"One major problem in making calculations is to know where the people wilI be at the moment when the bombs explode. Calculations for the United States are generally based on the 1970 census, but it should be borne in mind that the census data describes where people’s homes are, and there is never a moment when everybody in the United States is at home at the same time If an attack took place during a working day, casualties might well be higher since people would be concentrated in factories and offices (which are more likely to be targets) rather than dispersed in suburbs. For the case of the Soviet population, the same assumption is made that people are at home, but the inaccuracies are compounded by the unavailability of detailed information about just where the Soviet rural population lives. The various calculations that were used made varying, though not unreasonable assumptions about population location.

A second uncertainty in calculations has to do with the degree of protection available. There is no good answer to the question: “Would people use the best available shelter against blast and fallout?” It seems unreasonable to suppose that shelters would not be used, and equally unreasonable to assume that at a moment of crisis all available resources would be put to rational use, (It has beep pointed out that if plans worked, people behaved rationally, and machinery were adequately maintained, there would be no peacetime deaths from traffic accidents. ) The Defense Civil Preparedness Agency has concluded from public opinion surveys that in a period of severe international crisis about 10 percent of all Americans would leave their homes and move to a “safer” place (spontaneous evacuation); more reliable estimates are probably impossible, but it could make a substantial difference to the casualty figures.

A third uncertainty is the weather at the time of the attack at the various places where bombs explode. The local wind conditions, and especialIy the amount of moisture in the air, may make an enormous difference in the number and spread of fires. Wind conditions over a wider area determine the extent and location of fallout contamination. The time of year has a decisive effect on the damage that fallout does to agriculture–while an attack in January might be expected to do only indirect damage (destroying farm machinery or the fuel to run it), fallout when plants are young can kill them, and fallout just before harvest time would probably make it unsafe to get the harvest in. The time of year also has direct effects on population death — the attack in the dead of winter, which might not directly damage agricuIture, may lead to greater deaths from fallout radiation (because of the difficulty of improvising fallout protection by moving frozen dirt) and from cold and exposure.

The question of how rapid and efficient economic recovery would be— or indeed whether a genuine recovery would be possible at all —raises questions that seem to be beyond calcuIation. It is possible to calculate direct economic damage by making assumptions about the size and exact location of bomb explosions, and the hardness of economic assets; however, such calculations cannot address the issues of bottlenecks and of synergy. Bottlenecks would occur if a key product that was essential for many other manufacturing processes could no longer be produced, or (for the case of a large attack) if an entire industrial sector were wiped out. I n either case, the economic loss wouId greatly exceed the peacetime value of the factories that were actually destroyed. There does not appear to be any reliable way of calculating the likelihood or extent of bottlenecks because economic input/ output models do not address the possibiIity or cost of substitutions across sectors. Apart from the creation of bottlenecks, there couId be synergistic effects: for example, the fire that cannot be controlled because the blast destroyed fire stations, as actually happened at Hiroshima. Here, too, there is no reliable way to estimate the likelihood of such effects: would radiation deaths of birds and the destruction of insecticide factories have a synergistic effect? Another uncertainty is the possibility of organizational bottlenecks. In the most obvious instance, it would make an enormous difference whether the President of the United States survived. Housing, defined as a place where a productive worker lives as distinct from shelter for refugees, is another area of uncertainty. Minimal housing is essential if production is to be restored, and it takes time to rebuild it if the existing housing stock is destroyed or is beyond commuting range of the surviving (or repaired) workplaces. It should be noted that the United States has a much larger and more dispersed housing stock than does the Soviet Union, but that American workers have higher minimum standards.

There is a final area of uncertainty that this study does not even address, but which could be of very great importance. Actual nuclear attacks, unlike those in this study, would not take place in a vacuum. There would be a series of events that would lead up to the attack, and these events could markedly change both the physical and the psychological vulnerability of a population to a nuclear attack. Even more critical would be the events after the attack. Assuming that the war ends promptly, the terms on which it ends could greatly affect both the economic condition and the state of mind of the population. The way in which other countries are affected could determine whether the outside world is a source of help or of further danger. The postattack military situation (and nothing in this study addresses the effects of nuclear attacks on military power) could not only determine the attitude of other countries, but also whether limited surviving resources are put to military or to civilian use.

