Simulated nuclear war

If anyone was ever curious of what war between the United States and Russia would look like which includes guide to the plans,shows attacks on us and russian cities and other target databases.Really Interesting and gives u a chill down your spine.They are in pdf form.

nrdc.org...

[edit on 10-6-2008 by alienstar]

Nice find, alienstar! Really good, bursting with facts.

this reminds me of that video game DEFCON where you can wage nuclear war with your friends!

reply to post by alienstar


I doubt this would be everything in a nuclear attack. There's so much classified stuff that might skew the results by large deviations.

Its still an awesome find. I wish they had a full document PDF download. Not all the chapters are available to download. Big bummer.

This report is a good one, I've known of it for a while.

However, note that this is based on the best availiable data up to ten years ago. The U.S. has introduced some many new concepts and changed their nuclear war plans significantly. the SIOP essentially does not exist anymore, what took its place is a CONPLAN that is said to be quite different from the Cold War protocals.

Originally posted by sweatmonicaIdo
This report is a good one, I've known of it for a while.

However, note that this is based on the best availiable data up to ten years ago. The U.S. has introduced some many new concepts and changed their nuclear war plans significantly. the SIOP essentially does not exist anymore, what took its place is a CONPLAN that is said to be quite different from the Cold War protocals.

Please show us how it's changed, as far as I'm concerned scince 77 Russia has the MAJOR advantage over U.S.

With the reduction of US missile bases eg in the 80`s the Whiteman base was targetted by 100+ warheads - today its not a missile base anymore and the missiles are gone , so those 100 are retargeted elsewhere , and russian weapons arn`t quite as accurate as the US ones , so they make up for it by using a bigger yield.

Originally posted by Harlequin
With the reduction of US missile bases eg in the 80`s the Whiteman base was targetted by 100+ warheads - today its not a missile base anymore and the missiles are gone , so those 100 are retargeted elsewhere , and russian weapons arn`t quite as accurate as the US ones , so they make up for it by using a bigger yield.

Russian's CEP of nuke warheads are 250 meters "750+ feet" thier warheads are an average of 550kt-25 Megatone so even if they were 100-300kt (like the U.S.) they would still destroy thier targets.

Russia has even beefed up its nuclear forces even father.I know they made a new ballistic missile.Since then they have been showing off their new toys in the red square parade as well.

Pentagon sees Russia strengthening nuclear arsenal
news.yahoo.com...

Some statements transcribed here from the PDF file, Chapter 6, "Conclusions and Policy Recommendations":

The bottom line is that approximately one-third of Russia's citizenry become casualties from an attack with only 150 - 200 warheads. (Page 130).

Recommendation #1: Unilaterally reduce US nuclear forces, and challenge Russia to do the same. The United States will still have more than adequate nuclear deterrent. Under their worst case planning assumptions, our friends in Russia would know that our weapons hold millions of people at risk. (Page 131)

It is highly likely that going forward with a missile defense system will have widespread ramifications, including the obvious response of causing certain nations to build more offensive weapons to overwhelm the defense. (Page 132)

Seems reasonable to me.

After researching this in more detail, one of the issues I have about the NRDC (National Resources Defense Council) is that they appear to be anti-nuclear, across the board. Although the credentials of the paper's authors look great, I wonder if the NRDC isn't slanting things a bit to support their positions that nuclear power of any type is too dangerous to implement.

I would look upon the NRDC more favorably if I could trust their intentions better. Are they against nuclear war? (That's pretty good.) Are they against all nuclear power? (I would argue that.)

www.commondreams.org...

It would be very easy for them to misrepresent the facts within this very densely written nuclear warefare simulation. I looked at there equations at length in the appendices. They are very difficult. Who knows how correct they are?

Similarly, who knows if nuclear power generation is as dangerous as the NRDC claim? Is this group to be trusted? Or do they have some secret agenda that we don't know about, and probably wouldn't agree with?

Edit: To get their name exactly right.

