry about the current Russian deployments?
>
> Justifiable to who? Right now Russia and China are basically the main
> threats the US has to worry about concerning a large attack.
Perhaps you're not following.
A lare CD effort takes many years to put into place, and to make the
investment worthwhile many years of service must be expected.
"Hopelessly" seem to be thinking, based on his statements, that only
current Russian deployments must be factored into a CD effort - that no
increase in offensive deployments by either Russia or China need to
considered. This is very, very bad planning.
> >I believe we can avoid nuclear war entirely, and that CD adds little or
> >nothing to accomplishing that objective.
>
> Your right to believe that, but when you want to claim that's a
> logical conclusion you'll be challenged to prove it.
Gladly.
Carey
Noah Simoneaux
wrote:
(snip)
>Regardless of anything else, planning a fallout shelter without taking
>into account a firestorm is foolish. A-bombs blasts set almost
>everything on fire and sucks in tremendous amounts of oxygen into a
>central core. That is how firestorms start.
Ever see the films of the test blasts they did with the buildings and
cars? After the blast wave passes there is almost no fire left
burning. The flash from a nuclear weapon sets things on fire first,
since it travels faster than the blast wave. Then along comes the
blast wave and extinguishes most of the flames as it makes rubble of
things.
>
>Why do you think civil defense became such a joke?
The only people to whom civil defense became a joke were those who
bought into the propaganda of the anti-civil defense crowd. For people
who actually understand the idea, civil defense is still a valid idea.
In most cities you
>can locate buildings that can survive the blast damage from a nuke.
>Its is harder to find buildings that won't burn down and then stocking
>them with equipment that will protect people from a firestorm. It
>also makes cheap basement fallout shelters impossible.
Hardly impossible. Parroting propaganda isn't the same as actually
looking at reality. Even if some buildings burn or many buildings in a
city burn, that doesn't constitute a firestorm. No need to worry about
something that most likely wouldn't happen anyway.
Noah Simoneaux
<care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
(snip)
>4 miles. If the burst height were extended to 10,000 feet this ring
>would reach out to 4.4 miles.
Would you consider 5 miles "distant"? I wouldn't.
>>
>> >If evacuation is a necessary part of the picture then you are
>> >envisioning building "shelter cities" outside existing cities. "Cheap"
>> >shelter proposals don't include these costs at all.
Cheap is a relative term.
>It is a measure that radically changes the nature of the plan. If the
>objective is to have readily available shelter, for which the cost is
>largely underwritten by including within the structure (and possible
>serving as part of its living/utility space) - the basis of the low-ball
>"cheap" claim then evacuation to markedly reduce population
>concentration is out of the question.
Yeah, let's eliminate anything which makes our argument less
reasonable.
>> >Any CD effort that is cheap is not greatly effective.
>> >Any CD effort that is greatly effective is not cheap.
>>
>> Slogans trump logical arguments, don't they? ;)
>
>
>You don't like me to summarize my argument pithily?
>
>Too bad.
No, I don't like oversimplifications. Most often they pretend to
summarize ideas which are not nearly as simple as they appear.
In this case, you attempt to pass off highly subjective ideas such as
"cheap" and "effective".
>
>I find brief (re)statements of my position to be essential in most
>lengthy newsgroup threads since the more extensive discussion seem to
>escape some people.
>Alright - I'll reduce that to "effective nullification".
Might want to also qualify that with "effective in MY opinion". Since
your opinion is obviously slanted that is much more honest than
pretending it is objective.
>
>A trillion dollar nationwide effort that saves one life wouldn't be
>considered a good national investment.
>
>The biggest savings in lives comes from maintaining effective deterrence
>- no nuclear war at all.
Yeah, planning to prevent loss of lives couldn't deter nuclear war,
could it? Couldn't even factor in, eh?
>
>> >
>> >> >And it only provides protection if the
>> >> > attacker cooperates by refraining from attacking until mobilization is
>> >> > complete, but not so long that the population is forced to return to
>> >> > their homes.
>>
>> Hmmm, why is that? Once they relocate one time, they can't do it
>> again? Must be some new rule there.
>>
>> (snip)
>> >> > Expensive civil defense program lose a lot of their appeal when it is
>> >> > pointed out that simply by swithcing to a different targeting plan,
>> >> > their claimed effectiveness can be wiped out.
>>
>> No, their claimed effectiveness can be reduced, but that doesn't sound
>> as good as saying they were "wiped out".
>
>True. Lets say "dramatically reduced".
Say whatever you want, but don't be surprised when you get challenged
for claiming an opinion is a fact.
>A lare CD effort takes many years to put into place, and to make the
>investment worthwhile many years of service must be expected.
I'd bet no amount of time or money would make it worthwhile in your
estimation, since you're already assuming it's a waste of time.
>
>"Hopelessly" seem to be thinking, based on his statements, that only
>current Russian deployments must be factored into a CD effort - that no
>increase in offensive deployments by either Russia or China need to
>considered. This is very, very bad planning.
>
>> >I believe we can avoid nuclear war entirely, and that CD adds little or
>> >nothing to accomplishing that objective.
Your choice, but your beliefs aren't evidence of anything other than
what you find emotionally comforting.
>> Your right to believe that, but when you want to claim that's a
>> logical conclusion you'll be challenged to prove it.
>
>Gladly.
>
>Carey
OK, consider yourself challenged. So far all you've managed to do is
support it with emotional opinions.
Noah Simoneaux
wrote:
>Regardless of anything else, planning a fallout shelter without taking
>into account a firestorm is foolish. A-bombs blasts set almost
>everything on fire and sucks in tremendous amounts of oxygen into a
>central core. That is how firestorms start.
>Why do you think civil defense became such a joke? In most cities you
>can locate buildings that can survive the blast damage from a nuke.
>Its is harder to find buildings that won't burn down and then stocking
>them with equipment that will protect people from a firestorm. It
>also makes cheap basement fallout shelters impossible.
Oh yeah, something to add to the earlier post in this thread, in which
someone claimed the record was 2 for 2 with firestorms.
This is taken from the book "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons".
Paragraph 7.72.
"No definite firestorm occurred at Nagasaki, although the velocity of
the southwest wind blowing between the hills increased to 35 miles an
hour when the conflagration had become well established, perhaps about
2 hours after the explosion."
I think we should revise that scorecard to 1 of 2 from our very
limited statistical sample.
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
>
> Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:38AD7CED...@earthlink.net...
> > Hopelessly Midwestern wrote:
> >
> >The problem is eventually I began to realize the tremendous
> > problems that civil defense proponents were ignoring. Its a community
> > that talks to itself, and deals itself nothing but favorable hands.
>
> But your side doesn't, right? I once read that the main reason we don't
> have civil defense is because the officials in Wash., DC know they're going
> to die no matter what, so why worry about the citizens. A
> "let-em-go-to-hell-since-I-will" attitude.
You should read some serious histories of strategic doctrine. In the
early 60s, McNamara
pursued the "civil defense" option as a response to Soviet strategic
armaments, until extensive analysis showed that the offense had an at
least 3-1 cost advantage in nullifying the efforts. See for example
Freedman's "The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy ".
>
> > If evacuation is a necessary part of the picture then you are
> > envisioning building "shelter cities" outside existing cities. "Cheap"
> > shelter proposals don't include these costs at all.
>
> "Shelter-cities?" Another straw-man to knock down. As Dr. Teller states
> "It will suffice to warn our people and advise them where to go, how to
> protect themselves. The Federal Emergency Management Administration contains
> the beginnings on which such a policy might be built."
Ah, leave them to their own devices. A sound plan.
I guess these people are supposed to load up their cars with all the
tools, building supplies (even a door slit shelter needs a couple of
doors), food, and water to wait however long they can in expectation of
a possible attack, plus the post-attack recovery period if it actually
occurs.