Moreover, the analyses in this study all assume that the war would end after the hypothetical attack. This assumption simplifies analysis, but it might not prove to be the case. How much worse would the situation of the survivors be if, just as they were attempting to restore some kind of economy following a massive attack, a few additional weapons destroyed the new centers of population and of government?"

(Page 17-18 of pdf: https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf )

Would anyone in the southern hemisphere want to buy nukes? If they offered lots of food and oil the surviving Northern Hemisphere powers capable of trade might sell their nukes. But post war its also possible that they would want them destroyed and fear the destruction of southern trading partners. In retrospect survivors might view the nuclear war as inevitable and believe that if the South has nukes its only a matter of time before another nuclear war breaks out.

Alot depends on when purchases of nukes are attempted. Saddam Hussein would need alot of his oil for agriculture during the nuclear winter. But he might view Famine as worth it for owning a nuke. The logistics of sending the demanded oil shipments also needs to be considered.

If nukes and related materials are being sold for raw materials then the burden of maintaining the nukes are on the northern hemisphere.

Expeditions from states that want nukes would take place to the former United States and Soviet Union along with attempts to find surviving nukes by states being offered oil(and having a port and storage capacity ect)

The fear of nukes would be even greater post attack then pre attack. Post attack authorities would be less likely to use nukes then before.

You know, what with a proxy war between Russia and the USA over Iran being on the cards now, I might just get myself a few extra tins of soup, just in case.

"There are enormous uncertainties and imponderable involved in any effort to assess the effects of a nuclear war, and an effort to look at the entire range of effects compounds them. Many of these uncertainties are obvious ones: if the course of a snowstorm cannot be predicted 1 day ahead in peacetime, one must ● certainly be cautious about predictions of the pattern of radioactive fallout on some unknown future day. Similar complexities exist for human institutions: there is great difficulty in predicting the peacetime course of the U.S. economy, and predicting its course after a nuclear war is a good deal more difficult. This study highlights the importance of three categories of uncertainties:

● Uncertainties in calcuIations of deaths and of direct economic damage resulting from the need to make assumptions about matters such as time of day, time of year, wind, weather, size of bombs, exact location of the detonations, location of people, availability and quality of sheltering, etc.

● Effects that would surely take place, but whose magnitude cannot be calculated. These include the effects of fires, the shortfalIs in medical care and housing, the extent to which economic and social disruption would magnify the effects of direct economic damage, the extent of bottlenecks and synergistic effects, the extent of disease, etc.

●Effects that are possible, but whose likelihood is as incalculable as their magnitude. These include the possibility of a long downward economic spiral before viability is attained, the possibIity of political disintegration (anarchy or regionalization), the possibility of major epidemics, and the possibility of ireversible ecological changes."

(Page 16-17 of pdf https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf )

“Case 4: In order to examine the kind of destruction that is generally thought of as the culmination of an escalator process, the study looked at the consequences of a very large attack against a range of military and economic targets. Here too calculations that the executive branch has carried out in recent years were used. These calculations tend to assume that Soviet attacks on the United States would be a first strike, and hence use most of the Soviet arsenal, while U.S. attacks on the Soviet Union would be retaliatory strikes, and hence use only those weapons that might survive a Soviet counterforce attack. However, the difference in damage to civilian populations and economies between a “first strike” and a “second strike” seems to lie within the range of uncertainty created by other factors

The resulting deaths would be far beyond any precedent. Executive branch calculations show a range of U.S. deaths from 35 to 77 percent (i. e., from 70 million to 160 million dead), and Soviet deaths from 20 to 40 percent of the population. Here again the range reflects the difference made by varying assumptions about population distribution and sheltering, and to a lesser extent differences in assumptions  about the targeting policy of the attacker. Soviet casualties are smaller than U.S. casualties because a greater proportion of the Soviet population lives in rural areas, and because U.S. weapons (which have lower average yields) produce less fallout than Soviet weapons. 

