Shall We Play A Game? Goodbye Cruel World - Let’s Play Global Thermonuclear War

Assessing U.S. Options for the Future of the ICBM Force One of the most salient issues that surfaced in this study is the projected medium-term increase in the vulnerability of silo-based ICBMs to attack by precision conventional weapons.
Since the first nuclear test on 15 July 1945, there have been over 2,051 other nuclear weapons tests around the world. Within 20 years, the US and USSR tested nuclear weapons larger than 10 megatons, or 10 million tons of TNT. For scale, these weapons were at least 500 times as strong as the first atomic bomb. To put the size of history's largest nuclear blasts to scale, we have used real A-Bomb and H-Bombs for real visualizing the terrifying real-world impact of a nuclear explosion in this video.

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Conversations about War Games these days tend to focus on things like how ridiculous the idea of a kid hacking into NORAD’s weapon systems is, or the old-school gadgets and hardware, or how it’s dated because of the Cold War stuff, or any number of ultimately superficial and/or misremembered details. This is the problem with movies we haven’t seen in 20 years. This is why re-watching them is great, because it leads to pleasant surprises like War Games still being awesome.

Really, though, it’s War Games. The reason we remembered it being awesome is because it is. It wears its age remarkably well for a movie of its type and era, and is the rare Cold War movie that isn’t heavily reliant on archaic context for dramatic resonance. This is because it’s not a movie about the Other, as so many Cold War movies were about The Commies. War Games is about personal maturity, realizing that yeah, maybe you shouldn’t just hack into any computer because you can; yeah, maybe just because life is transient doesn’t mean letting Earth get nuked to glass is a good idea; and yeah, sometimes the only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess?

Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees, or of the U.S. Department of Defense.

SUMMARY
Our task was to consider the relative risks and benefits of options for the future U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) force. Our task was not to assess whether the United States should deploy ICBMs at all or change its nuclear strategy and doctrine.

In our work, we engaged former officials from Democratic and Republican administrations, nuclear policy specialists from universities and defense and arms control think tanks, and senior military officers, as well as other representatives of combatant commands and the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

The current policy, established following a 2014 Analysis of Alternatives (AOA), is to replace the Minuteman III system with a new Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) system, now named the LGM-35A Sentinel. Some observers, including members of Congress, have urged reassessing whether deterrence and other requirements could be met more cost-effectively by extending the life of the current Minuteman III missiles and their supporting infrastructure. Department of Defense (DOD) officials note that upgrades that otherwise would have been necessary to sustain the Minuteman III system to 2043 were not undertaken once the decision was made in 2015 to proceed with GBSD. Therefore, they insist, there is no realistic option today to pursue a life extension program for Minuteman III missiles beyond 2030, when they are due to be replaced by GBSD. Although we received considerable data from DOD officials on these topics, the iterative process through which we received information, the unclassified nature of our study, and the limited time available for investigating DOD conclusions left us unable to assess the DOD’s position regarding the technical and cost feasibility of an extended Minuteman III alternative to GBSD. To strengthen public confidence in its decisionmaking on the future ICBM, we believe the DOD should commission an independent, classified technical study (with an unclassified version) to address outstanding questions relating to the options and timelines in the 2014 Analysis of Alternatives, cost estimates, procurement decisions, and adversary threats to future silo-based ICBMs.

One of the most salient issues that surfaced in our study is the projected medium-term increase in the vulnerability of silo-based ICBMs to attack by precision conventional weapons. A non-nuclear attack on U.S. nuclear-armed ICBMs would confront the president with the choice of initiating in response what could be a large-scale nuclear attack on adversary homelands (either by launching U.S. ICBMs before they were destroyed or by using other nuclear forces). This threat is likely to materialize well before the notional GBSD service life expiration in 2075. We believe this issue deserves more debate, as it may raise questions about the declining strategic value of a long-term commitment to silo-based nuclear-armed ICBMs inherent in the decision to proceed with GBSD. Our discussions and research also explored issues that senior leaders, including the president, should consider regarding any silo-based ICBM system that the United States would deploy, today and in the future. These include allocating forces to simultaneously deter Russia (possibly in the absence of nuclear arms control, if occurring after the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or New START, expires in 2026) and a more nuclear-capable China from escalating regional conflicts; confronting possible risks posed by ICBMs overflying Russia to target China; building allies’ confidence in U.S. extended nuclear deterrence; mitigating risks of launch under attack scenarios; and facilitating the negotiation of verifiable nuclear arms control agreements with Russia and China.

Consideration of these challenges and issues will be especially important in fashioning the Employment Guidance that will follow from the Nuclear Posture Review.

PREFACE
Our task was to consider the relative risks and benefits of options for the future U.S. ICBM force. It was not our task to assess whether the United States should deploy ICBMs at all or change its nuclear strategy and doctrine.

Recognizing that after the completion of an Analysis of Alternatives in 2014 the government decided to retire Minuteman III ICBMs and to deploy GBSD ICBMs as the ground leg of the triad, we asked three questions:

Are there viable ICBM alternatives to continuing the GBSD program, including options for extending the service lives of Minuteman III ICBMs?
Have any new factors arisen since 2014 that should lead to reconsideration of a fifty-year commitment to the GBSD program?
What questions or concerns regarding silo-based ICBMs in general should be presented to the president rather than be resolved at lower levels without his awareness? (Presidential consideration of these issues can and should inform the Employment Guidance that the administration will prepare.)
To address the study questions in the limited duration of this project, we convened former officials from Democratic and Republican administrations and nuclear policy specialists from universities and defense and arms control think tanks to join with senior military officers and other representatives of Commands and the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) for three discussions of ICBM alternatives. These meetings included a briefing on the GBSD program by a senior Air Force official and a sustained question-and-answer session with him and senior military and OSD officials. The discussions were open-ended, substantive, and respectful in ways that several participants noted have become rare on these issues. We informed and backed up these discussions with a review of many government, think tank, and scholarly reports on ICBM alternatives. We also posed questions by email to Department of Defense officials, who provided substantive and detailed answers in several iterations.