Naturally all these people, untrained, unsupervised, out-of-shape, and
under extreme stress would build their shlters correctly to provide
adequate protection. And would evacuate to the correct areas in
efficient, orderly fashion in an unrehearsed evacuation - the largest
and fastest in world history.
Sure.
The 15 million people in the Los Angeles basin, for example, would have
to hack their shelters out of the hardpan of the Mojave desert (where
else would they evacuate to?). Ever try this?
How much food and water do you think these people will have with them?
Where would they get more after the cities are leveled?
> [Regarding evacuation]
> > Another poster on this threat thought "weeks" was optimistic.
>
> Since I'm a poster here, I guess that makes me a good reference too.
>
> >Seeing as
> > how it actually takes on the order of an entire day to evacuate limited
> > coastal areas in advance of a hurricane (I've seen this done) the
> > problem of evacuating all cities simulaneously is obviously much larger.
> > Perhaps it only takes one week, with remarkable efficiency (often not
> > found in a crisis - some coastal evacuation attempts have actually
> > failed due to poor execution and taken a couple of days to complete)
>
> One or two days. Why would it take longer to evacuate other than costal
> areas if the same sort of planning was used in inland areas? Do coastal
> areas have faster cars?
Because only limited number of people over a limited area are being
evacuated. They are travelling into and through areas that are not
already choked with traffic from people who are also evacuating, so the
farther they travel the less congested the road system becomes. Also,
you can actually ride out a hurricane in your car in perfect safety once
you are out of flood zones, and out of the immediate path of the
hurricane (say, a region 50 miles wide).
In a nationwide urban evacuation from a nuclear attack none of these
things are going for you.
The Greater New York area, a contiguous metropolitan region encompassing
parts of four states, has a population of 20 million people, and an
average population density of 2000 per square mile. To disperse these
people simultaneously over an area large enough to protect them from
attack means moving them hundreds of miles - all at once.
NWSS states "With the use of American automobiles
> an evacuation could be faster and more effective than is possible in
> Russia."
>
> > > Yeah, Carey, use big words like "collosal" and ignore what Norway,
> Sweden,
> > > Switzerland, China, and Russia are doing. Cheaply.
> >
> > Any CD effort that is cheap is not greatly effective.
> > Any CD effort that is greatly effective is not cheap.
>
> I keep thinking of that "1986 government study reported that blast shelters
> (similar to Swiss designs) built into the basements of new construction
> could be constructed for $350 to $500 per occupant space." This is for the
> most expensive (I think) aspect of civil defense: blast shelters. I know
> you compare to the higher costs of tornado shelters and such, but I do know
> that the tangle of codes and regulations has greatly increased
> construction/renovation costs, and with a pro-CD policy, that these numbers
> could be held much lower.
Remember that even an F-5 tornado shelter is not up to the loads of 5
psi blast wave.
There are sound reasons for building codes - like home safety and
durability.
Shelters have to remain serviceable for decades, for the program to have
lasting effect. Cheap,
expedient shelters are unlikely to remain serviceable for long.
> > The Swiss have an enormous investment in their defense infrastructure
> > accumulated over decades - perhaps the fact that it is financed through
> > mandates to private builders rather than appropraited though tax funds
> > you think it doesn't count?
>
> The costs, however enourmous, have not hindered the country's economy, have
> they?
I have said on this thread that the U.S. certainly has the means for
massive shelter program, but the scale of the program requires novel
definitions of "cheap" (no other government of similar magnitude gets
off with this designation).
>
> >Even so this infrastructure would not spare
> > Switzerland many lives if an attacker decided to clobber them with
> > nuclear weapons on a scale proportionate to what the U.S would receive
> > in an large scal attack.
>
> Using your all-out evenly-spaced civilian-targets-only scenario?
It simply requires a moderate number of warheads be targeted against the
population.
Don't abuse my "maximum targeting" calculation for a hypothetical 30 psi
blast shelter program - which would be extremely expensive. The cheapo
$500 basement shelter (if you've got a basement) could only be proof
against a few psi (if the building doesn't collapse on you). Achieving
the relatively low blast pressures over most urban areas requires only a
fraction as many warheads.
> > Your just repeating CD propaganda claims you read.
>
> You're just repeating the anti-CD propaganda claims you read.
>
> > A nation without industry, housing or other infrastructure is not what I
> > would call viable.
> > You think the economy is all about luxury goods? If so, you're a fool.
>
> No, but I was making a point -- much of the current economy is unnecessary
> for survival. Post-war, we would have a salvage/war-time economy without
> luxury.
It imposes a severe limit on how long a nation can mobilize.
It takes mere minutes to carry an attack out. An attacker can wait for
demobilization.
> > The point is you can't remain mobilized for long. All an attacker has to
> > do is wait it out, then attack. Result - total nullification of CD
> > efforts.
>
> Best to be prepared to wait-it-out then, at least better than the other
> side. Remember, they have to wait too.
Ah well, you believe that evacuation is a real and effective option for
Russia.
Its not effective for us, its no more effective for Russia (which has,
overall, a much harsher climate) for these unsheltered evacuees. See
below.
>
> Also, as Dr. Teller says, "Some may argue that the Russians could evacuate
> again and again and thus, by forcing us into similar moves, exhaust us. I
> believe that in reality they would anger us sufficiently so that we would
> rearm in earnest. That is not what the Russians want to accomplish."
It takes quite an imagination to believe that we had ever "disarmed".
> > This is a fantasy. The Russians are incapable of carrying this out.
> > There are no shelter cities to protect the Russians from fallout, or
> > even the elements (I understand the Russian winter is less than
> > pleasant...).
>
> There's your "shelter cities" strawman again. They may not have those, but
> the have prepared a system in place to educate their people and to evacuate
> in a crisis.
For a reality check, I just talked to a friend of mine from Russia, who
took a university course in civil defense there about 6 years ago.
According to him, CD there consists of basement fallout shelters, plus
use of the subway system. Sure, they discussed how to construct fallout
shelters in the woods, but there were no provisions to provide the
materials needed, and he was unaware of any mass evacuation plans (he
seemed surprised by the notion that one existed).
Sound like the evacuation program is empty platitudes.
And there is four letter word for urban basement fallout shelters -
"tomb".
As Kearny states:
>
> "Almost all Russians have compulsory instruction to teach them about the
> effects of nuclear and other mass-destruction weapons, and what they can do
> to improve their chances of surviving.
Laregely true (as noted above).
> Comprehensive preparations have been
> made for the crisis evacuation of urban Russians to rural areas, where they
> and rural Russians would make high-protection- factor expedient fallout
> shelters.
As far as I have been able to determine this is not really true - is a
paper plan without much substance. Call it a Potemkin program. The
belief that a real capability exists seems to come from taking claims in
Soviet/Russian CD literature at face value.
The CIA got into a lot of trouble by believing offical Soviet government
economic statistics (and thus greatly overestimated the size of their
economy).
It may surprise you, but official communist-era publications have a
record for rather low reliability.
I am well aware of claims made for the Soviet-era civil defense, I have
a copy (and read) Leon Goure's
"Civil Defense in the Soviet Union" - the major work in the field. Oddly
enough it is this book that is largely responsible for me to begin
disbelieving in the effectiveness of civil defense. For one thing, much
it is simply speculation about what they might be able to do, or the
recitation of what official publications claim.
At the time I read it, I was of a pro-CD frame of mind, and it was
through an attmept to demonstrate through my own analysis that the
program as described would be effective, that I came to realize the
fundamental flaws with the idea that offensive nuclear weapons could be
effectively redressed through this means.
> Blast shelters to protect millions have been built in the cities
> and near factories where essential workers would continue production during
> a crisis. Wheat reserves and other foods for war survivors have been stored
> outside target areas. About 100,000 civil defense troops are maintained for
> control, rescue, and post-attack recovery duties, The annual per capita cost
> of Russian civil defense preparations, if made at costs equivalent to those
> in the United States, is variously estimated to be between $8 and $20."