[edit on 16-6-2008 by Buck Division]

something i think most people don`t realise is that the US is now in ths situation of having to target 2 or 3 warheads at a single hardened silo to destroy it , the CEP of the best warhead is 90meters - the kill radius of an SS19 silo in rock is 50 meters - the russians have been in the same situation for many years so have over compensated with larger warheads , but the us super hard silos are vulnrable.

whats also funny is that russia have been reducing there weapons for years now - they have less than 400 long range icbm`s of all classes left - whilst the USA have hardly reduced any.

so , say again - who wants to rule the world

i do know the us eliminated all mx and also minuteman II.So the only ones that are in the silos the the minuteman III,with single headed warhead.

Originally posted by Buck Division
After researching this in more detail, one of the issues I have about the NRDC (National Resources Defense Council) is that they appear to be anti-nuclear, across the board.

The conspiracy against nuclear power is very real for reason i can't really understand given the fact that it does seem to be comparatively expensive to even sun and wind power to say nothing of coal and oil...

Although the credentials of the paper's authors look great, I wonder if the NRDC isn't slanting things a bit to support their positions that nuclear power of any type is too dangerous to implement.

The authors of disarmament, to say nothing of their friends in the energy restriction business, papers and policies always does seem to have more credentials than seems legitimate and i most certainly don't trust anyone who have been indoctrinated that completely. I am happy to see that even a little reading has made you suspicious of their motives.

I would look upon the NRDC more favorably if I could trust their intentions better. Are they against nuclear war? (That's pretty good.) Are they against all nuclear power? (I would argue that.)

www.commondreams.org...

Don't trust anyone in the disarmament business; we don't need less weapons we need to be allowed to follow the economic systems that would not allow our leaders to drive us into conflict with each other.

It would be very easy for them to misrepresent the facts within this very densely written nuclear warefare simulation. I looked at there equations at length in the appendices. They are very difficult. Who knows how correct they are?

And since we haven't had a nuclear war it's speculation any ways. It's not that i don't think we can come up with perfectly good simulations but that i know that the entire nuclear war simulation industry is bent on convincing us that the world will end the moment anyone uses one. The nuclear winter nonsense went on for long enough and the moment that could no longer be propagated so easily the world were suddenly swamped with disarmament groups trying to take these weapons ( by starting with civilian power stations ) from their various countries.

Similarly, who knows if nuclear power generation is as dangerous as the NRDC claim?

No it's not and low doses of radiation in fact offers a range of health benefits; the human body reacts favourable to the upper safety margins that are normally employed for nuclear power stations, the medical industry as well as nuclear powered ship construction.

Is this group to be trusted? Or do they have some secret agenda that we don't know about, and probably wouldn't agree with?

Edit: To get their name exactly right.

Their agenda is in my reading to use the existence of nuclear weapons ( which i agree we could probably do without if we could ensure that no one had them) to demonize the nuclear power industry towards a end goal of not only disarming and undermining the nations that have achieved the most economic prosperity but to ensure that this route of energy 'generation' is not open for the development of humanity.

Stellar

Originally posted by Harlequin
something i think most people don`t realise is that the US is now in ths situation of having to target 2 or 3 warheads at a single hardened silo to destroy it

This is not a 'new' situation and i am not sure if the Russian have spent additional resources hardening silo's past their massive programs of the early 70's to early 80's; by that time i think it became apparent that accuracy were improving quite a bit faster than hardening technologies did? Not sure but that's the impression i got.. As for the two or three warheads that is largely done so that the destruction of one ICBM wont lead to multiple silo's not getting hit hence the practice of targeting one enemy silo from multiple missiles. This becomes especially important when ABM defenses are expected to achieve a relative large volume of hostile ICBM's.

the CEP of the best warhead is 90meters - the kill radius of an SS19 silo in rock is 50 meters - the russians have been in the same situation for many years so have over compensated with larger warheads ,

I think both countries gave up hardening silos in the early 80's with the US EDIT stopping a bit sooner. As for the 90 meter CEP the US Trident D-5's are FAR more accurate and may very well in theory be sufficient to destroy hardened Russian silo's. A more pressing question is just how effective the S-300 range of missiles will be against various US ICBM/SLBM's.

but the us super hard silos are vulnrable.

Comparatively speaking the US does not have super hardened shelters and the Russians invested massively in making their silo's survivable so as to best enable their re-use with reloads. Super hardened Silo's with cold launch technology was a very important part of the Russian strategic aim of sustaining a nuclear exchange for months on end with reloads and firing continuing as long as the production could be kept up in the hidden, fortified or buried factories.

whats also funny is that russia have been reducing there weapons for years now - they have less than 400 long range icbm`s of all classes left - whilst the USA have hardly reduced any.

