Hacker News Reader

HNHacker News

Top New Best Ask Show Jobs

Comment by c03 | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

c03·

However nice that sounds, that is unlikely to happen.

History shows that targeting civilians is by far the most effective to make the opposition concede.

View on HN

Sure, but isn't the problem "second strike": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_strike

With nukes, you gotta stop your nuclear armed opponent from killing you second, first.

With nuclear weapons you know that getting all enemy weapons is a slim chance. So you aim for maximum destruction of the enemy.

If I had to decide on targets I would go for max destruction in terms of lives. In the initial impact and in the long term. So the biggest cities, nuclear power plants, water supply, food production.

As said when usi g this option I don't expect my people to survive as well.

Well if you go for maximum number of lives instead of nukes, then the nuclear answer to russia will likely be so strong that it really doesn't matter.

> History shows that targeting civilians is by far the most effective to make the opposition concede.

Judging by how WW2 went, history seems to show the exact opposite.

A Nuclear exchange is not really to make the other side concede. Both sides know if they fire nukes the other side will respond in minutes with their own massive salvo. The initial strike is essentially to render as much of the enemies military ineffective especially their nukes. Surviving for a second strike is not a given. In the event of a nuclear strike I think both sides understand that there wont be very many people or leadership to concede. Hence the term Mutually Assured Destruction.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com