I think this counts what would be otherwise described as "internal
security forces" as "civil defense" troops.
I have never seen evidence for these food storage sites surface.
Even if the implied 2-5 billion a year program would really be adequate
for the proposed purpose, how many such programs remain intact these
days in Russa?
>
> > Since you are now basing all your arguments on urban evacuation, it is
> > clear you have actually abandoned the concept of "cheap, effective"
> > civil defense from dwelling-installed blast shelters, which is what I
> > originally criticized - even though you can't bring yourself to concede
> > it.
>
> Civil Defense includes, but does not consist solely, of evacuation.
If the urban population doesn't evacuate, they are sitting ducks.
Kearny,
> an advocate of home blast shelters, says evacuation also is important.
> "The most realistic of the extensive Russian plans and preparations to
> survive a nuclear war are based on using at least several days during an
> escalating crisis to get most urban dwellers out of the cities and other
> high risk areas, to build or improve shelters in all parts of the Soviet
> Union, and to protect essential machinery and the like. The Russians know
> that if they are able to complete evacuation and sheltering plans before the
> outbreak of nuclear war, the number of their people killed would be a small
> fraction of those who otherwise would die. Our satellites and other sources
> of intelligence would reveal such massive movements within a day; therefore,
> under the most likely circumstances Americans would have several days in
> which to make life-saving preparations."
And with which city did the Russians demonstrate that this could be
successfully done?
Would you say that Russians today have such implicit and absolute faith
in their government and the wisdom of their leaders that they would rush
from the cities, with only what they could carry, into the countryside
so that the government could carry out nuclear blackmail?
...
> No, my "whole case" is NOT is based on Russian civil defense. I do use them
> as an example of a country that employing CD in spite of your protestations
> against its effectivness.
I guess the fact that the Russians do it (or at least talk about it)
must prove that it is a good idea.
>
> > Its been demonstrated on this newsgroup many times by many people that
> > you choose to believe sources repeatedly shown to be unreliable in the
> > extreme. I leave you to your imaginary world.
>
> My opponents' bombast does not automatically discredit the sources I post,
> as you suppose. Pertinent to this thread, I find Nuclear War Survival
> Skills to be highly reliable information. You yourself said IIRC that it
> was the best civil defense book you'd ever seen.
On shelter construction techniques.
I find his policy analysis and recommendations to be worthless.
>
> > > Civil defense takes away that certainty and adds
> > > another layer of deterrence.
> >
> > There is uncertainty about *precisely* how many millions would die as an
> > immediate consequence of nuclear attack (even leaving aside the vast
> > number that would surely die later of starvation, disease, and exposure)
> > even without CD. With CD this uncertainty is perhaps made greater,
>
> It is? Good. That's what I was saying.
>
> >but the certainty that vast numbers would die is unaffected.
>
> Of course. The degree of the difference is important though.
>
> > In the end, you still are still relying on deterrence for protection. I
> > have seen no demonstration on your part that there is any inadequacy
> > with deterrence now.
>
> This is a whole new discussion, but briefly, deterrence with less-risky
> non-weapon means is prefereable.
True. I'd rather see deterrence with fewer weapons, that are securely
based, and not kept in ready-to-fre condition (to prevent surprise
attack).
>
> > I pointed out that enough of Russian weapons are deployed
> > *right now* to defeat an imaginary shelter program.
>
> Only in your imaginary scenario. I figure it would take 18,000 Russian
> warheads of average size to create >30 psi over the 100 largest American
> cities. (Another post, where you replied to Noah S. covers my calculations
> in detail.) I've read they only have 6000 warheads deployed.
Like I said don't abuse the 30 psi calculation. This requires an
expensive buried shelter, no cheapo basement jobs. And which don't
exist.
The 6200 or so warheads in the current Russian arsenal correspond to
about 3600 equivalent megatons. A 1 Mt bomb can produce a 30 psi
overpressure out to a radius of 1.25 miles, for an area coverage of 4.9
square miles. Times 3600 this gives a coverage of 17,600 square miles,
versus 16,000 square miles for the 100 largest cities.
Note this doesn't prove that a 30 psi shelter could protect against this
magnitude of attack, but that the attack would defeat it. The reason?
Inside the 30 psi contour the pressure is actually higher than 30 psi,
at the periphery shock wave collisions with adjacent detonations produce
overpressures double that of a single detonation (60 psi). In an area
attack like this there are probably no areas that experience
overpressures of less than 40 or 50 psi.
For a milder 10 psi attack (enough to defeat most basement blast shelter
designs) only 1/5 as many are needed.
...
> Newsmax IIRC figures around 30,000, many of those being small tactical
> warheads. How many reserve weapons and in what strength do you think could
> be returned to service?
In principal perhaps as many as 15-20,000 of all kinds (without checking
references). The cost would be much less than building them in the first
place, but still a considerable strain for Russia under present
conditions, and which they seem disinclined to undergo (for one thing
their already sad conventional defense would suffer more). But
"considerable strain" and "discinclined" does not equate to "can't, no
matter what". Extreme measures are possible, if they feel sufficiently
threatened (like making Mr. B pay some of his taxes).
> > > Civil defense would save lives beyond the one week level.
> >
> > In a general nuclear war, if it occurred, extensive CD preparations (not
> > cheap) could save millions lives.
>
> I don't think they need be as expensive as you claim, but essentially I
> agree.
>
> > But the scale of the benefits claimed by CD proponents is grossly
> > exaggerated, and depends on extremely favorable scenarios (to CD). In
> > less favorable scenarios these supposed benefits largely evaporate.
>
> In what scenarios do you think the benefits "largely evaporate?" I assume
> you mean the all-out evenly-spaced civilian-targets-only scenario you've
> held forth.
Just one in which counter-population targeting is undertaken.
In reality only a fraction of Russia's warheads will bomb all
significant cities flat.
Don't take the extreme 30 psi scenario as the minimum requirement.
...
>
> > If you're agreeing with me then you must have changed your position.
>
> What I agreed with, and understood you to be saying, that civil defense has
> a deterrent value.
I believe it to have *negligible* deterrent value (or less). Even with
ambitious CD (unlike what the ioviet Union/Russia has actually
demonstrated), the consequences of war remain so dire as to take it out
of the realm of real-world decision making.
> Teller states "Its most practical aspect lies in the
> fact that the men in the Kremlin are cautious. If they cannot count on
> destroying us they probably will never launch their nuclear arsenal against
> us. Civil defense is at once the most peaceful and the most effective
> deterrent of nuclear war."
No, if the can count on themselves being destroyed - and they can -
regardless of what happens to us, they will be deterred.
They cannot protect themselves effectively. Camping out in the Russia
wilderness while their cities vanish is not a real option.
> > The Cold War really is over.
>
> Hopefully, but the nuclear weapons are still there, and I think a "don't
> worry - be happy" attitude is wishful thinking in light of recent headlines.
And we need to take the additional measures to ensure that those that
are retired are destroyed, and that most of those that remain are
retired as soon as possible.
> P.S. Carey, I appreciate your keeping this thread mostly free of the
> extreme "flaming" in which others enjoy indulging. I'm no "expert" like
> you, just a "layman" in the nuclear war field, so you challenge me, and I'm
> learning about your point of view. That's why I'm here (although I don't
> mind a little scrap now and then. hehe)
Neither do I!
Incidentally, this is my last post on this thread. I think the issues
and views are sufficiently well aired, and I don't have any more time
available for this at present.
Carey
d_st...@my-deja.com
Quite correct Noah.
I was posting from home and locate a site that stated it was 1 for 2.
I was going to post a correction, but it has been a busy day.
Drew
I also found this:
The major incendiary effect of nuclear explosions is caused by the
blast wave. Collapsed structures are much more vulnerable to fire than
intact ones. The blast reduces many structures to piles of kindling,
the many gaps opened in roofs and walls act as chimneys, gas lines are
broken open, storage tanks for flammable materials are ruptured. The
primary ignition sources appear to be flames and pilot lights in
heating appliances (furnaces, water heaters, stoves, ovens, etc.).