A conservative estimate in fact leaves the RF with somewhere between 400 and 600 ICBM's and 200 SLBM's while the US is credited with exactly 500 ICBM's and 336 SLBM's. The US missiles are generally more accurate but both countries deploy a similar number of warheads with Russian warheads normally having yields half or twice as great as similar US weapons. I am sure you know most of this but i like to go over the data on occasion and the best motivation for a few hours of browsing is knowing that you will be putting pen to paper.

As for the question of who wishes to dominate the world i think the cold war made it clear that one side was doing it's best to ward of aggression while the other staged invasions and interventions ostensible in defense of 'freedom' while killing those self same freedom fighters by the millions.

And yes, i would appreciate a response with details about the hardening and anything else you think i misrepresented or seem ignorant about.

Stellar

[edit on 18-6-2008 by StellarX]

StellarX i'm pretty impressed with your knowledge of all this.

Originally posted by alienstar
StellarX i'm pretty impressed with your knowledge of all this.

Always nice to impress people but i have found that i impressing someone normally means their just in agreement without having the actual knowledge. I wont speak to what you do or don't know but i am glad that you like what i am saying and hope that we are in fact both 'right'.

Stellar

what `opened the eyes` for the US was the AA-19 silo`s - not only were the missiles themselves horribly dangerous (in ability to hard-kill anything that wanted) but at the end of the 70`s and throughout the 80`s the minuteman (and peacekepper) were , and still are `at risk` from within cep , overpressure based kills.

i wonder what was thought the moment they in CONUS ops realised this.....

hence why the russian heavies were allways at the forefront of all thw SALT and START talks;

Afaik the D-5 uses an inertial navigation system combined with a stellar reference system to give a CEP of *around* 90m - and a gps was tested 15 years ago (with an earth penetrator as well) -i know the D-5A is planned to have them rolled out , but thats 2020 and onwards for MLU.

S-300 , well they also have the ABM complexes which still work so 100 mt exo/endo burst `neutron` bombs (xray enchanced actually but you know what i mean) will be a dampner on that aspect - and lets not forget the `keep the generals awake at night` FOBS - which is still in stockpile.

As for hardening - it does IMO give a glimpse of the war planners thinking - the russians were planning (as you said) for the ability for reuse the silo`s and keep shooting (and not only nuclear warheads - as ken alibek reported after his defeection , russian warplanning involved the massive use of biological warheads in icbm`s as well) , lets not forget that the ABM defends not only moscow but also the icbm field at kozel`sk (super hardened SS-19 as well) whilst the US went with more mobile `countervalue` second strike in the form of subs russia went for re-use (and mobile TEL`s)

what i think is interesting , and was born out in 1991 gulf war , is just how hard it is for anyone to actually find a TEL - the US according to the above report , wanted to blanket nuke thousands of qwaure miles of russian forests just to try and hit them.

thankfully both sides said `stop` , and we have `peace` or what is teh present facade of of it;

now heres food for thought - the cuban missiles event , the US was prepared to go to war when russia want to use cuba for irbm`s - and yet teh US crys foul when they have bases surrounding russia and russia complain about a US missile system....

to put into writing something i`ve known for along time - 80% of both US and Russian nuclear weapons are aimed at the other sides nuclear weapons ;

if you read the chapter 4 , page 47 it says the same - all of the ehavy US icbm force is aimed at the russian silo`s.

now - today in 2008 we have a quandry - both sides still have alot of warheads and not as many hardened silo`s to shoot them at - so what to do? sadly the answer is simply - change them from counter assest to counter value targets.

its a numbers game - and we are rapidly approaching the point where a nuclear war could be `won` - eliminate enough of the `other sides` ability -or even simply out last what they can shoot, so instead you hit the locations and targets to maximise long term casualities and minimise the ability to rebuild or strike back ; which is where russia with the larger land mass has the advantage.

I'm just curious, but has anyone on this planet learned anything from Chernobyl?

I sure as hell would hope so, or there will be no place safe on earth for as long as humans walk upright and only have two arms and two eyes.