Ultimately, the lack of classified information, technical and construction expertise, and time precluded us from conducting a detailed assessment of the feasibility or cost of alternative ICBM options. Whenever we sought to clarify what was or was not assessed in the 2014 Analysis of Alternatives, or to suggest that earlier studies indicated that Minuteman III and supporting infrastructure could be updated at costs similar to those of GBSD, the DOD provided information and/or argumentation that the ensuing eight years have rendered life extension of the missile and its supporting infrastructure nearly impossible and certainly not cost competitive. The information and argumentation we received were plausible, but given the limitations of the study we could not be confident in the fullness and conclusiveness of what we were presented. Much has changed since the 2014 AOA; perhaps there were options then that ought to have been given greater consideration but instead were ruled out. A new AOA conducted today would start with a different baseline, and it is not clear whether any Minuteman III life extension program is technically feasible or cost effective at this point. Even if it would not alter the decision to proceed with GBSD, we believe for future stewardship of the nuclear weapons enterprise there is a public interest in better understanding the decisionmaking process regarding the ICBM program from 2014 onward; a technical expert body would be necessary to conduct such a classified study and produce an unclassified report on it. In any case, comparison of weapons system alternatives involves trade-offs between estimated benefits and risks for deterrence, conflict and escalation management if deterrence fails, assurance for allies, and stability provided by arms control arrangements. Presidential guidance establishes the framework for making these trade-offs. There are also differences in cost that have implications for public spending and associated contractor profits, which affect decisionmaking calculations. A group as varied in its approaches to nuclear policy as the one we assembled would be unable to agree on how to measure and prioritize benefits and risks, especially with the information available.

THE DOD SEES NO FEASIBLE ICBM ALTERNATIVES NOW TO GBSD
There are reasons to prefer a less vulnerable basing mode than silos drilled into flat ground, but none of the workshop participants suggested that it was politically or economically feasible to make the ICBM force mobile beginning in 2029 when existing ICBMs are due to begin replacement. There was even less interest in exploring whether the technical and financial feasibility of deep underground (mountainous) deployment has improved to the point of deserving serious study and consideration. Thus, the practical choice facing successive administrations has been GBSD or Minuteman III life-extended in some form. Instead of pursuing a new ICBM, one could imagine the use of a common missile that meets both Air Force and Navy safety requirements, but no such missile exists. According to Department of Defense officials, the deployment of Trident D5 missiles in silos was considered in “precursor” activities to the 2014 Analysis of Alternatives. They further informed us that this approach was rejected because “the use of D5 motors would create a need for costly infrastructure modifications and missile design changes to meet more stringent hazard classification requirements” (among other reasons). Several workshop participants also noted that even if the Trident D5 missile could affordably be made to operate safely from silos, doing so would stake a large majority of the United States’ deployed strategic warheads on one missile system. If a systemic technical problem arose with the Trident D5 missile, it could seriously undermine nuclear deterrence.1

The 2014 Analysis of Alternatives considered options for maintaining a force of up to 450 ICBMs through 2075. (The United States currently deploys 400 ICBMs, but there was, and still is, a military requirement to generate up to 450 missiles.) The projected lifespan of the Minuteman III ICBM system and the challenges and costs of further extending its life was a primary consideration driving the analysis.

The Department of Defense informed us that it assessed, during the Analysis of Alternatives, that “there were only enough missile casings ([for the Minuteman] III) to support the ICBM force through” the “2043 time frame.” After 2043, the number of ICBMs would fall below “required levels” unless “a booster similar to GBSD assessed options” was introduced.

In our communications, the Department of Defense did not enumerate all the assumptions, including about the rate of missile testing, underlying these estimates. Nor did it describe the precise alternatives and timeframes pertaining to Minuteman III extension considered in the Analysis of Alternatives (which remains a classified document).

In a series of communications with the DOD, we sought to understand whether there might exist options today to extend the life of the Minuteman III system for some limited period. The information we received from the DOD was surprisingly detailed in some instances, yet piecemeal and vague in others. Given the lack of clarity on some issues and timelines involved with replacement or refurbishment of certain Minuteman III system components, as well as the time and information constraints governing this study, we were not able to assess the potential for a Minuteman III extension. A technically informed, classified study of sufficient duration would be needed.

In our workshops and in subsequent communications, the DOD view was clearly expressed: there is no alternative to GBSD today involving life extension of Minuteman III. According to DOD officials:

The 2043 date [for the service life of Minuteman III missile casings] identified in the AOA is no longer correct. The Minuteman III weapon system as a whole is not affordably sustainable beyond 2030 because of attrition, limited availability of spare components, and a constrained industrial base to support 50+ year-old technology. The decision to forgo extending the service life of the Minuteman III system was made in 2014. Efforts to life-extend would have needed to begin in 2015 to meet various end of life component needs. Based on DOD’s decision to pursue GBSD, only critical Minuteman III sustainment programs were executed to keep Minuteman III viable until the GBSD system reaches full operational capability.

Notably, among the challenges to a Minuteman III life extension program today, the DOD cited engineering assessments showing that due to the material removed from missing casings during the wash-out process, as many as 50 percent of the casings would become unserviceable. Thus, according to the DOD, there is no ICBM alternative to GBSD at this point and “a decision to switch to a life extension of the Minuteman III system now would not meet projected military requirements.”

In addition to issues of service life, the Department of Defense stated to us that GBSD would provide greater capability than Minuteman III in terms of “accuracy, probability-to-penetrate, range/payload, targeting flexibility, nuclear safety, and physical and cyber security.” The Department of Defense further argued that these capabilities were needed to meet U.S. Strategic Command’s requirements and that GBSD would be more “cost effective” than the Minuteman III life extension alternative.

Desired or required military capabilities are an obviously key variable in assessing GBSD and any alternative. As adversary counter-capabilities improve with time, U.S. capabilities may need to improve just to retain their prior net effectiveness.

In the workshops, various participants expressed concern about future developments in Chinese and Russian missile defenses. They argued that GBSD’s enhanced capabilities are needed to ensure the United States’ continued ability to penetrate these defenses. Other participants expressed doubt that Chinese or Russian missile defenses could plausibly be developed to the point where they significantly undermined the effectiveness of Minuteman III (which was designed to carry three warheads, but is only loaded with one, and so can presumably accommodate various countermeasures). We could not assess this issue on the basis of unclassified information and believe it would be helpful for the Department of Defense to explain its concerns about foreign ballistic missile defense developments in more depth.2 Another argument offered to support GBSD is that it would allow the United States to increase its ICBM force beyond 450 deployed missiles, silo-based or potentially mobile, if a decision is made to exceed the current cap. Such an expansion could be motivated by the large buildup in China’s nuclear forces—the Department of Defense assesses that China “likely intends to have at least 1,000 warheads by 2030”—or by an expansion of Russian forces following the expiration of New START.3 (The marginal cost of deploying more silo-based ICBMs would increase significantly beyond 450, however, because of the need to build new silos.)

