Effects of nuclear war as depicted by contemporary science

Contemporary science is the only medium that is able to give a non-biased view of what the post nuclear society will look like. Let us look at their estimates and see what are the effects of the nuclear war will look like and what society is going to gain from such an event.

Possible Causes and Effects of Nuclear Strikes

The first strikes in an all out nuclear war are going to destroy two types of targets. First and most obvious one is the major cities. These hostages of the nuclear powers present a potential target as at the primary stage of a nuclear conflict the governments will attempt to scare their opponents into submission. The best way to do this is to antagonise the citizens of the enemy country and their governments. A result of this would be that citizens will start making demands for their government to put a stop to the war. However, in an event of such crisis it is likely that the military will acquire a complete control and any notions of democracy will be abandoned. Secondary targets will be affected by the level of intelligence acquired by the nuclear powers. These will be the military targets per se, inevitably nuclear missile sites, but military installations as well, as the enemy countries will seek to deprive each other of nuclear capability. The combined effect of these strikes will lead to destruction of all major cities in the nuclear powers, thus changing the geopolitical balance. Leaders and part of the population of major world powers will take shelter in underground bunkers that were built at the time of the cold war only to emerge decades later.

Effects of a Nuclear War

Immediate effects of a nuclear explosion are blast, thermal radiation, and prompt ionising or nuclear radiation. The first thing effect is the intense flux of photons from the blast, which releases 70-80% of the bomb's energy. The next phenomenon is the supersonic blast front. The pressure front has the effect of blowing away anything in its path. After the front comes the overpressure phase. The pressure gradually dies off, and there is a negative overpressure phase, with a reversed blast wind. This reversal is due to air rushing back to fill the void left by the explosion. The air gradually returns to normal atmospheric pressure. Then come the middle term effects such as keloid formation and retinal blastoma. Genetic or hereditary damage can appear up to forty years after initial radiation.

The chief delayed effect is the creation of huge amounts of radioactive material with long lifetimes ranging from days to millennia. The primary source of these products is the debris left from fission reactions. A potentially significant secondary source is neutron capture by non-radioactive isotopes both within the bomb and in the outside environment. These radioactive products are most hazardous when they settle to the ground as "fallout". The rate at which fallout settles depends very strongly on the altitude at which the explosion occurs, and to a lesser extent on the size of the explosion.

The final effect of the nuclear war will be resulting nuclear winter. Numerous and immense fireballs caused by exploding nuclear warheads would ignite huge uncontrolled fires over any and all cities and forests that were within range of them. Great plumes of smoke, soot, and dust would be sent aloft from these fires, lifted to high altitudes where they could drift for weeks before dropping back or being washed out of the atmosphere onto the ground. These thick black clouds could block out all but a fraction of the Sun's light for a period as long as several weeks. Surface temperatures would plunge for a few weeks as a consequence, perhaps by as much as 11° to 22° C. The conditions of semidarkness, killing frosts, and subfreezing temperatures, combined with high doses of radiation from nuclear fallout, would interrupt plant photosynthesis and could thus destroy much of the Earth's vegetation and animal life.

Effects to Human Life

Initial blast is likely to be responsible for most of the death in the major cities. Resulting heat waves and radiation will further contribute to the loss of life, especially in the developed countries that are likely to become the primary target of the nuclear blasts. Destruction of industrial, medical, and transportation infrastructures along with food supplies and crops would trigger a massive death toll from starvation, exposure, and disease. Radiation is also likely to present danger to the people for centuries after the war. Finally extreme cold of nuclear winter along with initial destruction of much of the plant life by lack of sunshine would ensure that human population would be reduced to a fraction of its previous numbers.

Post Nuclear World

The damaging effects of the nuclear war are likely to lead to rearrangement of the structure of the society. For most parts the lack of resources will make sure that all notions of monetary system and as a result selfish capitalist society will be abandoned. Community spirit will be improved by decades of living within the nuclear shelters. Moreover, scientific development will progress as it is likely that the majority of scientists will be preserved by the governments for military purposes. However, it is also likely that governments will lose any justification for existence and as a result scientific development will be unheeded by any restraints. Likelihood of mutations caused by radiation will serve several purposes. In the face of larger difference between humans than at present all the racial problems will be abandoned. On the other hand the presence of mutants will enhance human race and advance it up the evolutional ladder. Finally in such conditions humanity would be unable to resist any moral implications of genetic research and will be able to reap all the benefits of conscious manipulation of human genes. In such conditions society will be able to take new step in the development of civilisation, which at the moment is at the stage of stagnation.