The world political map was on fire after Russia violated the Ukrainian border and launched a military invasion into the country. While Ukraine and Russia are involved in an unending war, Ukraine is receiving military aid from NATO countries led by America. In the situation where the two world powers who inherit the largest number of nuclear weapons are facing each other in a raging war, there is an unprecedented fear of the possibility of a nuclear war. What is the fate that will happen in the end if the dawn of such an end happens is a topic that many people are discussing. Various professionals and authentic scholars are expressing their views on what will be the face of a nuclear war if there is a nuclear war.
Professor Max Tegmark, who studies artificial intelligence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), had managed to produce a computer simulation based on more accurate data. He and his team have used data from official sources and nuclear programs disclosed by states for this purpose. It brings to light the chain of events that will unfold if a nuclear war breaks out between Russia and America. You can watch it as a video on Future of Life Institute’s official YouTube channel.
Nuclear weapon targeting, missile trajectories, electromagnetic pulses and the spread of carbon dioxide rising from mass explosions have all come into focus here.
Once a nuclear war breaks out, it doesn’t matter who ‘fired the first shot’. This is because the other side will naturally have to retaliate in order to provide some protection. Here it is assumed that the first attack will be launched from the side of Russia.
About 10 minutes after the first few missiles were launched from Russia, the US immediately recognized it and immediately counterattacked. For this purpose, it is assumed that the ballistic missiles of American submarines located west of Norway will be used. In a few more minutes, Russian missiles flying over northern Canada will begin to land on American soil. The first few bursts will generate electromagnetic pulses of enormous power, damaging a wide range of electronic devices as well as grid power supplies. The electromagnetic pulse emitted will be as powerful as ten thousand volts per meter.
Subsequent attacks target military operations centers and missile launch facilities that potentially host an adversary’s nuclear weapons. For this, intercontinental ballistic missiles that can attack from one land to another will be used and it will take about half an hour to reach the destination.
Then the two countries attack the main cities of the opponent. With the aim of undermining their military bases. Also, it is a secondary objective to prevent the re-emergence of the related gangs during the post-war period.
According to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty signed by NATO member states, an attack on a member country should be considered as an attack by other member countries on all of them. In such a case, they are obliged to launch collective self-defense against the attacker. Among these countries, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and Turkey, the United States has retained its strategic nuclear weapons, while France and the United Kingdom have their own nuclear weapons. Therefore, it is assumed that Russia will attack the United Kingdom and France with the initial attack in order to prevent the counterattacks that will come from another direction.
Firestorms begin to blow through many North American and European cities. Strong winds will cause the fire to grow and spread, burning anything that is standing and melting glass and some metal structures. The tar on the roads quickly turns into a flammable liquid.
But the length and breadth of the nuclear weapons program does not end there. So far peer-reviewed studies have revealed that explosions, electromagnetic pulses and radioactivity are not the most dangerous steps in such a chain of events. What the world should fear most is the period of silence that will follow. It is then that the black thick carbon smoke caused by nuclear storms slowly spreads and nuclear winter occurs. This leads to the smoke rising from everything that is being destroyed mixing into the atmosphere.
The atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki also caused a firestorm. But Max points out that today’s hydrogen bombs are more powerful than the atomic bombs that were dropped back then, and the fate of such a bomb in a city like Moscow, which has fifty times the population of Hiroshima, would be terrifying. In such a case, there will be huge firestorms and smoke that will rise up to the stratosphere, which will wrap up the fate that Japan faced. Gradually heated by the sun, it remains above the threshold of rain clouds for many years. It covers most of the Northern Hemisphere due to the speed of the wind currents blowing from such a high altitude.
In such a case, the temperature on the earth drops due to the sunlight not falling properly. In this way, the dust that was thrown by an asteroid collision that happened 65 million years ago suffered the consequences of blocking the sunlight, and the dinosaurs that ruled the earth at that time.
Studies show that even in the summer of nuclear cooling, the temperature will drop by about 20 degrees Celsius. A recently published research paper indicates that about 5 billion people will die due to hunger during this season, even among the population who are able to survive the direct impact of nuclear explosions. Among them, 99% of the people living in the United States of America, Europe, Russia and China are considered to be among them, due to the fact that the countries affected by the attacks in the Northern Hemisphere will feel the greater impact of nuclear cooling. The main reason for this is the long-term disruption of agriculture due to the current recession.
No one can say with certainty how many people will die from a nuclear war and the nuclear cold that brings darkness to the world. But as Max Tegmark’s study shows, there will be no winner in such a war. In the end, the entire human race will have to accept defeat and embrace death.
Among the measures to be taken to prevent a nuclear war from happening someday, social awareness is also in an important place. Future of Life has also made a big contribution to this recently. With the aim of increasing the knowledge of the public about this and creating a good dialogue among the world leaders about the global actions, it c. Dr. 4 million research program has also been implemented.
The political and social environment for a nuclear war to explode has been building gradually for a long time. By educating the public, world leaders can be motivated to think carefully about the future even under such crisis situations.