To the extent that China’s growing ICBM force intensifies the United States’ interest in a more capable ICBM—namely GBSD—some workshop participants expressed concern that ICBMs launched from existing U.S. bases toward targets in China must fly over Russia, which could create the risk of inadvertent escalation. China’s ICBMs also would fly over Russia en route to their targets in the United States. But Russia, for political and technical reasons, would be much less likely to react dangerously to a Chinese overflight than an American one. We discuss this issue in more depth later in this paper. Here we note that the overflight issue raises the requirements question, which asks how many targets in China, if any, could be destroyed with sufficient reliability only by GBSD and not D5 (or future replacement) sea-launched ballistic missiles launched from U.S. submarines.

Ultimately, whether or not it is possible to further life-extend Minuteman III to some intermediate date, if a presidential determination deems capabilities beyond those of Minuteman III are necessary, and that GBSD will provide those capabilities, then it is clear to us that there is no ICBM alternative other than GBSD.

That there remain questions about the feasibility and desirability to sustain the Minuteman III system as a GBSD alternative—including legislation submitted by some members of Congress directing the DOD to carry out an independent study of these issues—is an indication that during and subsequent to the 2014 Analysis of Alternatives, the DOD could have done more to improve public confidence in its ICBM procurement process and decisionmaking. In our view, and in light of questions raised in this paper, the DOD could perform an important public service by commissioning an independent, classified study of the data and argumentation that informed the 2014 Analysis of Alternatives and subsequent deliberations of the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations on options for the ICBM force. Among pertinent questions to explore are:

What number of missiles was posited as necessary over time for deployment, testing, and spares? On what evidence were the posited requirements based?
On what basis was the time horizon established for maintaining the given ICBMs, and how well does this basis withstand scrutiny?
How comparable (in terms of categories of expenditure) were proffered cost estimates of the alternatives?
What plausible changes in adversary threats to silo-based ICBMs were considered?
No nuclear weapon system comes without policy and/or technical challenges and trade-offs. Regardless of the answers to these questions, the deterrence provided by GBSD or any other silo-based ICBM comes with questions, challenges, and potential risks. The next section explores whether the potential vulnerability of silo-based ICBMs to non-nuclear threats may diminish the strategic value of GBSD well before it reaches its nominal end of service life in 2075. (Other questions, challenges, and potential risks would come with a decision to either pursue nonfixed basing modes or to eliminate ICBMs or any other leg of the nuclear triad.)

FUTURE VULNERABILITY TO CONVENTIONALLY ARMED WEAPONS
Developments in long-range non-nuclear weapons—particularly hypersonic boost-glide missiles—could plausibly enable Russia or China to threaten U.S. ICBMs in silos with a non-nuclear attack in the next couple of decades. While conducting such an attack would be exceedingly risky and imaginable only to stave off an existential defeat, it would be less risky than using nuclear weapons against U.S. ICBMs—a threat deemed sufficiently credible to factor into U.S. planning. What implications does this potential change portend for U.S. deterrence strategy and force posture choices, including continued basing of ICBMs in silos?

A non-nuclear attack on U.S. nuclear-armed ICBMs would confront the president with the choice of initiating in response a nuclear attack on the adversary homelands (either by launching U.S. ICBMs before they were destroyed or by using other nuclear forces). This nuclear first use would in turn be likely to prompt the adversary to launch nuclear strikes against the United States. A major objective of deterrence strategy, and indeed nuclear war planning, is to put the burden of catastrophic escalation on the adversary with the view that a rational adversary will choose not to escalate. If conventional threats to silo-based U.S. nuclear forces materialized, the United States would more likely be the actor deterred from initiating nuclear exchanges against homelands. Presumably, the United States would have similar, if not superior, capacity to target adversary silos with non-nuclear weapons, but such a capability would not obviate the problems caused by the vulnerability of U.S. nuclear-armed ICBM silos. Here, skeptics ask why non-nuclear threats to U.S. ICBMs should pose a major challenge to deterrence when Russian leaders constantly stress their fear of U.S. conventional attack on their silos and assert that such attacks would draw a nuclear response.

There is much to debate under this heading—which is exactly the point. U.S. leaders should consider the possibility that silos could become vulnerable to non-nuclear attack long before 2075 (the planned end date of GBSD). Would it be strategically rational, legal, and credible to initiate nuclear exchanges against the Russian and, through reciprocation, U.S. homelands in response to non-nuclear attacks against silos in remotely populated areas? Would it be feasible and cost effective to adapt GBSD missiles to serve in a mobile basing mode? (We heard contradictory statements from different government officials about this.) Or, if mobility is not feasible for political and/or economic reasons, or if it is insufficient to avoid Russian or Chinese detection and targeting, would vulnerability to conventional strikes argue for eliminating nuclear-armed ICBMs? If so, this would seem to argue for reconsidering the long-term commitment to silo-based ICBMs inherent in the decision to proceed with GBSD.

FURTHER FACTORS FOR HIGH-LEVEL CONSIDERATION
Deterrence and allied reassurance in the security environment of today and the projected future militate for retaining ICBMs. For political and economic reasons, ICBMs are likely to remain deployed in silos for the near term, at least. As the Biden administration proceeds to develop its Employment Guidance, it would bolster national and international security by fully considering the following factors in making policies regarding the future of the U.S. ICBM force.

ICBMS OVERFLYING RUSSIA TO TARGET CHINA
China’s rapid buildup of nuclear forces and other military capabilities is frequently cited as necessitating procurement of GBSD with its greater capabilities than Minuteman III. However, to hit targets in China from current U.S. bases, both Minuteman III and GBSD ICBMs would need to fly north and over Russia. Some participants in our study averred that U.S.-Russian tensions would likely be extremely high during an escalating U.S.-China war; human or technical error could cause the Russian system to wrongly conclude that the missiles’ aimpoints were in Russia or that the United States was planning to disrupt Russia’s early-warning system through high-altitude nuclear explosions over Russia.4 Either misperception could lead to Russia launching a nuclear attack on the United States.

Some participants argued that these risks are overstated. They argued that U.S. officials could and would alert Russian leaders of impending overflight. These and other participants suggested that Russia’s early-warning system would identify from their trajectories that the ICBMs were flying toward targets in China, thus corroborating U.S. messages to Russian officials. Other experts have argued that the United States would not need or choose to use ICBMs against China, so the overflight problem is not real. The role of GBSD and its added capabilities could be confined to deterring Russia, giving the United States more confidence that it could rely on submarine- or air-launched nuclear weapons to contend with China in a sequential two-war scenario.

Neither our discussions nor the extant public literature indicates that the Russia overflight issue has been sufficiently worked through. We submit that in developing the Employment Guidance, the president should request a fuller analysis of the issue and alternatives for addressing it.

