The final switch: Goldsboro, 1961 (2013) | Hacker News Reader

The final switch: Goldsboro, 1961 (2013)

blog.nuclearsecrecy.com

23 points1970-01-0115 comments

Sometimes I wonder if things would have turned out better if the Manhattan project scientists had done their calculations about if the nuke would set fire to the atmosphere and discovered that it in fact would. At that point, you wouldn't do any nuclear weapons testing unless you wanted to run the risk of killing all humans, and I wonder if that would have completely stopped nuclear weapons development, as you could never test if they actually worked without significant risk.

I know that there are discussions about how the war in Japan would have ended if the US hadn't dropped the nukes on them, I've heard that it would save a lot of lives, and also that it would end a lot of lives, so I don't really feel like I know enough to weigh in on that discussion :/

> you wouldn't do any nuclear weapons testing unless you wanted to run the risk of killing all humans

My first guess would be that the scientists involved would look for creative ways to test while minimizing that risk. test underground or under water (if that would make a difference), test in space (when possible), test smaller yields, etc.

Humans go to extreme lengths to create world ending weapons, and we still do it despite this danger. Even if the danger is slightly less acute, we're developing biological weapons and dangerous pathogens that if release accidentally would still have a realistic chance to wipe out humanity.

I suppose doing it underwater would probably work, given that it isn't exposed to atmosphere. I'm not sure if smaller yields would help, since if larger yields have a higher chance of setting the atmosphere on fire, we've set off some pretty big bombs and AFAIK the margin for devastation was already not huge for Trinity (not an expert though)

The nuclear bombs were quite deadly to civilians compared to "traditional" firebombing-- Hiroshima alone had 2-3 times more victims than the extensive Tokyo firebombing campaign (200k-300k vs ~100k), despite the Tokyo area being much larger (=> >1M homeless).

But it is reasonable to assume that less starvation from a slightly earlier end of the war compensated for the higher lethality of nuclear bombs.

A potential land invasion (with lots of death Americans) is also often cited to "justify" the nukes, but I'd be careful with that argument because it is unclear that it would've been necessary (in a no-nuke timeline). The US post-war strategic bombing survey said on this: "it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated."

Do you not think that nuclear weapons were a significant net gain for conflict avoidance (keeping the cold war cold)?

Nuclear power also arguably saved lots of lives by avoiding fossil emissions/air pollution (probably significantly more than were killed in Hiroshima, Nagasaki and all nuclear accidents combined; https://www.giss.nasa.gov/pubs/abs/kh05000e.html estimates ~2M).

Personally, I'll gladly take a small risk of global nuclear war over a larger risk increase for a conventional WW3, but this might be a matter of taste...

Wasn't the cold war caused by both the US and the USSR stockpiling nuclear weapons, aggravated by the USSR putting nuclear weapons in cuba, etc? If there were no nuclear weapons, I think the cold war might have been even colder, since there was no threat of nuclear apocalypse.

Nuclear power doesn't rely on nuclear weapons. Sure, the chicago pile came out of the manhattan project, but nazi germany had already been experimenting with nuclear power, and Fermi had split the atom too. He didnt necessarily recognise what he had done correctly, but work into nuclear research was going on at the time, and I think nuclear power would have been invented without nuclear weapons

If there is no threat of nuclear escalation then Russian expansionism towards central and western Europe looks much more likely to me; basically a repeat of WW2, but starting with post-war Germany being annexed (like Czechoslovakia in WW2) and things continuing from there. It is unclear that the US would have been willing to sacrifice enough conventional materiel and soldiers to prevent this (stationing some nuclear missiles is very cheap by comparison).

The history of nuclear power was dominated by nation-states (instead of private investment). If the big incentive of enrichment ("supply chain safety for nuclear weapons") is taken away, I'm skeptical that enough capital flows into the whole technology to ever really make it worthwhile.

It seems pretty likely to me that nuclear power in 1980 ends up in a similar position as fusion power today, instead: Looking somewhat promising but very expensive and no one really wants to invest enough.

The notion that the bombings constituted an informed political decision intended to forestall an otherwise unavoidable invasion, and that Japan wasn’t ready to surrender is a complete retcon.[0] But a great example of how well Americans control the narrative—even eight decades after the fact. If anyone else did them they would be condemned as Great Crimes of History.

[0]: Truman didn’t order Hiroshima, and didn’t even know about Nagasaki. He did stop them after that.

Japan did not surrender after the Tokyo raid in March 1945 which killed more people than the individual bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki [0] and the emperor urged Japanese people to fight. Japan planned a full out defense of the 4 main islands, starting in Kyushu - operation Ketsugo [1].

The Emperor only changed its mind after the first atomic bomb drop on Hiroshima. The Big Six did not accept the American terns (Big Six wanted no invasion, wanted Japan to try its own war criminals, and wanted the Emperor to lead the country and answer to no-one). The Emperor gad to tell the council of Big Six that he already made up his mind to accept unconditional surrender and that he was going to tell Japan the very next day. Some military officers stormed the place trying to steal the radio recording of the Emperor. Army Minister Anami committed suicide because he could not bear to hear the radio address [2]

Japan military was geared to fight to the end on the main islands and dropping the atomic bombs was necessary to stop them. Dropping the bombs saved American lives, and maybe even some Japanese ones.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo#Operation_Mee...

[1] https://www.history.navy.mil/about-us/leadership/director/di...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korechika_Anami

> Japan did not surrender after the Tokyo raid in March 1945 which killed more people than the individual bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Wrong. Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed way more people than the Tokyo firebombing 250.000 and 110.000 vs 80.000), and needed only a single bomb on a single plane, compared to the massive efforts to destroy Tokyo.

Oh really? <s> I will believe you after you convince Wikipedia to fix the page i linked in my previous post </s>.

Snark aside, your total may be including victims of radiation that died months and years later. If so, these victims were not incorporated in the decision made by the Emperor 2 days later - because these deaths did not happen yet and were not foretold/expected. (And you should also adjust your posting).

I've rechecked, you were right.

Radiation deaths after the bombing were neglectable though. 3000 more cancer deaths, leukemia.

And to address your last phrase. I do not know what you mean by Truman did not order Hiroshima, and did not even know about Nagasaki.

But it should be clear that, while Truman delegated authority for picking up targets and dropping the bomb to military and State department, Truman along with the rest of his administration Sec of State Byrnes, Sec of War Stimson, Chief of Staff Gen. Marshall already decided the atomic bomb will be dropped on Japan. When Sec of State Byrnes explicitly warned the Japanese about "prompt and utter destruction" he meant exactly that. [0]

Dropping the bomb was done with Truman's approval.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potsdam_Declaration#Terms

This is an excerpt from "Always/Never" from Sandia.[1]

[1] https://newsreleases.sandia.gov/always_never/

(2013)

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