Smoldering material from the thermal pulse can be very effective at
igniting leaking gas.
Although the ignition sources are probably widely scattered a number of
factors promote their spread into mass fires. The complete suppression
of fire fighting efforts is extremely important. Another is that the
blast scatters combustible material across fire breaks that normally
exist (streets, yards, fire lanes, etc.).
The effectiveness of building collapse, accompanied by the disruption
of fire fighting, in creating mass fires can be seen in the San
Francisco earthquake (1906), the Tokyo-Yokahama earthquake (1923), and
the recent Kobe earthquake (1995). In these disasters there was no
thermal radiation to ignite fires, and the scattering of combustible
materials did not occur, but huge fires still resulted. In San
Francisco and Tokyo-Yokohama these fires were responsible for most of
the destruction that occurred.
Quote from the High Energy Weapons Archive
http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/
David Naugler
> Oh yeah, something to add to the earlier post in this thread, in which
> someone claimed the record was 2 for 2 with firestorms.
> This is taken from the book "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons".
> Paragraph 7.72.
>
> "No definite firestorm occurred at Nagasaki, although the velocity of
> the southwest wind blowing between the hills increased to 35 miles an
> hour when the conflagration had become well established, perhaps about
> 2 hours after the explosion."
>
> I think we should revise that scorecard to 1 of 2 from our very
> limited statistical sample.
You've weakened your own argument here. Before you were saying that firestorm
resulted form Japanese residential construction methods of the time. Now it
appears that is not a factor. It would then appear that 50% probability of
firestorm might be a reasonable assumption.
Previously you said:
>Ever see the films of the test blasts they did with the buildings and
cars? After the blast wave passes there is almost no fire left
burning. The flash from a nuclear weapon sets things on fire first,
since it travels faster than the blast wave. Then along comes the
blast wave and extinguishes most of the flames as it makes rubble of
things.
Those were *test* blasts not real cities with crowded back lanes, wooden
overhead electric power poles, wooded parks, office building filled with paper
and all sorts of flammable structures which might only be partially collapsed.
The best you can say on the basis of argument you've given is that firestorm
might be less than 100% certain. A second blast might still ignite a firestorm.
George Herbert
>Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>> Like I said don't abuse the 30 psi calculation. This requires an
>> Don't take the extreme 30 psi scenario as the minimum requirement.
>
>shelters to over 50 psi.
As I recall from an earlier go around on this point, Carey looked up
Kearny's detailed work and found that Kearny tested with a 50 PSI very
short transient overpressure, not the sort of relatively sustained
overpressure and winds you expect from a real nuclear weapon,
thus invalidating the claim that they'll withstand a nuclear
bomb overpressure at that level. Or am I remembering wrong?
-george william herbert
gher...@crl.com
Hopelessly Midwestern
news:qwUr4.102328$A5.19...@news1.rdc1.bc.home.com...
>
> But I thought the whole nuclear winter scenario was predicated upon
nuclear
> effects which generated massive widespread firestorms throughout the
northern
> hemisphere. Has that scenario been canceled? By whom? Could I be put on
the
> mailing list please?
Unsurvivable "nuclear winter" is a discredited theory that, since its
conception in 1982, has been used to frighten additional millions into
believing that trying to survive a nuclear war is a waste of effort and
resources, and that only by ridding the world of almost all nuclear weapons
do we have a chance of surviving.
Non-propagandizing scientists recently havecalculated that the climatic and
other environmental effects of even an all-out nuclear war would be much
less severe than the catastrophic effects repeatedly publicized by popular
astronomer Carl Sagan and his fellow activist scientists, and by all the
involved Soviet scientists. Conclusions reached from these recent, realistic
calculations are summarized in an article, "Nuclear Winter Reappraised",
featured in the 1986 summer issue of Foreign Affairs, the prestigious
quarterly of the Council on Foreign Relations. The authors, Starley L.
Thompson and Stephen H. Schneider, are atmospheric scientists with the
National Center for Atmospheric Research. They showed " that on scientific
grounds the global apocalyptic conclusions of the initial nuclear winter
hypothesis can now be relegated to a vanishing low level of probability."
Their models indicate that in July (when the greatest temperature reductions
would result) the average temperature in the United States would be reduced
for a few days from about 70 degrees Fahrenheit to approximately 50 degrees.
(In contrast, under the same conditions Carl Sagan, his associates, and the
Russian scientists predicted a resulting average temperature of about 10
degrees below zero Fahrenheit, lasting for many weeks!)
Persons who want to learn more about possible post-attack climatic effects
also should read the Fall 1986 issue of Foreign Affairs. This issue contains
a long letter from Thompson and Schneider which further demolishes the
theory of catastrophic "nuclear winter." Continuing studies indicate there
will be even smaller reductions in temperature than those calculated by
Thompson and Schneider.
Nuclear War Survival Skills
Cresson Kearny
http://www.oism.org/nwss/s73p912.htm
Noah Simoneaux
wrote:
>You've weakened your own argument here. Before you were saying that firestorm
>resulted form Japanese residential construction methods of the time. Now it
>appears that is not a factor. It would then appear that 50% probability of
>firestorm might be a reasonable assumption.
Actually, that would strengthen my argument that our sample is
statistically too small to base a conclusion on. If 50% of the combat
tests resulted in firestorms even when the construction favored it,
that would mean firestorms are less likely than if they happened 100%
of the time.
>
>Previously you said:
>
>>Ever see the films of the test blasts they did with the buildings and
>cars? After the blast wave passes there is almost no fire left
>burning. The flash from a nuclear weapon sets things on fire first,
>since it travels faster than the blast wave. Then along comes the
>blast wave and extinguishes most of the flames as it makes rubble of
>things.
>
>
>Those were *test* blasts not real cities with crowded back lanes, wooden
>overhead electric power poles, wooded parks, office building filled with paper
>and all sorts of flammable structures which might only be partially collapsed.
>
>The best you can say on the basis of argument you've given is that firestorm
>might be less than 100% certain. A second blast might still ignite a firestorm.
That's what I've been saying all along, in addition to the statement
that 2 combat tests is far too small a sample to claim any probability
for firestorms. If only 50% of the combat tests resulted in firestorms
when conditions are favorable, the chances would be even less when
conditions were unfavorable.
Bev Clark/Steve Gallacci
>2 hours after the explosion."
>
>I think we should revise that scorecard to 1 of 2 from our very
>limited statistical sample.
>
However, it is very reasonable to assume massive fires, even firestorms
with urban/suburban hits. Plenty of mulched fuel and ignition sources,
even without anything flash-initiated. Earthquakes all too commonly have
major fires where the local architechture provides enough fuel.
But the main issues with comprehensive CD include potential attackers
optimising their attack to thwart DC.
And the matter of more likely that any attack would be a suprise "bolt
form the blue" thing, so the nessisary hours to days of warning that
would be needed for CD programs to work would simply not be possible.
Given the ever changing nature of what the likely nature of the threat
might come as, most people might be better served with something along
the lines of the old CD shelters, primarily for simple fall-out. It is
much more likely that if there is any nuclear action, most people would
only have to deal with either prompt down wind or global weather fall out
rahter than having a nuke in their laps.
Finally, in the real world, any program will csot moeny and political
patronage, and a level of high intensity support for a fairly long time.
Given that even in the worst of the cold war days there was never a real
effort to get anything really going, how would you expect to get anything
like the massive programs that have been suggested done? Fearmongering
hype can only work so long and sell only so many people.
Noah Simoneaux
<care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
(snip)
>You should read some serious histories of strategic doctrine. In the
>early 60s, McNamara
>pursued the "civil defense" option as a response to Soviet strategic
>armaments, until extensive analysis showed that the offense had an at
>least 3-1 cost advantage in nullifying the efforts. See for example
>Freedman's "The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy ".
