Top 100 means about half of all countries.
So many people having their fingers at the triggers. There would be many unreasonable and evil ones among them.
We would have nuclear war every year.
this post was submitted on 23 Mar 2025
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We would have nuclear war every year.
I suspect we'd only have it once.
I suggest to read about Hiroshima, and what really happened there, and afterwards.
Here's a good book: Hibakusha: Survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki https://a.co/d/8KS4RXC
One bomb kills people in a circle of 10 or 50 km (I forgot), and injures people maybe 100km around. Then it does damage to nature maybe even 1000 km around. I live 2000km from Chernobyl, and we had some warnings regarding vegetables for a year or so.
But the planet has a circumference of 40.000 km. Now let your thoughts run around the planet.
I live 2000km from Chernobyl
Chernobyl is not comparable to a nuclear bomb. Chernobyl is a reactor, made to release a steadily amount of radiations for years to make electricity.
Chernobyl irradiated a large area because the graphite that was located in the reactor core has burned, and the fumes have been carried by the wind, taking a lot of high-level activity nuclear waste hundred or thousands of kilometers away.
A bomb is way smaller than a reactor, and is designed to release most of its energy instantly to make the biggest explosion possible. That means a short burst of radioactivity very high level of radioactivity, with a very small half-life.
A few days after a bomb explodes, most of the radiations would have depleted.
a few days after a bomb explodes, most of the radiation would have depleted.
I know this is a settled fact, and supported by the fact that Japan had rebuilt both cities in under 6 years. But I wanted hard facts on this. Which, as it turns out, is really hard to find. I see a lot of reports basically echo what you said but nobody seems to have actually really measured this.
The best sources I found was this document from the which claims that soil radiation fell from 4.31 micro Curries per cm3 in hour 3, to just 0.23 half a day later, and 3.1x10(-5) 45 days later.
This site from the Japanese government claims that 24hrs after detonation the radiation at ground zero was 1/1000th of what it was immediately after.
Well, my point was really that, nowadays, a launch by anyone would likely result in other launches, leading to all out war and global catastrophe. I wasn't getting into the literal size of bomb impact areas vs global surface area.
leading to all out war and global catastrophe.
I doubt it.
Unlike your typical nice bar brawl, not everybody is actually that eager to get involved in an exchange of nukes, and alliances get sometimes weaker when the risks get higher.
I wasn't getting into the literal size of bomb impact areas vs global surface area.
Of course you are free to build your opinion on whatever speculation you like the most.
Did you know that a good share of all American nukes are mounted on short range missiles that can travel only 100 km or so? Some people were considering funny scenarios there...
Also, the bomb at Hiroshima was a relatively small one compared to what's available now I believe.
It depends on the systems of alliances and international commitments against a first strike. For instance, the Iran-Iraq War went on for several years and included the deployment of chemical weapons. I'm pretty sure that a nuclear exchange would be tolerated.
We would have nuclear war within a decade, as the odds of a country with nuclear weapons having a coup and some fanatics launching them for a wide variety of reasons is far higher when there are so many. Not to mention the increased odds of a country firing them off when invaded or to protect a friendly country that is invaded.
One day humanity would end because the president of Turkmenistan got into an argument with the president of Uzbekistan over where the imaginary line that separates the countries is drawn on maps.
Historically nukes have served as an effective deterrent to war, ironically. Given that very strong historical pattern, I'd assume the world would, overall, become a more peaceful and cooperative place thanks to mutually-assured destruction.
an effective deterrent to war
Do not fool yourself. Nukes have NOT achieved that on their own.
It has always been humans who were somewhat responsible and willing to communicate (diplomacy) instead of shooting blindly.
Vasily Arkhipov in 1962 and Stanislav Petrov in 1983 are usually credited as single-handedly preventing nuclear launches. If it wasn't for them, perhaps people wouldn't think that nuclear weapons are such a strong deterrent.
Perhaps in other timelines, the world ended. Maybe this is the 1% of timelines that survived.
Until one of them fires the nukes, that is. But sure, it might not happen
It's like paying your rent by playing Russian roulette
It's only happened twice in world history for a reason.
There are thousands of nukes in the world, but no one ever fires them. They make the world more peaceful, not more dangerous.
We've gotten very uncomfortably close to a nuclear exchange multiple times in history
The only reason it didn't happen is pure luck
One thing that would quickly start to happen is a lot of the smaller countries would either be forcefully taken over or be quieted down. Most countries have neighbours they do not share good relations with - and with nuclear armament - bigger of 2 could easily pose nuclear threat and have a much bigger say in their arguments. This could mean taking over contested/disputed lands or some kind of minearl deals being forcefully signed. Soon the total world country count would start to decrease purely because of this (annd would actually accelerate until a point where most countries would form coallitions with some nuclear power and sum total of power on both (or all sides in general) be roughly comparable such that no one poses a greater threat to another and not have an equal threat back at them.
a few dozen nukes make other military strength less important. an army of a few hundred soldiers could destroy a whole other country. so nations could focus on more important things.