I watched a very long Lex Fridman podcast, an interview with journalist and author Annie Jacobsen. I came for information on aliens (Annie says no) but stayed through a numbing section on what the actual results of a nuclear war would be. She has a new book coming out March 26, 2024, called Nuclear War: A Scenario, which portrays a ticking-clock picture of what happens after the first push of the button. We live our lives in the shadow of the atom bomb, thinking of it as far off, improbable, but the recent movie Oppenheimer reminds us of our, of humankind’s, hideous propensity for creating the unimaginable.
Jacobsen, a Pulitzer nominated journalist, traffics in facts. Her interviews were with both military and civilian people who at one time were working as part of the apparatus that delivers nuclear payloads. The ‘here’s how it works’ people. The main take-away in it is simple, brutal, final, unchangeable. It works quick. An ICBM, intercontinental ballistic missile, sent from Russia, reaches the east coast of America in 26 minutes. A satellite will see that missile take off from Russia within seconds of launch, and it will signal the immediate need for a counter-strike. The US president then has 6, yes 6 minutes to decide whether or not to retaliate.
In that doomsday scenario, the first bomb drops, and millions of people in a major city die from that single bomb. A few more, and it becomes tens of millions. People close to the bomb are instantly vaporized and should consider themselves lucky. Others farther away are horrifically burned, their skin falls off, their lungs collapse, their hearing is obliterated, they’re blinded, pinned within destroyed buildings, they begin sustaining radiation poisoning.
Soon comes nuclear winter. The sun is blotted out of the sky by soot. Temperatures drop worldwide. The food supply chain is non-existent. Any future agriculture ceases. Widespread radiation contamination begins. Cancers abound. Mutations. Flesh bodies no longer function. Five billion people die of illness, relocation and starvation.
After that, it’s supposition and science fiction scenarios. Leaders and the super-rich hunker far below in bunkers. On the surface, we degenerate to beasts and cannibals. Apocalyptic preachers gather isolated followings. In remote alcoves, a few survivalists live. Whatever is left of humankind waits.
Over 3000 nuclear warheads in the world are immediately ready to deploy, the largest numbers in the US and Russia. Ready to deploy means they’ll go flying within one minute of the button being pushed. It’s estimated that about 300-400 nuclear warheads exploding over the earth will destroy everything.
I wrote a song years back after seeing a documentary about Hiroshima. It never made it on the radio, or you’d have heard it. Here are the lyrics.
I saw the buildings blown away in the red fire nuclear storm I saw the people turn to gray in the red fire nuclear storm I saw humanity quake and pray in the red fire nuclear storm I saw the dawning of the modern day in the red fire nuclear storm I saw and I cannot turn away in the red fire nuclear storm I saw and I cannot turn away I don't want to die, I don't want to see trees fly It says Never Again in Japanese letters and they know why I saw the buildings blown away in the red fire nuclear storm... I saw and I cannot turn away I saw and I cannot turn away