You should read something like Edward Zuckerman's book, "The Day After
World War III". The US had not even come close to giving up on civil
defense, at least not for the leadership. The president still has the
launch codes with him at all times, and the order of succession is
checked often to make sure that not all the leadership of the country
is in the same place at one time.
(snip)
>Ah, leave them to their own devices. A sound plan.
It is a sound plan when people decide it's not worth the money it
would cost to prepare in a reasonable manner.
>
>I guess these people are supposed to load up their cars with all the
>tools, building supplies (even a door slit shelter needs a couple of
>doors), food, and water to wait however long they can in expectation of
>a possible attack, plus the post-attack recovery period if it actually
>occurs.
>
>Naturally all these people, untrained, unsupervised, out-of-shape, and
>under extreme stress would build their shlters correctly to provide
>adequate protection. And would evacuate to the correct areas in
>efficient, orderly fashion in an unrehearsed evacuation - the largest
>and fastest in world history.
I'd bet they could manage somehow if they actually saw some blasts
happen. Any who escaped the initial blasts would have a chance to
survive if they weren't unlucky enough to be right under a follow-up.
>
>Sure.
>
>The 15 million people in the Los Angeles basin, for example, would have
>to hack their shelters out of the hardpan of the Mojave desert (where
>else would they evacuate to?). Ever try this?
Wherever else they'd have to. So you're saying the entire Los Angeles
Basin would have to be evacuated? That's some serious overkill with
nuclear weapons. Figured out how many weapons that would take?
>
>How much food and water do you think these people will have with them?
>Where would they get more after the cities are leveled?
Not much point in leveling whole cities. A waste of weapons, and few
people with nuclear weapons are dumb enough to waste them.
(snip)
>Because only limited number of people over a limited area are being
>evacuated. They are travelling into and through areas that are not
>already choked with traffic from people who are also evacuating, so the
>farther they travel the less congested the road system becomes. Also,
>you can actually ride out a hurricane in your car in perfect safety once
>you are out of flood zones, and out of the immediate path of the
>hurricane (say, a region 50 miles wide).
>
>In a nationwide urban evacuation from a nuclear attack none of these
>things are going for you.
No, but one thing going for you is that any people who do get out in
time may survive. I don't know how you feel about it, but I consider
it better for some percentage(any percentage) of people to survive
rather than none. If they all sit there and say civil defense is a
waste of time their odds will be greatly reduced.
>
>The Greater New York area, a contiguous metropolitan region encompassing
>parts of four states, has a population of 20 million people, and an
>average population density of 2000 per square mile. To disperse these
>people simultaneously over an area large enough to protect them from
>attack means moving them hundreds of miles - all at once.
Hundreds of miles? Some would only have to move less than 10 miles.
What's hundreds a very rough average?
(snip)
>And there is four letter word for urban basement fallout shelters -
>"tomb".
There's a phrase for that attitude, too. Ostrich.
>At the time I read it, I was of a pro-CD frame of mind, and it was
>through an attmept to demonstrate through my own analysis that the
>program as described would be effective, that I came to realize the
>fundamental flaws with the idea that offensive nuclear weapons could be
>effectively redressed through this means.
You seem to consider it effective only if it saves 100% of the
population. I doubt any claims of CD are that ambitious. Of course, I
consider them somewhat effective if they save any lives, while a
moderately effective CD program could save millions.
(snip)
>The 6200 or so warheads in the current Russian arsenal correspond to
>about 3600 equivalent megatons. A 1 Mt bomb can produce a 30 psi
>overpressure out to a radius of 1.25 miles, for an area coverage of 4.9
>square miles. Times 3600 this gives a coverage of 17,600 square miles,
>versus 16,000 square miles for the 100 largest cities.
Now all we'd have to do is move all those 100 largest cities together
so the 3600 megatons could be applied to them. Oops, can't move the
cities. Guess it would take much more to do the job then. Oh well,
that's the way it works when you misuse statistics. ;)
(snip)
>They cannot protect themselves effectively. Camping out in the Russia
>wilderness while their cities vanish is not a real option.
Possibly not for you, but most people would take that option if the
alternative was becoming nuclear dust.
(snip)
>And we need to take the additional measures to ensure that those that
>are retired are destroyed, and that most of those that remain are
>retired as soon as possible.
Yeah, and we can trust all sides to disarm like they say they will.
Heck, I don't even trust the US government to do it if they think they
can keep their dealings secret.
(snip)
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> Like I said don't abuse the 30 psi calculation. This requires an
>
I used 30 psi as a conservative measurement. Kearny tested his expedient
Drew Stowers
wrote:
>On Tue, 22 Feb 2000 13:19:06 GMT, dsto...@wolfenet.com (Drew Stowers)
>wrote:
>
>(snip)
>>Regardless of anything else, planning a fallout shelter without taking
>>into account a firestorm is foolish. A-bombs blasts set almost
>>everything on fire and sucks in tremendous amounts of oxygen into a
>>central core. That is how firestorms start.
>
>Ever see the films of the test blasts they did with the buildings and
>cars? After the blast wave passes there is almost no fire left
>burning. The flash from a nuclear weapon sets things on fire first,
>since it travels faster than the blast wave. Then along comes the
>blast wave and extinguishes most of the flames as it makes rubble of
>things.
The test blast were used against isolated buildings. I don't know
where you live, but housing density is much higher in Seattle then the
Nevada desert.
Against just one building the chance of fire maybe low. Against
several hundred (or thousand) in a city, what are the chances that a
gas stove will light off, or someone will have a candle burning, or
fireplace going.
>>
>>Why do you think civil defense became such a joke?
>
>The only people to whom civil defense became a joke were those who
>bought into the propaganda of the anti-civil defense crowd. For people
>who actually understand the idea, civil defense is still a valid idea.
Against one or two nukes you may have something. To protect against
several thousand in a full exchange is another thing. Some of the
problems with CD back in the Cold War:
1. Pork Barrel politics. A shelter program would be bigger than the
interstate highway construction program. Congress was just as likely
to build thousands of bad shelters as good ones.
2. Big shelters would become big targets. If the USSR could hit a
missile silo, they could certainly hit a large shelter.
3. Evacuation of Urban centers would be a problem
4. Starting an evacuation (depending if the situtation was tense)
could well trigger a first strike from the USSR.
5. Costs would be astronomical.
Additionally, CD utilmately would not work they way it was planned.
In a tense situation, people would likely start filtering out to the
shelters on their own, triggering an unplanned evacuation. Not a
problem if the USSR believes it is not a prelude to a US first strike.
If the US was contemplating a first strike, then there wouldn't be an
evacuation to tip off the USSR.
>
> In most cities you
>>can locate buildings that can survive the blast damage from a nuke.
>>Its is harder to find buildings that won't burn down and then stocking
>>them with equipment that will protect people from a firestorm. It
>>also makes cheap basement fallout shelters impossible.
>
>Hardly impossible. Parroting propaganda isn't the same as actually
>looking at reality. Even if some buildings burn or many buildings in a
>city burn, that doesn't constitute a firestorm. No need to worry about
>something that most likely wouldn't happen anyway.
>
From what I have read there are 2 possiblities. Firestorm or
Conflagration. Either way people in shelters are going to fry unless
precautions are taken. Additionally, with most buildings in city
lieing in the streets, how are people going to to get out of the
shelters?
Mike Bremseth
> Oh yeah, something to add to the earlier post in this thread, in which
> someone claimed the record was 2 for 2 with firestorms.
> This is taken from the book "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons".
> Paragraph 7.72.
>
> "No definite firestorm occurred at Nagasaki, ...
> <snip>
I apparently have a different version (1964?)of "The Effects" as the
quoted para is 7.77 in mine.
However, 7.76 if very relevant here:
".. Because of limited experience, the conditions for the development of
fire storms in cities are not well known. .... Based on these criteria,
only certain sections - usually the older and slum areas - of a very few
cities in the United States would be susceptible to fire storm
development."
