naraburns nihil supernum
2yr ago
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #2
This is a refreshed megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
During the early months of the Ukrainian War I got nuclear anxiety and assuaged it by reading a fair deal about modern nukes, and one thing that surprised me was that even the strategic nuclear weapons were tinier than I assumed. People are used to talking about "megatons" when talking about nukes, but even the biggest nuke in the current Russian nuclear arsenal is "only" 800 kilotons, with most being much smaller; they'd cause a huge amount of damage, to be sure, but compared to magazines using Tsar Bomba - a bomb that was only built and exploded once for flaunting purposes over 50 years ago - as their typical nuke for "What would happen if..." demonstrations, serves to show that the popular idea of nuclear weapons is hugely overblown.
I would guess that if Israel dropped a nuke on Gaza, it would create enough nuclear panic throughout the entire Israel - which is right next to Gaza, that's the whole point of this conflict - to create some major local reprecussions solely through that effect.
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Notes -
During the early months of the Ukrainian War I got nuclear anxiety and assuaged it by reading a fair deal about modern nukes, and one thing that surprised me was that even the strategic nuclear weapons were tinier than I assumed. People are used to talking about "megatons" when talking about nukes, but even the biggest nuke in the current Russian nuclear arsenal is "only" 800 kilotons, with most being much smaller; they'd cause a huge amount of damage, to be sure, but compared to magazines using Tsar Bomba - a bomb that was only built and exploded once for flaunting purposes over 50 years ago - as their typical nuke for "What would happen if..." demonstrations, serves to show that the popular idea of nuclear weapons is hugely overblown.
I would guess that if Israel dropped a nuke on Gaza, it would create enough nuclear panic throughout the entire Israel - which is right next to Gaza, that's the whole point of this conflict - to create some major local reprecussions solely through that effect.
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