BENEFITS AND RISKS OF LAUNCH UNDER ATTACK
The United States retains options to launch silo-based nuclear weapons minutes after detecting an incoming attack. The primary purpose of this policy is to convince Russian (and, in the future, Chinese) leaders that they cannot destroy a significant fraction of the U.S. nuclear arsenal in a first strike and that attempting to do so would most likely lead the United States to use those weapons against opposing nuclear forces and related infrastructure, which could leave the adversary worse off than the United States for having started such an exchange.

A number of prominent defense experts argue that the possibility of the United States’ launching a massive nuclear attack based on a mistaken warning of an incoming attack, or on an unprepared president’s misjudgment in the extreme pressure of the fifteen-minute window for a decision, is significant enough that an official launch under attack (LUA) protocol should be foresworn. In our workshops, Department of Defense officials argued that the risks of mistaken warning leading to a launch of U.S. ICBMs are greatly exaggerated. The technologies, procedures, and personnel training involved in detecting and assessing launches of adversary attack are designed to prevent one component or person from making an error that could lead to a mistaken or inadvertent launch; the total system is extremely reliable, they argued.

Contextual considerations reduce the risk further, they said. It is extremely unlikely that Russia (or another adversary) would launch an attack against the U.S. ICBM force except in a major conflict in which U.S. military forces have been engaged and the nuclear force generated. In this scenario, a Russian attack on U.S. ICBMs could not negate massive U.S. nuclear retaliation by the generated submarine- and bomber-based forces, so Russian leaders would not be expected to order such an attack. A U.S. president who did receive warning of an attack would not be pressed to launch the ICBM force because he or she would be confident that already-generated U.S. nuclear forces would survive and be able to inflict unacceptable damage. Conversely, if the United States received warning of an adversary attack on U.S. ICBMs in a non-crisis, non-conflict context, as has occurred previously, military and civilians throughout the system, including in the White House, would be primed to suspect that the warning is somehow mistaken.

There is no way for independent observers to evaluate these assertions one way or the other. That said, given the consequences of a large-scale nuclear launch, the president should consider two potential safeguards to bolster confidence that the risks of LUA are exaggerated.

First, as a matter of policy, if the president (or a designated successor) is presented with one or more options for nuclear employment, he or she should also be presented with a “no immediate nuclear response” option. (Non-use is always a default option for the president; the idea here is to make it an explicit, active option.)

Second, more attention should be given to preparing presidents and their senior advisers for potential nuclear employment decisions, especially LUA. To be fair, these individuals are extraordinarily busy, nuclear employment decisions may seem exceedingly remote to them, and the national security bureaucracy cannot force them to engage. Nonetheless, a nuclear employment decision—especially a large-scale launch—is the most fateful decision a president, who has sole authority, could make.

As part of the process of presidential engagement with a Nuclear Posture Review, therefore, the value of exercises should be explained. Given all the expense and care that go into trying to ensure that U.S. nuclear weapons and command-and-control systems function flawlessly and to train the military personnel who conduct nuclear missions, it seems unwise, if not irresponsible, that U.S. presidents and their senior advisers do not participate in realistic exercises. The president should agree to observe exercises that practice nuclear employment decision making in realistic conditions, including in scenarios in which an incoming attack against the U.S. ICBM force is detected. In such nation- and humanity-threatening scenarios, decision making time would be severely compressed and some favored advisers might not be available. Psychologically, this is another reason why the options presented to presidents should include “no immediate nuclear response.”

The Effects of a Global Thermonuclear War 4th edition: escalation in 1988

INTRODUCTION: The following is an approximate description of the effects of a global nuclear war. For the purposes of illustration it is assumed that a war resulted in mid-1988 from military conflict between the Warsaw Pact and NATO. This is in some ways a worst-case scenario (total numbers of strategic warheads deployed by the superpowers peaked about this time; the scenario implies a greater level of military readiness; and impact on global climate and crop yields are greatest for a war in August). Some details, such as the time of attack, the events leading to war, and the winds affecting fallout patterns, are only meant to be illustrative. This applies also to the global geopolitical aftermath, which represents the author's efforts at intelligent speculation.
There is much public misconception concerning the physical effects of nuclear war--some of it motivated by politics. Certainly the predictions described here are uncertain: for example, casualty figures in the U.S. are accurate perhaps to within 30% for the first few days, but the number of survivors in the U.S. after one year could differ from these figures by as much as a factor of four. Nonetheless, there is no reasonable basis for expecting results radically different from this description--for example, there is no scientific basis for expecting the extinction of the human species. Note that the most severe predictions concerning nuclear winter have now been evaluated and discounted by most of the scientific community.

Sources supplying the basis for this description include the U.S. Defense Nuclear Agency manual on nuclear weapon effects, scientific papers describing computer simulations of long-term effects published by groups ranging from the U.S. government to left-leaning scientific organizations, and research by a similar variety of groups on weapons characteristics and strategy.

1 July 1988: Gorbachev is killed when his plane is attacked by a Stinger surface-to-air missile in East Germany; military heads take control in Moscow, accuse the CIA of responsibility for the assassination, impose a news blackout in the U.S.S.R., and send troops to East Germany and Poland to impose martial law.

15 July 1988: West Germans propose intervention in East Germany following reports of violence there; clashes occur along the border between the two Germanys; NATO puts its forces in West Germany on alert.

19 July 1988: A massive Soviet invasion of West Germany begins: NATO airfields are attacked by missiles with chemical warheads as tanks pour across the border. U.S. nuclear forces are put on alert: Bergstrom Air Force Base (AFB) near Austin receives 4 B-52 bombers dispersed from their home base.

31 July 1988: With Soviet forces 200 kilometers (km) (120 miles) inside northern West Germany, NATO issues a vague ultimatum to the U.S.S.R.

1 August 1988: NATO nuclear weapon depots are attacked by conventional and chemical weapons; ongoing naval combat claims a Soviet ballistic missile submarine in the Arctic Ocean.

4 August 1988: NATO threatens the use of tactical nuclear weapons against Soviet forces advancing towards urban areas in western West Germany.

6:00 AM CDT 5 August 1988: Soviet attacks begin against U.S. military satellites: two ground-based laser facilities are used to disable intelligence satellites in low Earth orbit and damage or harass sensors on those in higher orbits. "Killer" satellites are launched and will reach target satellites over the next few hours. Some of the Soviet civilian population is being moved to bomb shelters, subway tunnels, and out of cities. In West Germany invading Soviet forces launch some tactical nuclear weapons against NATO forces.

