We are all sitting on an atomic bomb: where do we want to go? A few numbers.
Because the problem is always the bar fight, the derby, the good guys against the bad guys. As soon as we come out of the delirium covid Vax against NoVax, cleverly concocted by who between the two quarrels made his pigs comfortable, here we are plunged into the upgrade of the crazy video game: Russia against Ukraine. Or is it better to say Russia versus USA? Or Russia against the rest of the world. And who is the bad guy? Is the information they are preparing for us correct? How many years do we have to go back to find out who started first? Has Putin fallen into a trap set up by dint of provocation and fraying of nerves, or is Putin the villain who now wants to destroy Ukraine and then conquer Europe and from there the rest of the world? US Zelensky puppet or poor unwitting victim?
Dear Italians, it no longer matters who started first, who will be armed more, who will be strategically better. The problem is that if this escalation continues to find out who has it longer, the rocket, no one will come out well. This short article is not to suggest a position, as already mentioned, they are not needed. It is only to provide some technical data about the game that we are superficially handling. And I'm not talking about tanks or homemade Molotov cocktails.
It should be recalled that Russia still has the largest number of nuclear weapons in the world today, even though it is far from the peaks of the Cold War. We are talking about 6400 total warheads, divided into 1600 strategic, and 4800 tactics. The United States has fewer (but still many) of them with 4018 nuclear warheads, of which 1365 are strategic and 2653 are tactics. The latter include the 90 B61 atomic bombs, detachable by F-16, Tornado and F-35 fighter / fighter bombers, stored in Italy in the bases of Aviano (Pordenone) and Ghedi (Brescia) and, as is known, also usable by the Air Force Italian military, on American orders, based on the concept of Nuclear Sharing, also extended to the air forces of Germany, Holland, Belgium and Turkey.
In the field of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), the Russians have a double advantage over the Americans. They have more diversified devices, which can be launched not only from fixed underground ramps, which are by their nature more vulnerable and of known location, but also from truck-mounted mobile ramps, always in motion and concealable anywhere, in bunkers, between buildings, in valleys or in boundless forests of the Siberian taiga.
Therefore not always detectable, as elusive as the SSBN submarines scattered in the oceans of the globe. In addition, some of them, the UR-100NUTTH missiles, are already equipped with Avangard hypersonic warheads, spacecraft with speeds of 33,000 km / h (Mach 27) which in the phase of reentry into the atmosphere are credited with evasive maneuvers to dodge the anti-missile defenses. . In hypersonic people, Americans are known to still lag behind, even compared to China. In addition, their standard ICBM, the Minuteman III, dates back to 1972, although updated several times, and is available only in fixed silos.
Its hypothetical successor, the missile of the GBSD (Ground Based Strategic Deterrent) program, for the construction of which the giant Northrop Grumman won a contract worth 13 billion dollars, will be ready no earlier than 2029. The Among other things, Russian nuclear forces held extensive launch exercises just last February 19, while the Americans tested the chain of command and readiness of their ICBMs with the January Global Lightning maneuvers.
In theory, the Russian leadership is well aware that an extended nuclear war is not an option and cannot really be won by anyone. On January 3, 2022, Russia, like the other four permanent powers of the UN Security Council, had also signed the joint declaration on the impossibility of nuclear war.
Putin's evocation of this threat should therefore be considered a stretch in the diplomatic messages that the powers are used to exchange. And Belarus' new readiness to host Russian nuclear weapons as a deterrent to US missile bases in Poland and Romania is also a sign of this kind. But it is important that both parties understand the messages correctly and not, perhaps assuming erroneously that one is preparing a "first blow" against the other. What is certain is that the events of these days, a consequence of negligence, bad faith and misunderstandings that have continued since the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991, seem to represent the showdown of an entire thirty years.
Trailer of the film Doctor Strangelove. That is how I learned not to worry and to love the bomb.
True protagonist of this extraordinary film, the "End of the World" bomb (as the Russian ambassador macaronically defines it) has a peculiar characteristic that perhaps US intelligence has not properly examined: in fact, it cannot in any way be stopped. Once the war mechanism has been set in motion, there is no hand – neither human nor divine – capable of resetting the timer and backing off. Stanley Kubrick (1964)
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The article We are all sitting on an atomic bomb: where do we want to go? A few numbers. comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/siam-tutti-seduti-su-unatomica-dove-vogliamo-andare-a-parare-qualche-numero/ on Tue, 01 Mar 2022 14:56:02 +0000.