- - - -
On time-limited pre-blast evacuation there isn't a clear cut answer:
From memory - female spy in Paris when the Germans invaded in 1940. She -
like virtually the rest of the city - tried to evacuate. After 12 hours,
she hadn't reached the city limits, so she went back. I think that
evacuations from hurricane areas tend to support the view that swift
evacuation is not possible.
However, it is well established that people only panic in a situation
where they believe that excape is possible. Consequently, if the bulk of
people believe there is no escape upon launch notification, they might
not try to escape. Consequently, if there are only a few who think escape
possible, they might have relatively clear sailing out of the city.
At this point, it seems that time limited pre-blast evacuation would not
work, but evacuation over a longer period might. But, as noted in this
thread, doing this might bring about more problems that it solves, and
would not necessarily be an effective strategy anyway.
Mike Bremseth
> Noah Simoneaux
>
>
> -----= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =-----
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Change gov to net
David Naugler
news:MPG.131d176fb...@news.earthlink.net...
> In article <38b2b12e...@news.preferred.com>, no...@yournet.com
> says...
>
> > Oh yeah, something to add to the earlier post in this thread, in which
> > someone claimed the record was 2 for 2 with firestorms.
> > This is taken from the book "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons".
> > Paragraph 7.72.
> >
> > "No definite firestorm occurred at Nagasaki, ...
> > <snip>
>
> I apparently have a different version (1964?)of "The Effects" as the
> quoted para is 7.77 in mine.
>
> However, 7.76 if very relevant here:
>
> ".. Because of limited experience, the conditions for the development of
> fire storms in cities are not well known. .... Based on these criteria,
> only certain sections - usually the older and slum areas - of a very few
> cities in the United States would be susceptible to fire storm
> development."
>
16 percent of the U.S. population lives in poverty, i.e. in older slum areas.
Not to worry, only 16 per cent of the U.S. population is susceptible to death by
firestorm.
Mike Bremseth
dnau...@sfu.ca says...
> > .... Based on these criteria,
> > only certain sections - usually the older and slum areas - of a very few
> > cities in the United States would be susceptible to fire storm
> > development."
> >
>
> 16 percent of the U.S. population lives in poverty, i.e. in older slum areas.
> Not to worry, only 16 per cent of the U.S. population is susceptible to death by
> firestorm.
Of course you note the quote says "of a very few cities".
Also, you really want to stay with that 16 percent figure? The friends of
mine who study rural poverty will be glad to know that poverty only
occurs in urban areas.
Mike Bremseth
Hopelessly Midwestern
> In article <38b2b12e...@news.preferred.com>,
"Firestorms" could occur only when the concentration of combustible
structures is very high, as in the very dense centers of a few old American
cities. At rural and suburban building densities, most people in earth-
covered fallout shelters would not have their lives endangered by fires.
Firestorms destroyed the centers of Hamburg, Dresden, and Tokyo. The
old-fashioned buildings of those cities contained large amounts of flammable
materials, were ignited by many thousands of small incendiaries, and burned
quickly as standing structures well supplied with air. No firestorm has ever
injected smoke into the stratosphere, or caused appreciable cooling below
its smoke cloud.
Buildings in the blasted area for miles around ground zero will be reduced
to scattered rubble - mostly of concrete, steel, and other nonflammable
materials - that will not burn in blazing fires. Thus in the Oak Ridge
National Laboratory translation (ORNL-TR-2793) of Civil Defense. Second
Edition (500,000 copies), Moscow, 1970, by Egorov, Shlyakhov, and Alabin, we
read: "Fires do not occur in zones of complete destruction . . . that are
characterized by an overpressure exceeding 0.5 kg/cm2 [- 7 psi]., because
rubble is scattered and covers the burning structures. As a result the
rubble only smolders, and fires as such do not occur."
excerpts from:
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> Don't take the extreme 30 psi scenario as the minimum requirement.
In our previous debate some months back, you stated, "It seems that his
[Kearny's] best designs provide protection up to about 50 psi. Broadly
speaking, the 50 psi contour marks the division line between survivable and
non-survivable conditions."
I used 30 psi, even though, according to you, 50 psi is realistic.
Hopelessly Midwestern
news:8902lh$g...@crl3.crl.com...
> Hopelessly Midwestern <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
> >Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> >> Like I said don't abuse the 30 psi calculation. This requires an
> >> Don't take the extreme 30 psi scenario as the minimum requirement.
> >
> >shelters to over 50 psi.
>
> Kearny's detailed work and found that Kearny tested with a 50 PSI very
> short transient overpressure, not the sort of relatively sustained
> overpressure and winds you expect from a real nuclear weapon,
> thus invalidating the claim that they'll withstand a nuclear
> bomb overpressure at that level. Or am I remembering wrong?
>
Noah Simoneaux
Gallacci) wrote:
(snip)
>However, it is very reasonable to assume massive fires, even firestorms
>with urban/suburban hits. Plenty of mulched fuel and ignition sources,
>even without anything flash-initiated. Earthquakes all too commonly have
>major fires where the local architechture provides enough fuel.
Massive fires are different from a firestorm. Many shelters could
protect people underground from fires if they protect them from
fallout.
>
>But the main issues with comprehensive CD include potential attackers
>optimising their attack to thwart DC.
>And the matter of more likely that any attack would be a suprise "bolt
>form the blue" thing, so the nessisary hours to days of warning that
>would be needed for CD programs to work would simply not be possible.
>Given the ever changing nature of what the likely nature of the threat
>might come as, most people might be better served with something along
>the lines of the old CD shelters, primarily for simple fall-out. It is
>much more likely that if there is any nuclear action, most people would
>only have to deal with either prompt down wind or global weather fall out
>rahter than having a nuke in their laps.
>
>Finally, in the real world, any program will csot moeny and political
>patronage, and a level of high intensity support for a fairly long time.
>Given that even in the worst of the cold war days there was never a real
>effort to get anything really going, how would you expect to get anything
>like the massive programs that have been suggested done? Fearmongering
>hype can only work so long and sell only so many people.
Fearmongering hype is a propaganda label. One could say that
fearmongering hype is the reason we have enough lifeboats on passenger
ships nowadays. Very few passenger ships sink these days, but ever
since the Titanic they've had to carry sufficient lifeboats for
everyone.
No, I'd never expect everyone to be sold on the idea of CD. People do
dumb things, including things counter to their own survival. Makes me
wonder how people thought we deserved the species name "homo sapiens".
Hopelessly Midwestern
Bev Clark/Steve Gallacci <bev...@netcom.com> wrote in message
news:88vc3k$580$1...@nntp2.atl.mindspring.net...
>
> However, it is very reasonable to assume massive fires, even firestorms
> with urban/suburban hits. Plenty of mulched fuel and ignition sources,
> even without anything flash-initiated. Earthquakes all too commonly have
> major fires where the local architechture provides enough fuel.
"Firestorms" could occur only when the concentration of combustible
Noah Simoneaux
wrote:
(snip)
>16 percent of the U.S. population lives in poverty, i.e. in older slum areas.
>Not to worry, only 16 per cent of the U.S. population is susceptible to death by
>firestorm.
Many of them would probably die from blast effects anyway. Much of the
area susceptible to firestorm would already suffer almost 100%
casualties before any firestorm started.
Of course, results vary if you factor in some silly strategy where the
enemy targets all their weapons in some senseless attack where they
try to level all the cities. Urban renewal might be a good reason(?)
for starting a nuclear war, but failing to hit the enemy's weapons
seems downright stupid. It's bad strategy to assume one's enemies are
stupid.
Carey Sublette
George Herbert wrote:
>
> Hopelessly Midwestern <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
> >Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> >> Like I said don't abuse the 30 psi calculation. This requires an
> >> [...]
> >> Don't take the extreme 30 psi scenario as the minimum requirement.