10:00 AM CDT 5 August 1988: NATO forces begin launching tactical nuclear weapons against Soviet forces in West Germany and bases in East Germany. North Korea invades South Korea while launching chemical weapon strikes against U.S. and South Korean forces.

12:00 noon CDT 5 August 1988: Nuclear hostilities on a global scale begin as the U.S.S.R. launches a preemptive strike. Over 1,000 Soviet missiles--carrying 5,400 warheads--are launched as a counterforce strike against the U.S. and its NATO allies.

Current population figures are: Rio Grande Valley--690,000; Travis County--550,000; Texas--16,800,000; the United States--245,000,000; the world--5,150,000,000.

12:05 PM CDT: Nuclear weapons are detonated aboard several Soviet satellites in low Earth orbit over the U.S. and other areas, generating electromagnetic pulses (EMP). This devastates electronics in these areas. Most unhardened computers and related equipment are rendered useless, destroying communication, information, and power supply networks on a nationwide scale. Transportation vehicles using electronics are inoperable. Many satellites are disabled. While few human casualties have occurred so far, much of the civilian elements of a continent-spanning society are devastated. For most American civilians this is the only warning of the coming attack they will receive: no effective civil defense program exists.

U.S. strategic bombers begin leaving their bases. This includes 25 B-52s and 5 B-1Bs in Texas, with four of these B-52s leaving Bergstrom AFB near Austin. These 30 bombers are carrying 400 nuclear bombs and missiles.

12:10 PM CDT: NATO missiles in Europe (U.S., British, and French weapons) are launched against Warsaw Pact targets. This includes U.S. Pershing II and Gryphon missiles, most of which were not yet retired under the INF treaty.

Soviet submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) warheads begin reaching targets in Texas and other parts of the U.S. Over the next 15 minutes 55 SLBM warheads succeed in reaching targets in Texas out of 74 launched (the rest were on missiles that malfunctioned early in flight). In Travis County, a 1.5-megaton (1 mt equals the explosive energy of 1,000,000 tons of TNT) warhead detonates 2.5 km (1.5 miles) over Bergstrom AFB. Over the next few minutes ten warheads, each between 200 kilotons and 500 kilotons (1,000 kt equals 1 mt) detonate over Bergstrom and in a pattern extending 100 km (60 miles) to the north, west, and east--this in an attempt to destroy the four escaping bombers.

Each explosion produces a fireball which radiates intense light (flash) for about 10 seconds: all exposed combustible material ignites up to ranges of 3 to 9 km (2 to 5.5 miles); second degree burns to exposed skin and fires are produced up to 6.5 to 18.5 km (4 to 11.5 miles) away. The atmospheric shock wave (blast) from each explosion causes partial or complete destruction of all buildings within 1.5 to 4.5 km (1 to 3 miles) and causes moderate damage and 50% injuries or deaths at 5.5 to 15 km (3.5 to 9.5 miles) in the 10 to 40 seconds following detonation. (These figures represent the variation among 200-kt to 1.5-mt warheads exploded in the air or on the ground.) Severe damage and fires result in much of Austin.

Immediate nuclear radiation from the weapons being used is generally absorbed by the atmosphere before it reaches people surviving the flash and blast. (This radiation is only important with small nuclear weapons such as the bombs dropped on Japan in World War II or the tactical nuclear weapons being used in Europe. Delayed radiation from fallout is a different matter, however.)

12:15 PM CDT: The U.S. launches intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) against the U.S.S.R. These are launched from underground silos in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, and Missouri. Some SLBMs are launched at this time as well.

12:25 PM CDT: The U.S.S.R. launches most remaining nuclear forces, attacking cities and other targets in the U.S. and Western Europe as well as mainland China.

Antiballistic missiles (ABMs) with nuclear warheads are being launched to defend Moscow from incoming warheads. Throughout the U.S.S.R. several types of surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) are also being used against incoming nuclear warheads--occasionally with success.

12:30 PM CDT: Soviet ICBM warheads begin reaching U.S. targets. NORAD headquarters near Colorado Springs receives a few 20-mt warheads: the ground shock produced by each one attains 7.3 on the Richter scale. U.S. submarines begin launching SLBMs against the U.S.S.R. In Texas, 80,000 people have already died.

Altogether, over 1,000 tons of debris from Soviet ballistic missiles will fall over the U.S.; much will burn up in the atmosphere, but some larger objects will hit the ground with energy equivalent to their own weight in TNT.

12:35 PM CDT: Another wave of Soviet warheads arrives in Texas: 45 of the 53 ICBM warheads targeted in Texas actually detonate successfully. In Travis County, a 550-kt warhead detonates on the ground at the former site of Bergstrom AFB, adding to the devastation in Austin. In the Rio Grande Valley, a 550-kt warhead detonates on the ground at the Raymondville Coast Guard station and a second one two minutes later; Raymondville is destroyed.

With Soviet warheads minutes away, Israel launches nuclear missiles and nuclear-armed aircraft against capitals and military targets of most other Middle Eastern nations.

12:50 PM CDT: A massive barrage by U.S. SLBMs mostly overwhelms the Moscow ABM system; American, British, French, and Chinese nuclear warheads targeted within 100 km (60 miles) of Moscow total over 500. About 200 reach their targets (although only about 40 were lost to ABMs): while most Soviet leaders in underground shelters survive (the primary goal of the local ABM system), most civilians in the subway tunnels and other shelters will die over the next few hours.

The Moscow area ranks with the six ICBM fields in the U.S. as the hardest hit areas of the world. An average of 350 warheads detonate in each ICBM field, each producing a crater 350 m (400 yards) across; a total of 100,000 sq. km (40,000 sq. mi.) is devoid of life. Out of 1,000 ICBM silos, 100 still had ICBMs; now six are left usable.

The nuclear weapons that have reached Texas so far were directed against U.S. military forces and capabilities. Although this attack did not specifically target the civilian population, it has so far killed 800,000 and injured 3,000,000 people in Texas.

1:00 PM CDT 5 August: A third strike reaches Texas, with 146 warheads launched. Two 750-kt warheads detonate over Austin. In the Rio Grande Valley, a 1.1-mt warhead detonates over Brownsville, three 350-kt warheads detonate around McAllen, and 550-kt warheads are groundburst in Harlingen and at Cameron County Airport. Massive fires and severe blast damage occur throughout all of these metropolitan areas.

