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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   19528 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 28, 2024

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Because, let's be real here: if WWIII happens, then dealing with SJ is not very hard. Half their voter base will literally die in a fire.

This is a common argument over at Jim's blog — that nuclear war will benefit the right because it's the big lefty cities that will go up in mushroom clouds, not the right-wing countryside. I've had a few objections to this; primarily, given what the competence crisis has done to our government's ability to maintain things — and particularly, the question of tritium production — I'm not sure our nukes will work, meaning I'd expect us to lose WWIII, and that will have serious negative consequences for us regardless of which side wins the internal political conflict.

More personally, I once found a website that let you see the blast radii for various nukes superimposed on a (Google-sourced) city map of your choice. And if your standard Russian or Chinese nuke got dropped on JBER — a reasonable target for either country in a WWIII scenario, especially the former — then I'm outside the "killed almost instantly in the blast" radius… and, unfortunately, inside the "die slowly after an agonizing hour or two from horrible burns down one side of your body" radius.

Russian Nukes are likely even worse- US nuclear maintenance might be skimped on or done by questionably competent people who overlook mechanical issues, but the commanders aren’t systematically stealing the budget for it. And China has a shortage of warheads to wipe out life in the U.S.

Moreover, nuclear targeting is not done on the basis of a list of largest cities in the enemy’s homeland, it’s done by targeting military and command installations and war critical infrastructure as well as strategic forces. A lot of that is pretty red, although admittedly DC and San Diego are not.

Moreover, nuclear targeting is not done on the basis of a list of largest cities in the enemy’s homeland, it’s done by targeting military and command installations and war critical infrastructure as well as strategic forces. A lot of that is pretty red, although admittedly DC and San Diego are not.

I'd expect both in actual practice; a lot of the point of a deterrent (short of the US/Russian lolhuge arsenals) is that you threaten to go countervalue in response to an attack out of spite, and it's likely that things going nuclear will be the result of a false alarm saying the other side's attempting alpha strike.

A full exchange of nuclear warheads will end the US as a political entity for at least decades and probably forever. If it reforms it will be much later. The current political situation will cease to matter at all to the survivors. Pretending this is not true is deeply silly.

In a scenario where Taiwan goes hot in the near future and the Chinese arsenal is deployed, I'd expect probably a few dozen mushroom clouds over the USA, due to destruction on the ground + ABM + other targets (Taiwan itself, Japan, South Korea, Australia, possibly others). The USA would probably survive, although things'd be tough for a while.

The Russian arsenal, assuming for the sake of argument that it works, is a different kettle of fish.

In a scenario where Taiwan goes hot in the near future

China is rapidly building up there arsenal. Taiwan won't go hot until they know they can slag the US as a going concern.

Well yes, right wing posadism remains stupid.

Although you aren't technically replying to me, I feel obliged to note yet again that Is =/= Ought. I have no clue why I keep having to spell this out, and in Rat spaces no less.

I am saying that SJ is, probabilistically, less of a problem because there's a fair chance nuclear war gets rid of it rendering most efforts to fight it moot. I am not saying that mass casualties from nuclear war are good because of this. The past couple of election cycles I've been begging all the parties to do anything about civil defence; I'd have been willing to vote for the Greens if they'd had word one about this.

"I know my thumb is broken and if I cut my whole arm off that will defiantly fix the problem" type thinking

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