A nuclear war is survivable

The rules and definitions: The Rules Which Thou Shalt Not Break: 1. No spamming, trolling, flaming, racism, hateful phrases, words, sentences, comments or posts. 2. No personal attacks towards the other debater. 3. No personal attacks towards any spectator, voter, commenter or any other user of www.debate.org The definitions of words: A) Nuclear war: In this case an all-out worldwide nuclear war. War which is being fought with nuclear weapons. B) Nuclear weapon: an explosive device whose destructive potential derives from the release of energy that accompanies the splitting or combining of atomic nuclei. C) Worldwide: Extending or spread throughout the world. And now, my case. An all-out worldwide nuclear war would be the worst catastrophe in history, a tragedy so huge it is difficult to comprehend. Even so, it would be far from the end of human life on earth. The dangers from nuclear weapons have been distorted and exaggerated, for varied reasons. These exaggerations have become demoralizing myths, believed by millions of Americans. Myth Number 1: Fallout radiation from a nuclear war would poison the air and all parts of the environment. It would kill everyone. (This is the demoralizing message of On the Beach and many similar pseudoscientific books and articles.) Facts: No. First of all, fallout doesn't "poison" anything. Fallout particles, which are created upon the detonation of a nuclear device, are tiny pieces of material which are radioactive. Yes, exposure to too much radiation will kill you, but the good news is that the radiation from fallout has a rapid half-life. After seven days from the initial blast, the radioactivity fallout gives away is only a very small portion of what it was initially. If the radiation is initially 100R/hr, after two weeks it would be only 1 R/hr because of rapid decay. Those who would have good shelter could come out after a couple of weeks and be perfectly fine. Sure, there may be some amounts of radiation around, but it won't kill you. "What about water and food?" you may be asking. Well, all you need to do is wash the fallout particles from any food and you will be 100% fine, because the radiation only does harm to living things. To make water safe to drink, you only need to filter the fallout from it. Myth #2: Myth: Fallout radiation penetrates everything; there is no escaping its deadly effects. Facts: Nope. The following is a list of how to decrease the amount of radiation by half: * Steel: 21 cm (0.7 feet) * Rock: 70-100 cm (2-3 ft) * Concrete: 66 cm (2.2 ft) * Earth/Wood: 2.6 m (8.8 ft) * Soil: 1 m (3.3 ft) * Ice: 2 m (6.6 ft) * Snow: 6 m (20-22 ft) If one would have two meters of concrete between himself and the fallout, the radiation would be decreased from 1 to 1/6. That would mean that if the amount of radiation would be 100 R/hr, the person inside would receive only 16 R/hr! Of course, this paired with the rapid decay of radiation would make it easy to survive. Myth #3: Myth: A heavy nuclear attack would set practically everything on fire, causing "firestorms" in cities that would exhaust the oxygen in the air. All shelter occupants would be killed by the intense heat. Facts: On a clear day, thermal pulses (heat radiation that travels at the speed of light) from an air burst can set fire to easily ignitable materials (such as window curtains, upholstery, dry newspaper, and dry grass) over about as large an area as is damaged by the blast. It can cause second-degree skin burns to exposed people who are as far as ten miles from a one-megaton (1 MT) explosion. (See Fig. 1.4.) (A 1-MT nuclear explosion is one that produces the same amount of energy as does one million tons of TNT.) If the weather is very clear and dry, the area of fire danger could be considerably larger. On a cloudy or smoggy day, however, particles in the air would absorb and scatter much of the heat radiation, and the area endangered by heat radiation from the fireball would be less than the area of severe blast damage. Myth #4: In the worst-hit parts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki where all buildings were demolished, everyone was killed by blast, radiation, or fire. Facts: In Nagasaki, some people survived uninjured who were far inside tunnel shelters built for conventional air raids and located as close as one-third mile from ground zero (the point directly below the explosion). This was true even though these long, large shelters lacked blast doors and were deep inside the zone within which all buildings were destroyed. (People far inside long, large, open shelters are better protected than are those inside small, open shelters.) Myth #5: Myth: Because some modern H-bombs are over 1000 times as powerful as the A-bomb that destroyed most of Hiroshima, these H-bombs are 1000 times as deadly and destructive. Facts: A nuclear weapon 1000 times as powerful as the one that blasted Hiroshima, if exploded under comparable conditions, produces equally serious blast damage to wood-frame houses over an area up to about 130 times as large, not 1000 times as large. Myth #6: Myth: A Russian nuclear attack on the United States would completely destroy all American cities. Facts: As long as Soviet leaders are rational they will continue to give first priority to knocking out our weapons and other military assets that can damage Russia and kill Russians. To explode enough nuclear weapons of any size to completely destroy American cities would be an irrational waste of warheads. The Soviets can make much better use of most of the warheads that would be required to completely destroy American cities; the majority of those warheads probably already are targeted to knock out our retaliatory missiles by being surface burst or near-surface burst on their hardened silos, located far from most cities and densely populated areas. Myth #7: Myth: So much food and water will be poisoned by fallout that people will starve and die even in fallout areas where there is enough food and water. Facts: If the falloutparticles do not become mixed with the parts of food that are eaten, no harm is done. Food and water in dust-tight containers are not contaminated by fallout radiation. Peeling fruits and vegetables removes essentially all fallout, as does removing the uppermost several inches of stored grain onto which fallout particles have fallen. Water from many sources -- such as deep wells and covered reservoirs, tanks, and containers -- would not be contaminated. Even water containing dissolved radioactive elements and compounds can be made safe for drinking by simply filtering it through earth. Myth #8: Myth: Overkill would result if all the U.S. and U.S.S.R, nuclear weapons were used meaning not only that the two superpowers have more than enough weapons to kill all of each other's people, but also that they have enough weapons to exterminate the human race. Book Page: 17 Facts: Statements that the U.S. and the Soviet Union have the power to kill the world's population several times over are based on misleading calculations. One such calculation is to multiply the deaths produced per kiloton exploded over Hiroshima or Nagasaki by an estimate of the number of kilotons in either side's arsenal. (A kiloton explosion is one that produces the same amount of energy as does 1000 tons of TNT.) The unstated assumption is that somehow the world's population could be gathered into circular crowds, each a few miles in diameter with a population density equal to downtown Hiroshima or Nagasaki, and then a small (Hiroshima-sized) weapon would be exploded over the center of each crowd. Other misleading calculations are based on exaggerations of the dangers from long-lasting radiation and other harmful effects of a nuclear war. My case: If a person has a good shelter with a high enough RPF (radiation protection factor), he can easily survive until the radiation level has decreased enough.