This concludes most of the nuclear war in Texas: 273 warheads were fired at 233 targets, and 215 detonated successfully, with a total yield of 128 megatons (about 40 times the explosive force of all conventional bombs and shells used in World War II). In addition, about 5 off-course warheads struck randomly in Texas. At this point 3,500,000 Texans have been killed.

2:00 PM CDT: About 5% of the land area in Texas is burning. In a few areas conditions permit firestorms to develop. In contrast to the World War II atomic bombings in Japan, continuous fire areas sometimes cover hundreds of square km (or sq. mi.), preventing survivors from escaping. Fires cover about 700,000 sq. km (270,000 sq. mi.) in the United States, 250,000 sq. km (100,000 sq. mi.) in the U.S.S.R. and 180,000 sq. km (70,000 sq. mi.) in Europe. Scattered or continuous fires rage across more than one-third of the area of several states, including North Dakota, Ohio, New Jersey, Maryland, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.

3:00 PM CDT: Intense naval combat between U.S. and Soviet ships and submarines includes the use of tactical nuclear weapons. U.S. naval superiority has been offset by Soviet naval nuclear superiority: U.S. ships are being destroyed by nuclear cruise missiles and nuclear torpedoes. By the end of the day the superpowers will have lost over 100 vessels altogether.

Since most major dams in the U.S. have been destroyed by nuclear explosions, flooding is progressing downstream from these reservoirs. Some rivers particularly affected are the Missouri, Colorado, and Tennessee Rivers.

5:00 PM CDT: The mushroom clouds from nuclear explosions have drifted 100 to 300 km (60 to 180 mi.) downwind, frequently forming the leading edge of large smoke plumes. In the darkness beneath these plumes, temperatures have dropped noticeably.

Vaporized soil and other material, mixed with radioactive bomb residues, settles to the ground in areas where mushroom clouds pass overhead: this is fallout. Immediately downwind of groundbursts, radiation from fallout may be severe enough for exposed persons to already suffer ill effects. The black rain occurring beneath many clouds is radioactive--sometimes enough to burn the skin after prolonged contact.

Smoke downwind of urban fires is also hazardous. The blasts and fires have consumed 70% of the world's industrial capacity. Toxic chemicals have been released in large amounts.

7:00 PM CDT: Soviet bombers are delivering weapons against U.S. cities and other targets, including high-yield bombs and long-range cruise missiles. None of these targets are in Texas, however. The largest individual weapons used in the war are a couple of 50-mt Soviet bombs dropped in China: craters 2 km (1.3 mi.) across are produced, and severe or moderate damage is produced in an area up to 100 km (60 miles) across.

NATO and Warsaw Pact tactical nuclear weapons are being used by the hundreds along the front in West Germany. Missiles and aircraft have been launched against most cities and military targets in Europe, and nuclear combat has degenerated to disorganized use of short-range systems, especially missiles and nuclear artillery shells. U.S. Green Berets are crossing enemy lines carrying the smallest nuclear weapons to be used: these atomic demolition munitions are used to destroy bridges and similar targets and have explosive yields as low as 10 tons of TNT equivalent (somewhat more than the truck bomb that destroyed the Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983).

9:00 PM CDT: Some bombers from Texas are delivering their weapons to Soviet soil, having survived Soviet air defense forces (many using nuclear-tipped anti-aircraft missiles). About half of the weapons carried by Texas bombers actually reach their targets (amounting to 200 warheads with a total yield of 40 mt). Nearly all of these weapons have selectable explosive yields, and usually a yield much lower than the maximum option is used. Only ten of these bombers manage to reach friendly territory afterwards, and they are generally forced to make emergency landings: the U.S., for instance, has less than 100 surviving runways capable of handling B-52s.

12:00 midnight CDT 5/6 August 1988: The nuclear exchange is generally over. In the U.S. 5,800 warheads detonated totaling 3,900 mt. Soviet and NATO weapons successfully used in Europe numbered 3,300 (1,200 mt) (excluding tactical weapons). About 6,100 warheads (most of them American, but some Chinese, British, and French) exploded in the U.S.S.R. with a total yield of 1,900 mt. Mainland China (P.R.C.) received 900 (detonating) warheads (1,300 mt) from its northern neighbor. Other areas receiving at least a dozen warheads include Canada, North and South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Greenland, Puerto Rico, India, Israel, Australia, Guam, Cuba, Syria, and Egypt. Hundreds of other nuclear weapons have been used in naval combat, in troop combat in West Germany and along the U.S.S.R./P.R.C. border, and in defending the Soviet Union from nuclear attack. About 50% of the global strategic and theater nuclear arsenal has been used. About 10% was launched but did not reach a target and 30% was destroyed on the ground. Altogether, World War III has involved the detonation of 18,000 warheads with a total yield of 8,500 mt. Including tactical weapons, there were 67,000 nuclear weapons in the world a day ago; now, there are 10,000 left.

In Texas 6,400,000 have been killed (38% of its original population). Of the 10,400,000 survivors, 3,000,000 have severe injuries and 2,000,000 have lesser injuries. In the Rio Grande Valley 340,000 have been killed (49%) and 90,000 injured (13%); in Travis County over 400,000 are dead (75%). In the U.S. about 110,000,000 people have died altogether, with the 135,000,000 survivors including 30,000,000 injured. In the U.S.S.R. about 40,000,000 have been killed out of a pre-war population of 285,000,000. Mainland China has had 100,000,000 killed out of a population of 1,090,000,000. Examples of other countries: United Kingdom, 20,000,000 killed (out of 57,000,000); Denmark, 2,700,000 killed (out of 5,100,000); Australia, 3,000,000 killed (out of 16,000,000). In Mexico over 3,000,000 have been killed, mostly in cities on the border with the U.S. Throughout the world about 400,000,000 have died.

9:00 AM CDT 6 August: Survivors in urban areas are having little success at finding medical help. For the United States as a whole, hospital beds in surviving hospitals total 80,000, while severe injuries total 20,000,000. About 9,000,000 people in the U.S. have severe burns on much of their bodies, while only 200 beds in burn care facilities survive in the country. Many remaining hospitals lack even emergency power, due to the EMP attacks. The vast number of injuries force doctors and nurses to try to ignore patients that cannot be saved or have non-life threatening injuries. Many survivors in urban areas are in the process of fleeing to neighboring areas in search of medical care and to escape fires; this puts them in the open, often exposed to fallout.

Midnight CDT 6/7 August: Israel is being attacked by Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. About one-third of Israel's military forces survived the Soviet nuclear attack; they are now occasionally using nuclear artillery shells against attacking troops. Other Arab states are preparing to join the campaign.

