jeff@rtech.ARPA (Jeff Lichtman) (03/03/85)
The Pentagon has just issued a report accepting as valid the nuclear winter theory. If the Soviets also find the theory valid, it will mean that current theories about deterrence will be out of date. If the leaders of an aggressive nation believed that they would destroy themselves by using enough of their own weapons, then they wouldn't use those weapons in large enough numbers to create this effect, even if they had them. Therefore, neither power would need to have a large arsenal of nuclear weapons to keep the other power from using theirs in large numbers. The nuclear winter theory says, more or less, that the smoke from the fires caused by a nuclear war would blot out the sun, thus causing the air temperatures around the world to drop by as much as 75 degrees Fahrenheit (24 degrees Celcius). My guess is that the nuclear weapons researchers in the US will concentrate on creating bombs that create a lot of blast and radiation relative to the amount of heat they produce. -- Jeff Lichtman at rtech (Relational Technology, Inc.) aka Swazoo Koolak