> >
> >I used 30 psi as a conservative measurement. Kearny tested his expedient
> >shelters to over 50 psi.
>
> As I recall from an earlier go around on this point, Carey looked up
> Kearny's detailed work and found that Kearny tested with a 50 PSI very
> short transient overpressure, not the sort of relatively sustained
> overpressure and winds you expect from a real nuclear weapon,
> thus invalidating the claim that they'll withstand a nuclear
> bomb overpressure at that level. Or am I remembering wrong?
>
> -george william herbert
> gher...@crl.com
No, you're right.
It is par for Hopelessly's course, that he doesn't recall this (and I
confidently expect the next time this subject arises he won't then).
Kearny's shelters did not get through 50 psi entirely unscathed, but
even so they were subjected to impulses equivalent to a mere 2 psi of a
strategic size weapon. Kearny's shelters are incapable of handling a 50
psi static load (or anything approaching it), they *rely* on the inertia
of the soil overburden to time average the impulse. They would certainly
fail under the far more prolonged load of a strategic warhead yield.
You can build a shelter proof against a 30 psi or 50 psi strategic
weapon overpressure, but they are made out of reinforced concrete or
steel arches and are expensive.
This oversight by Kearny points out a disturbing aspect of his book, and
by implication the lab organization that presumably reviewed and
implicitly endorsed it. It is in the mechanics of shelter design that
Kearny should be most authoritative, but his failure to address this
issue calls into question the reliability of his judgement.
This is brought even more sharply by his inclusion of a picture of an
sandbag/open culvert bomb shelter in Hiroshima that, he says, survived a
high overpressure without damage (though he adds it didn't have the
balst door necessary to protect the occupants). He thus creates the
false impression that all this cheap shelter need to be proof against
the bomb, was the addition of a door. In reality, if it had had a
sufficiently strong door to keep out the blast pressure, the shelter
would have failed catastrophically killing its inhabitants. The only
reason the open culvert survived is that it was just that - open -
allowing the blast pressure to equalize instantaneously (good for the
shelter, fatal for its occupants).
Carey Sublette
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> It is par for Hopelessly's course, that he doesn't recall this (and I
> confidently expect the next time this subject arises he won't then).
And this is on par for your machinations, Carey.
Kearny's book, as it explicitely states in the introduction, is NOT a civil
defense book. His shelters are expedient, and not designed for permanent
CD. You love to build a strawman of Kearny's expedient designs and then
knock it over as a representation of all CD.
> Kearny's shelters did not get through 50 psi entirely unscathed,
Yes, they did.
> You can build a shelter proof against a 30 psi or 50 psi strategic
> weapon overpressure, but they are made out of reinforced concrete or
> steel arches and are expensive.
And of such would a real CD program consist.
> This oversight by Kearny points out a disturbing aspect of his book,
Your slanting of facts is what is disturbing.
> by implication the lab organization that presumably reviewed and
> implicitly endorsed it. It is in the mechanics of shelter design that
> Kearny should be most authoritative, but his failure to address this
> issue calls into question the reliability of his judgement.
Your slanting of facts calls into question the reliability of your
judgement.
Hopelessly Midwestern
Hopelessly Midwestern <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote in message
news:u1Us4.311$i_1....@dfiatx1-snr1.gtei.net...
>
> Kearny's book, as it explicitely states in the introduction, is NOT a
civil
> defense book.
Actually, this is stated in the Forward, not the introduction...
This book is not a description of civil defense. It is a guide to "Stop-gap"
civil defense which individuals could carry out for themselves, if need be,
with no expenditures by our government. It fills the gap between the
ineffective civil defense that we have today and the highly effective
survival preparations that we could and should have a few years from now.
However, if we go no further than what we can do on the basis of this book,
then the United States cannot survive a major nuclear war.
http://www.oism.org/nwss/s73p907.htm
Carey Sublette
Carey Sublette wrote:
>
> George Herbert wrote:
> >
> > Hopelessly Midwestern <yoss...@cyberdude.com> wrote:
> > >Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > >> Like I said don't abuse the 30 psi calculation. This requires an
> > >> [...]
> > >> Don't take the extreme 30 psi scenario as the minimum requirement.
> > >
> > >I used 30 psi as a conservative measurement. Kearny tested his expedient
> > >shelters to over 50 psi.
> >
> > As I recall from an earlier go around on this point, Carey looked up
> > Kearny's detailed work and found that Kearny tested with a 50 PSI very
> > short transient overpressure, not the sort of relatively sustained
> > overpressure and winds you expect from a real nuclear weapon,
> > thus invalidating the claim that they'll withstand a nuclear
> > bomb overpressure at that level. Or am I remembering wrong?
> >
> > -george william herbert
> > gher...@crl.com
>
> No, you're right.
>
> It is par for Hopelessly's course, that he doesn't recall this (and I
> confidently expect the next time this subject arises he won't then).
>
> Kearny's shelters did not get through 50 psi entirely unscathed, but
> even so they were subjected to impulses equivalent to a mere 2 psi of a
> strategic size weapon. Kearny's shelters are incapable of handling a 50
> psi static load (or anything approaching it), they *rely* on the inertia
> of the soil overburden to time average the impulse. They would certainly
> fail under the far more prolonged load of a strategic warhead yield.
>
> You can build a shelter proof against a 30 psi or 50 psi strategic
> weapon overpressure, but they are made out of reinforced concrete or
> steel arches and are expensive.
>
> This oversight by Kearny points out a disturbing aspect of his book, and
> by implication the lab organization that presumably reviewed and
> implicitly endorsed it. It is in the mechanics of shelter design that
> Kearny should be most authoritative, but his failure to address this
> issue calls into question the reliability of his judgement.
>
> This is brought even more sharply by his inclusion of a picture of an
> sandbag/open culvert bomb shelter in Hiroshima that, he says, survived a
> high overpressure without damage (though he adds it didn't have the
> balst door necessary to protect the occupants). He thus creates the
> false impression that all this cheap shelter need to be proof against
> the bomb, was the addition of a door. In reality, if it had had a
> sufficiently strong door to keep out the blast pressure, the shelter
> would have failed catastrophically killing its inhabitants. The only
> reason the open culvert survived is that it was just that - open -
> allowing the blast pressure to equalize instantaneously (good for the
> shelter, fatal for its occupants).
>
> Carey Sublette
Also, although Hopelessly seems to keep obsessing about currently
deployed Russian forces as the only (or maximal) threat the key issue
here is the cost-effectiveness of defense vs offense.
Although CD could arguably be made feasible by strict limits on
strategic arms (and thus all parties would then have to cooperate to
maintain the overall strategic environment), another one of Hopelessly's
hobby-horses is denouncing strategic arms agreements.
A genuine 30 psi hardened shelter, proof against the inevitable urban
conflagration (fireproof door and ventilation system, insulated, and
sealable airtight and with with independent air supply for the duration
of the fire), effective provisions for egress (the entrance will most
probably be covered with debris), and durable enough to remain
serviceable for a few decades (you don't want it filling with water, and
it would be a pity if the ventilation system was inoperable or the door
wouldn't seal) is going to cost substantial bucks. I don't think my
guesstimate of $20,000 is excessive (price out an in-ground pool
lately?), in fact now that I think about it maybe that was a good bit
too low. Evan at $20,000 an approximately one trillion dollar price tag
would be requried to protect 220 million urban Americans (with an
average occupancy of 4.4, compared to the average household size of 2.6;
if I used the household occupancy rate the cost would go up by 60%).
Going to 50 psi or 100 psi doesn't help matters for defense either. The
number of additional warheads required is proportionate to the
overpressure, so 100 psi takes about three times as many as 30 psi.
Adding the necessary 10,000 550 kt warheads costs, what?, maybe 100
billion? Though quite a large expenditure it is only a fraction of the
what either the Soviet Union or the U.S. has spent on strategic arms to
date, and only a fraction of the defense costs for the mere 30 psi
threat. To boost hardness to 100 psi requires a structure three times
stronger, at considerably greater cost. And at 100 psi the nature of the
problem has changed radically (not in the defense's favor).