The situation is tense between India and Pakistan: both nations have a handful of small atomic bombs, and India was attacked with Chinese nuclear weapons. Meanwhile civil war is developing in South Africa and various other nations.

Early 7 August: Deposition of fallout in Texas is generally over with, and 80% of the radiation that will result from this fallout has already been emitted. Fire-produced pollutants are noticeable throughout the state--including smoke, smog, and various hazardous chemicals--with urban areas still burning.

In those parts of Texas affected by fallout, radiation sickness is already evident in many survivors, including symptoms of nausea, vomiting, and skin burns. In a few small areas fallout has been severe enough to already have killed many of those exposed, by causing radiation damage to the central nervous system. Survivors are having difficulty dealing with injuries, lack of food and medical help, and emotional shock.

The U.S. government is essentially gone, as well as most state governments; only two state capital cities survive (the missiles targeted on them malfunctioned). The Rio Grande Valley is receiving refugees from Mexico--survivors of devastated areas seeking help.

10 August: The smoke clouds in the northern hemisphere are spreading to produce a band around the world covering the primary participating nations. Large amounts of particles in the atmosphere include 1,500 million tons of dust, 25 million tons of smoke from vegetation, and 80 million tons of smoke from cities and other manmade sources. This last type of smoke has the greatest impact: smoke from petroleum and petroleum products is particularly effective at absorbing sunlight. Altogether, about 0.4 cubic km (0.1 cu. mi.) of dust and smoke is in the stratosphere.

Typical sunlight levels in Texas are comparable to an overcast day; in some areas, smoke from large continuing fires reduces mid-day light levels to that of twilight. The average temperature in Texas is 22° C (72° F), compared to 29° C (85° F) a week ago.

12 August: About 90% of the radiation that will result from fallout in Texas has been emitted. The average radiation dose in Texas is about 500 rem; by comparison, a dose of 100 rem in less than a week causes radiation sickness in half of people exposed; 50% of people exposed to 450 rem in a short period will die within 30 days; and a dose of 1,500 rem will kill nearly all people exposed within 10 days. Persons who stayed indoors the whole week generally cut their dose by 70%; staying in designated areas of marked fallout shelters would reduce dosage by 99%.

For the entire U.S., the average dose in the open from fallout is 1,200 rem; by comparison the average for the Soviet Union is 150 rem. The difference comes from the larger average yield of Soviet weapons, the larger size of the Soviet Union, the frequently "dirtier" nature of Soviet weapons, and the fact that more Soviet warheads are exploded on the ground (increasing fallout). For Europe the average dose in the open is 500 rem. This fallout is of course unevenly distributed: in the U.S. the dose exceeds 1,800 rem in about 8% of the land area, and the dose exceeds 500 rem in about 1% of the U.S.S.R.

In most of the areas affected by fallout, radiation is diminished sufficiently to be of little concern to people there. However, areas downwind of nuclear strikes on nuclear power plants are still dangerous--in some locations 100 km (60 mi.) downwind of such strikes, radiation levels are high enough to kill in 2 days. Radiation levels are still high enough to cause sickness from 2-days' exposure in areas up to 500 km (300 mi) downwind of the ICBM fields.

Delayed fallout is being deposited throughout the northern hemisphere: this is from radioactive material launched into the stratosphere, falling over a larger area for months to come. The health effect from this, however, will not be noticeable against the background of other problems.

20 August: In the northern hemisphere, smoke in the lower atmosphere is subsiding (although smoke in the upper atmosphere still absorbs much sunlight). Unusual weather includes windy conditions in some coastal areas. Fog has developed over the oceans and smog envelops the interior of North America and Eurasia. Fallout from the northern hemisphere is now reaching the southern hemisphere. Radiation levels there will peak at ten times the natural background levels--this will not pose a health risk, but it produces fear in many countries.

Many persons suffering radiation sickness are now showing additional symptoms: hair loss and leukopenia. (Those that survive to the end of the year will regrow their hair.)

Combat continues in central Europe, mostly without tactical nuclear weapons. The position of the front is little changed, with forces on either side unable or unwilling to budge.

25 August: The ozone layer has been cut in half over the northern midlatitudes. In spite of this, nearly all of the Earth's surface is receiving less solar ultraviolet radiation than before the war: smoke in the northern hemisphere blocks most sunlight, and as this smoke was initially injected into the atmosphere much ozone was displaced into the southern hemisphere. This situation will change.

Disorganized forces from Iraq, Iran, and Libya are beginning to join the Arab battle against Israel. North Korean forces have overrun many remaining cities in South Korea. Civil war has developed throughout China: with much of the government and military wiped out by Soviet nuclear attack, surviving communist forces are under attack and ethnic conflicts are developing. Tibet has declared independence. Ethnic conflict is also breaking out among surviving populations in some parts of the Soviet Union and Europe.

Naval combat between NATO and Soviet vessels has slackened. Before the war the U.S. had fifteen aircraft carriers; three were destroyed in port on the first day and five more have been destroyed by Soviet naval nuclear weapons. A number of submarines survive with ballistic or cruise missiles.

Hardly any satellites in Earth orbit are functioning. EMP bursts disabled most civilian satellites. Debris from anti-satellite attacks is dispersing and striking more satellites, while particle radiation from nuclear explosions above the atmosphere is trapped in the Earth's magnetic field, making near-Earth space lethal to men and satellites for months or years to come.

1 September: Light levels and temperatures in the northern hemisphere have reached their lows. Temperatures in the lower stratosphere (an altitude of 10 km/6 mi., where most atmospheric smoke is) are around 15° C (50° F)--this is 40° C (70° F) warmer than normal. At the ground, temperatures vary little with altitude (mountains are sometimes warmer than adjacent lowlands), but they vary significantly with distance inland. The interiors of North America and Eurasia are on average 10° C (18° F) cooler than normal--corresponding to normal temperatures for October or November. In west and north Texas temperatures are around 17° C (62° F); near the coast it is nearer 22° C (72° F). In the midlatitudes of the northern hemisphere sunlight is 25% or less of normal--sometimes insufficient for net plant growth. This helps reduce the formation of hurricanes this season.

At this point 9,000,000 Texans and a total of 140,000,000 Americans have died.

Mid-September 1988: Epidemics are developing among surviving populations, particularly food poisoning, dysentery, and typhoid. Displaced populations, including many injured, are particularly affected; those with radiation sickness are particularly vulnerable, since radiation sickness involves damage to the immune system: susceptibility to disease for those is increased by a factor of 2 to 5. In some locations outbreaks of disease are a consequence of the use of biological weapons.

