Nuclear War: A Scenario

I didn't realize how much I read about the development of nuclear war capability, and the after effects of a nuclear war, compared to the conduction of a nuclear war.

Of the 90 or so books I read last year, my favorite non-fiction was Richard Rhodes' 1987 THE MAKING OF THE ATOMIC BOMB. It describes in close detail the scientific history leading up to the development of the most powerful bombs ever developed, at the time. DARK SUN, the sequel, which describes the sequel to the Bomb (the Super) is on my list to read.

In fiction, post-apocalypse stories are some of my favorite. THE ROAD is perhaps my favorite book, and takes place after some world-ending cataclysm (which is left ambiguous, but reads nuclear to me). On the other end of the spectrum, the video game series (and now TV show) FALLOUT has been one of my favorites for years upon years.

There's a theory about why we haven't encountered alien life called the Great Filter. It imagines that something makes it extremely difficult for life to progress to such a stage as to develop into something we would or could identify. Civilization-ending nuclear war (e.g., any and all nuclear war, Annie Jacobsen writes) could be a possible filtration event for our species. It would also be a filter through which survivors pass.

I read parts of this book sitting in Meridian Hill Park in Washington, D.C., about 2 miles north of the White House. After each section, I looked up to watch dogs playing, people running around, a little kid pick up a stick. I imagined what it would look like if these were instantly turned to carbon following a bright flash, all grass and trees around me vaporized instantly, the stoneworks and roads turned molten. In D.C., helicopters are constantly passing. Big Sikorsky VH-3Ds frequently pass over the Park, and each time I imagine that the President must be on it (who knows?). A large helicopter passed in the distance and I watched it and imagined being in the back cabin as the first pure white silent flash of a nuclear detonation blinded me. Not having time to understand that words like “time” and “reality” would no longer have any meaning to anyone nearby. Perhaps anyone, anywhere, if the scenario this book describes were to occur.

I told my mom what I was reading and she asked if it made me nervous. No, I live 1.5 miles from the White House. If a nuclear bomb is detonated, most likely I will be dead before anyone could hear it. Then again, I live in a basement, so perhaps I would live for a while crushed under the building. Or maybe I would be lucky and the force of the detonation would blow all of the buildings totally away and leave me with a view of the gray, fire-lit skies. Lucky enough to die imminently of radiation poisoning. Hm.

What makes me nervous is that everyone interviewed for the book knows that this situation doesn't work. Everyone. No one thinks it is a good idea for nuclear bombs to exist. At best they deter other people from using nuclear bombs. In a way, deterrence does less to guarantee that no one will ever use one, and more to guarantee that if anyone ever detonates one, everyone will detonate all that they have.

There are a few scenes in the book where leadership fret about what appears weak and strong following the detonation. That is to say, once where I am sitting right now ceases to exist and once what survivors of government and military there are sheltered in Raven Rock pondering the end of humanity and proportional response. I had to set the book down and think about this. Is anyone concerned about looking weak after taking an intercontinental ballistic missile to the cranium? I thought it sounded a little unrealistic. Then I got nervous because it sounds a little too realistic.

I am not sure what else to say about the book. The long and short of it is, if there's ever a mistake or madness that leads to a nuclear launch (let alone detonation), there's a good chance that no one will ever say anything ever again. Or see, hear, or think anything ever again. At least not after a few months for the few survivors to starve to death. They might think of a few things. One of them might be, “oops.”

But probably not.