jkca1 wrote:
I understand that letting NK use nuclear weapons is not an option. If conventional weaponry can stop Kim I am all for it. However, I am not willing to let him develop longer range missiles and then see the west coast become a nuclear wasteland. I'm less than 100 miles from the Frisco. If Frisco goes the radiation could kill me and my family and on any given day we may be standing at ground zero. Anyone heard of nuke insurance?
"The latest North Korean nuclear test is estimated to have the explosive power of 20-30 kilotons — equivalent to 20,000 to 30,000 tons of TNT going off at once. That’s more than the 15- and 20-kiloton strength of the bombs the United States dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.
"First, there would be an explosion — a fireball roughly a third of a mile wide with temperatures equal to the surface of the sun. A blast wave would knock down most buildings within a half-mile of the explosion. A flash of thermal energy would burn exposed people within a mile of the detonation and temporarily blind those looking toward it. Up to several miles away from the detonation, there would be less severe damage, like shattered windows.
Then, there would be deadly radiation. Debris from the explosion would be sucked upwards into a giant mushroom cloud and then carried downwind. This would be the threat that concerns most of us: Falling particles the size of grains of sands sprinkling down across the Bay Area would emit gamma rays that could give people severe radiation poisoning.
The most dangerous zone would be 10 to 20 miles downwind of the explosion, while some fallout could occur 100 miles away or farther, depending on the magnitude of the explosion. (Communities upwind and far enough away from the explosion would escape relatively unharmed.)
Whoa, take a deep breath.
The USSR/Russia and Red Chinese have had thousands of nuclear warheads, some of them in the megaton range, aimed at the US for the past 50+ years. But they haven't used them. Why do you think N Korea would attack the US with a single (or even a dozen) nuclear warheads?
You might want to go with the "N Korea is bent on attacking the US with nuclear weapons even if this means national suicide for them!" argument. However, as bad as a nuclear attack by N Korea would be, they are not going to be turning the west coast into a nuclear wasteland. The Hiroshima bomb (15 kilotons) and Nagasaki bomb (21 kilotons) didn't turn southern Japan into a nuclear wasteland. The 100 above ground nuclear weapons tests (including a device with a 74 kiloton yield) that the US conducted 65 miles NW of Las Vegas, Nevada, didn't turn Las Vegas into a nuclear wasteland.
Relax, go ahead and get on with your life.
"Human existence is based upon two pillars: Compassion and knowledge. Compassion without knowledge is ineffective; Knowledge without compassion is inhuman." Victor Weisskopf.