Early October 1988: Many crops are withering throughout the midlatitudes in the northern hemisphere. Sunlight, temperatures, and rainfall are all below normal; in many areas concentrations of ozone, smog, and other pollutants in the lower atmosphere are still high enough to afflict plants; and in restricted areas plants have suffered from fallout. This is particularly true in the American Midwest. About 200,000 se. km (80,000 sq. mi.) in the U.S. is still radioactive enough to cause radiation sickness after two weeks' exposure.

At this point about 580,000 have died in the Rio Grande Valley (84% of the original population) and 40,000 are injured (6%); of Travis County's pre-war population, only 50,000 survive (9%)--most of whom have fled to neighboring areas. About 2,000,000 have died from fallout in Texas now, bringing the death toll to 10,000,000. Of the 6,800,000 survivors, 2,000,000 are injured and 2,000,000 are suffering radiation sickness (these two groups overlap). A total of 160,000,000 Americans have died, or 65% of the pre-war population; in the Soviet Union 90,000,000 have died. The death toll in the United Kingdom is 30,000,000 and in Denmark is 3,300,000. World population is now 4,300,000,000.
November 1988: The ozone layer in the southern hemisphere is now 5% depleted. The effect of this will not be noticed, however, since it is less than natural variations.
December 1988: Crop failures throughout the third world have caused famines in many areas and have also encouraged civil unrest. India has collapsed into civil war. Having devastated Israel, Arab nations are in chaos: the Middle East was heavily dependent on the Western nations economically. Surviving Taiwanese forces are participating in the civil war in mainland China.
Some third world countries, particularly Latin American countries, are launching raids on U.S. coastal areas by sea. These military task forces scavenge and steal what they can find, from raw materials and food to equipment for industrial, military, and agricultural use. Surviving industrial facilities on the coasts, particularly the Pacific and Gulf coasts, are targeted. A couple of raiding parties have visited the Port of Brownsville's former location and surrounding areas but found little of interest.
In the United States, exposure is a serious problem; the only source of heating for most survivors is wood fires.
March 1989: Temperatures in the northern hemisphere are 4° C (2° F) below normal on average. This will shorten growing seasons and prolong agricultural disruptions. Before the war Japan was heavily dependent on food imports; now even fishing in neighboring waters is still unproductive. In Japan 30,000,000 starved to death this winter. Surviving Japanese military forces have waged attacks as far as Australia in search of food sources.
The Midwestern U.S., formerly where most of the nation's grain was produced, received the greatest share of the fallout from strikes on ICBM fields; about half the rural population in this area escaped immediate effects but was killed by fallout. With modern farming technology unavailable, farming this year will be subsistence farming.
The Mississippi River now reaches the Gulf of Mexico 300 km (200 mi.) west of its former mouth. Over the next few years much of former New Orleans will sink below sea level.
Some peat bogs in the northern Soviet Union ignited by the nuclear war are still slowly burning; some will continue to burn for a couple of years.
April 1989: Hundreds of thousands of Mexican refugees have come north hoping to find food. The population of the southwestern U.S. was relatively concentrated in urban areas; with these destroyed, Mexicans will soon represent a majority of the area's population. Violence often occurs when they encounter communities of survivors. Communities in the U.S. faring better than average include survivalist communities in the Northwest and Mormon communities in the Utah area.
May 1989: Radiation hazards from fallout-stricken areas continue to diminish. In the U.S. about 10,000 sq. km (4,000 sq. mi.) is still radioactive enough for two weeks' exposure to cause radiation sickness. Over 90% of this area was contaminated by fallout from strikes on nuclear reactors. This includes about 400 sq. km (150 sq. mi.) in Texas.
July 1989: Wildfires are recurring in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Fires especially sweep through the vast areas where fallout killed vegetation. This includes strips of land extending hundreds of km (or mi.) from strikes on nuclear reactor sites, often carrying radioactivity into the air again.
Since the war, natural processes have begun to restore the ozone layer. In the northern hemisphere the ozone layer is 40% depleted, although localized depletions have sometimes been worse. The resultant increase in ultraviolet radiation has reduced plant growth and crop yields and made it easier to get sunburn. In the southern hemisphere ozone depletion is still around 5%.
August 1989: Disease has ravaged the surviving population in the U.S. About 30% of survivors have been afflicted with one or more of the following: dysentery, food poisoning, viral gastroenteritis, typhoid, influenza, and pneumonia. These diseases have killed about 10,000,000 in the past year. Bubonic plague has broken out, killing nearly 1,000,000 so far and spreading to Mexico. Starvation is also a major cause of death: total food production in the U.S. in the past year was about 2% of that for the previous year.
Famines are occurring throughout the third world--not from nuclear winter but from the social and technological collapse of agriculture. Much of the third world supplemented its agricultural capacity with fertilizers, insecticides, and food imports from the West. Political chaos in many areas and disruption of supply networks has also disrupted production. Food production in the third world in 1989 will be below half that of 1987.
Surviving Americans now number 45,000,000, including 4,000,000 Texans. A few million surviving Americans are permanently sterile due to radiation exposure. World population is now 3,300,000,000.
August 1991: The Earth's atmosphere has been quite nearly purged of soot and dust. Slightly cooler conditions persist due to large amounts of nitrogen oxides in the upper atmosphere. The primary impact is slightly shorter growing seasons in northern areas.
Now that third world countries are recovering agriculturally and beginning to reduce famine, they are being stricken by epidemics. Bubonic plague has spread to Latin America and is appearing in Europe. Africa, which has been particularly ravaged by war and famine, is now seeing the spread of various diseases going unchecked by modern medicine.
December 1992: Depletion of the ozone layer in the northern hemisphere is now only 15%, which is less than natural variations before the war.
2000: China, now under nationalist government, is trying to retake Manchuria (which had declared independence after the war) and Mongolia. Other nations are sufficiently secure internally to launch invasions to acquire various resources.
2010: Some people exposed to fallout after the war are now dying of cancer; however, cancer as a cause of death among the survivors is minimal compared to other causes: disease, starvation, and exposure.
Chinese forces are operating in Southeast Asia, Japan, the Philippines, and particularly Siberia, where there is an influx of Chinese settlers.
2040: Some areas that received fallout from strikes on nuclear power plants and above-ground nuclear waste storage facilities are still uninhabitable and will remain so for some time to come. Genetic defects are found in as much as a few percent of the population born in the northern hemisphere after the war; however, most are not noticeable or are not handicapping. The more profound physical deficiencies are due to malnutrition. Some of the surviving nations have emerged by now as major powers, including Australia, New Zealand, China, Argentina, and Brazil.

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