The Beltway, Security, and Nuking the World: Some Images for You

Mar 17, 2010 at 12:29 PM

By Bonnie Kristian

Here are a few graphics I've been collecting for a while (click on each for the source).

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Bonnie,

Correct me if I'm wrong, but something seems very peculiar about the second image about nukes. In short, I think the conclusions drawn from it might be wrong. Let's see:

So roughly 12.5% of the world is populated by humans. The equation is then carried out, resulting in the need of ~1.2million nukes to end humanity.

Just by using my head, does this not seem wrong? Let's say we used even a thousand nukes on the world's major cities, I do think there would be tremendously more damage than what that chart illustrates. It does not take into consideration the further population density like the big cities.

As well, even if one nuke were to be used on a given area (say New York) there would obviously not be enough force to wipe out all of NYC. However, there would be enough nuclear waste, radiation sickness, general human catastrophe (e.g., no food at the stores, no electricty, no running water, etc.) that millions who did not die from the blast, would die from the aftermath.

Really, that chart seems very suspicious to me--I think it sways the point and detracts from the reality.

Submitted by Jared Fuller on March 17, 2010.

The chart was also assuming the most powerful nukes in service, so that would decrease the power of the US Gov.'s arsenal.
But I'll agree that assuming targeting large populations and including fallout when counting the power of nukes would be a huge increase in damage done. The chart is definitely being extremely conservative in its bodycount.

Submitted by Druk (not verified) on March 17, 2010.

I think you're right that 1,000 nukes in major cities would wipe out a lot of people, and that irradiation would have ongoing effects perhaps not covered by these graphs.

But, the calculations here represent how many nukes it would take to kill everyone. So, that means using a whole nuke to attack even the remotest, sparesely-populated area, even if it was to kill only one person. The question answered by this graph is how many nuclear blasts it would take to blow up every square inch of land inhabited by people, which is probably not the most instructive way to analyze the destructive capacity of nuclear weapons.

Submitted by David Hoyt on March 18, 2010.

The largest nuclear device, built by the Soviet Union during the Cold War, had a blast radius of 35km, or a total circular destruction of 70km, or about 43 miles in every direction, with a fireball radius of 15km in the centre.

Given that, the amount of nukes required to wipe out humanity would be half your estimate, so around 500,000.

I would imagine the amount of nuclear devices to wipe out mankind would be much smaller than 500,000. That is the amount of nukes to completely destroy Earth, but the nuclear fallout from so many devices detonating at once, would cause everyone to die of radiation poisoning within days, even if there were only 1,000 or so nuclear devices detonated.

So, doomsday is really entirely possible. It won't happen because of God (if you believe in one), it's going to happen by our own hands if we're not careful.

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on March 17, 2010.

I thought it was an interesting chart and honestly didn't recalculate the math myself. But if you click through to the post where I got it, he also addresses what would happen if only highly populated areas were hit.

Submitted by Bonnie Kristian on March 17, 2010.

I read through it--his analyses were less than appealing. In fact, I think he tries to purposefully make the situation seem all fine and dandy, when it is very much in fact the oppositte.

The stats used = debatable (as one commentator above noted).

The aftermath, not even addressed.

The catastrophe it could entail (e.g., market fallouts, if major ports destroyed, etc.), not even noted.

In short, this rosy red picture painted by the artist is a distraction from the very real issues of nuclear warheads and their use. Although I do not think his intent was propaganda, it seems to be of the vain that would use these exact same sorts of charts to skew information.

Beware the chartist. So says Bruce Blumert: http://www.lewrockwell.com/blumert/blumert81.html

Submitted by Jared Fuller on March 17, 2010.

Did the author completely fail to recognize the global nature of atmospheric dust created?

"nuclear winter"

Submitted by Michael Brummit (not verified) on March 18, 2010.

I don't think he is attempting to minimize the consequences of nuclear war -- or at least I'm not in posting it. Rather, when I looked at the chart originally, I mainly took it as a challenge to the fearmongering governments tend to do on this subject -- particularly ours in relation to Iran.

It's not saying that nuclear war is some little thing we shouldn't fear, but that sometimes the way the data is represented is inaccurate and designed to exaggerate our fears and push us towards acceptance of more war and more government control to "keep us safe."

(As a side note, the artist notes at the top of his post that he's going to revise the charts to take into account fall-out, nuclear winter, etc.)

Submitted by Bonnie Kristian on March 18, 2010.