At 100 psi the advantage of airbursting vanishes, and all warheads would
be ground bursts resulting in extremely intense local fallout. At 100
psi, the fireball radius reaches the blast radius, and the entire area
of the 100 largest cities becomes a continuous carpet of fire. At 100
psi, the prompt radiation from the explosion tops one million rems.
To survive this a shelter has to be quite sophisticated, simply being
stronger isn't good enough. A complex entry system is needed (not only
to survive the intense blast pressure and hypersonic winds) but to
prevent radiation that penetrates the door from scattering into the
occupied area of the shelter and cooking the inhabitants. The
ventilation system and entrance also have to survive temperatures of
several thousand degrees C for several seconds.
This calls for a sophisticated shelter design, sort of a mini-missile
silo. Not cheap.
Hopelessly Midwestern
>
> Also, although Hopelessly seems to keep obsessing about currently
> deployed Russian forces as the only (or maximal) threat the key issue
> here is the cost-effectiveness of defense vs offense.
If you remember, I asked you how many they could bring out of retirement.
I'm well aware the Russians could expand their deployed arsenal. This sort
of hyperbole is habitual for you.
> Although CD could arguably be made feasible by strict limits on
> strategic arms (and thus all parties would then have to cooperate to
> maintain the overall strategic environment), another one of Hopelessly's
> hobby-horses is denouncing strategic arms agreements.
Your hyperbole remains characteristic. I'm all for arms agreements if they
can be verified. (Trust but verify - Reagan.) I'm against limiting arms
unilaterally and under unfavorable terms, as history shows much of trust has
been foolishly placed in arms agreements .
I think what we need is mutual invulnerability or MASS - Mutual Assured
Security and Survival, and CD is an important part of that concept and
doesn't rely on the good graces of one's enemies.
> A genuine 30 psi hardened shelter, proof against the inevitable urban
> conflagration (fireproof door and ventilation system, insulated, and
> sealable airtight and with with independent air supply for the duration
> of the fire), effective provisions for egress (the entrance will most
> probably be covered with debris), and durable enough to remain
> serviceable for a few decades (you don't want it filling with water, and
> it would be a pity if the ventilation system was inoperable or the door
> wouldn't seal) is going to cost substantial bucks. I don't think my
> guesstimate of $20,000 is excessive (price out an in-ground pool
> lately?), in fact now that I think about it maybe that was a good bit
> too low.
$20,000 for the 4.4 average urban household ($4545 per occupant) is slightly
excessive for the best premium shelter.
A high-tech disaster shelter (the hatch produces little thermal or radar
signature, the septic tank lasts 3-6 months, twelve 12-volt, deep-cycle
sealed batteries for power, HEPA filters for bio/chem warfare, etc) costs
$39,700 (for a Radius P-10 Disaster Shelter for 10 -- $3,970 per occupant.)
http://www.radius-defense.com/s16.htm
Of course, a CD program would probably do construction much cheaper, as this
US government study (Chester, C.V. and Zimmerman, G.P., Civil Defense
Shelters, A State-of-the-Art Assessment, 1986, Oak Ridge National
Laboratory) shows -- $350-500 per occupant.
>Evan at $20,000 an approximately one trillion dollar price tag
> would be requried to protect 220 million urban Americans (with an
> average occupancy of 4.4, compared to the average household size of 2.6;
> if I used the household occupancy rate the cost would go up by 60%).
To protect ALL of the 220M urban Americans using Oak Ridge National
Laboratory estimates would cost 77 to 110 billion dollars. If Americans
would give up tobacco for two years ($49 billion annually in US) they could
pay for it -- in cash.
Even at Carey's premium disaster shelter prices ($20,000 shelter for 4.4
people,) amotorized monthly payments (360 months at 7%) would only amount to
only $30.24 per occupant. Of course, a CD program would likely evacuate a
certain percentage of "non-essential" urban residents, lowering the costs
considerably.
> Going to 50 psi or 100 psi doesn't help matters for defense either. The
> number of additional warheads required is proportionate to the
> overpressure, so 100 psi takes about three times as many as 30 psi.
> Adding the necessary 10,000 550 kt warheads costs, what?, maybe 100
> billion?
$100B is roughly equal to what it would cost to build shelters for all urban
Americans according to the ORNL estimates (which, of course, you dispute.)
However, even if it cost as much as you say (a trillion)....
The "cost-effectiveness at the margin" argument had never been analyzed in
terms of strategy. The "margin" was assumed to be a dollar-to- dollar
comparison of offensive versus defensive weapon systems, determining that
strategic defenses were too expensive to deploy. Not considered at the time,
was "The Preferred Defense Option", which posited that only 10% of defenses
to 100% of offenses would be required to deter attack, and was based on the
logical assumption that a nuclear attacker would require a 90-95% confidence
level in the success of the attack, but the defender would require only a
minimum of ten percent of defenses to defeat that level of confidence (of
deliberate attack), especially if deception were employed in deployment of
the defenses.) (www.tacda.org)
>Though quite a large expenditure it is only a fraction of the
> what either the Soviet Union or the U.S. has spent on strategic arms to
> date, and only a fraction of the defense costs for the mere 30 psi
> threat. To boost hardness to 100 psi requires a structure three times
> stronger, at considerably greater cost.
The Radius P-10 goes to 150 psi. (If it actually helps.) Same price.
>[snip details]
> This calls for a sophisticated shelter design, sort of a mini-missile
> silo. Not cheap.
No, that sort of sophisticated shelter is not cheap like the ORNL
blast-shelter estimates, but it's here, and less expensive than you
estimated. And if FEMA started purchasing Radius P-10's by the thousands
for CD, the cost would be reduced substantially. Probably they would make
them bigger for a FEMA contract, and the price per occupant would be much
lower than for the P-10.
Also, we have the Swiss, Norwegians, Swedes, Russians, and Chinese from whom
we should learn.
offb...@my-deja.com
Carey Sublette <care...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> A genuine 30 psi hardened shelter, proof against the inevitable urban
> conflagration (fireproof door and ventilation system, insulated, and
> sealable airtight and with with independent air supply for the
Okay, that's the cities. I live in the country. Kearney's shelters
should be enough for me, shouldn't they?
BRGarity
a "rural" area would be darn near impossible to the millions living in the
cities. We've got a lot of first strike targets around here( military bases,
seaports, airports capable of handling strategic bombers, and military support
industry). How do I know these are first strike targets you ask; I spent eight
years of my life targetting missiles and bombs against the Commies. And to
clear up the shelter argument a little- Fallout shelters were designed to
protect people from fallout ONLY, a Blast Shelter is an Extremely expensive
Structure to build. As an example, a relative of mine had a home built with a
50 PSI BLAST SHELTER as an integral part of the home; The shelter cost almost
three times as much to construct as the rest of the home. And the house is all
steel reinforced concrete.
Lone Wolf 1
jottol
> Persons who want to learn more about possible post-attack climatic
effects
> also should read the Fall 1986 issue of Foreign Affairs. This issue
contains
> a long letter from Thompson and Schneider which further demolishes the
> theory of catastrophic "nuclear winter." Continuing studies indicate
there
> will be even smaller reductions in temperature than those calculated by
> Thompson and Schneider.
What do these studies use as models? I'd assume volcanic eruptions such as
the one that caused the 1816 'Year Without A Summer.' Mt. Pinatubo caused
short-term climatic change over the northern hemisphere in summer, 1992.
Would a global nuclear war approximate the effects of a single major
volcanic eruption? (Who really knows?)
I've often wondered what the effect would be of nuclear attacks on cities
with nuclear plants nearby. Or attacks on nuclear plants themselves.
Given Three Mile Island and Chernobyl as models, has this issue been
addressed?