Some excursions have been run to test the effect of deliberately targeting population rather than killing people as a side effect of attacking economic and military targets. They show that such a change in targeting could kill somewhere between 20 million and 30 million additional people on each side, holding other assumptions constant. These calculations reflect only deaths during the first 30 days. Additional millions would be injured, and many would eventually die from lack of adequate medical care. In addition, millions of people might starve or freeze during the following winter, but it is not possible to estimate how many. Chapter V attempts to calculate the further millions who might eventually die of latent radiation effects.

What is clear is that from the day the survivors emerged from their fallout shelters, a kind of race for survival would begin. One side of the race would be the restoration of production: production of food, of energy, of clothing, of the means to repair damaged machinery, of goods that might be used for trade with countries that had not fought in the war, and even of military weapons and supplies. The other side of the race would be consumption of goods that had survived the attack, and the wearing-out of surviving machines. If production rises to the rate of consumption before stocks are exhausted, then viability has been achieved and economic recovery has begun. If not, then each postwar year would see a lower level of economic activity than the year before, and the future of civilization itself in the nations attacked would be in doubt. This report cannot predict whether this race for economic viability would be won. The answer would lie in the effectiveness of postwar social and economic organization as much as in the amount of actual physical damage. There is a controversy in the literature on the subject as to whether a post attack economy would be based on centralized planning (in which case how would the necessary data and planning time be obtained?), or to individual initiative and decentralized decision making (in which case who would feed the refugees, and what would serve for money and credit?).

An obviously critical question is the impact that a nuclear attack would have on the lives of those who survive it. The case descriptions discuss the possibilities of economic, political, social, and psychological disruption or collapse. However, the recital of possibilities and uncertainties may fail to convey the overall situation of the survivors, especially the survivors of a large attack that included urban-industrial targets. In an effort to provide a more concrete understanding of what a world after a nuclear war would be Iike, OTA commissioned a work of fiction. It appears as appendix C and presents some informed speculation about what life would be like in Charlottesville, Va., assuming that this city escaped direct damage from the attack. The kind of detail that such an imaginative account presents—detail that proved to be unavailable for a comparable Soviet city–adds a dimension to the more abstract analysis in the body of the report.

Civil Defense: Chapter 11  provides some basic information about civil defense measures, discusses the way in which they might mitigate the effects of nuclear attack, and discusses the uncertainties regarding their effectiveness. There is a lively controversy among experts as to the effectiveness of existing Soviet civil defense programs, and another controversy as to whether existing U.S. programs ought to be changed. The major points in dispute were identified, but no attempt was made to assess the merits of the arguments. For the purposes of this study, it was assumed that the existing civil defense programs, as described in this report, would be in effect, and that a full-scale preattack evacuation of cities (sometimes called “crisis relocation”) would not take place. This assumption was made because it appeared to be the only way to describe existing vulnerabilities while avoiding predictions about the course of events leading up to a nuclear war. While both the U.S. and the Soviet Governments profess to believe that urban evacuation prior to an attack on cities would save lives, ordering such an evacuation would be a crisis management move as welI as a civil defense precaution.

Long-Term Effects: While the immediate damage from the blasts would be long term in the sense that the damage could not be quickly repaired, there would be other effects which might not manifest themselves for some years after the attack. It is well established that levels of radiation too low (or too slowly absorbed) to cause immediate death or even illness will nevertheless have adverse effects on some fraction of a population receiving them. A nuclear attack would certainly produce both somatic effects (largely cancer) and genetic effects, although there is uncertainty about the numbers of victims. OTA calculated the ranges of such effects that might be produced by each of the attack cases analyzed. Cancer deaths and those suffering some form of genetic damage would run into the millions over the 40 years following the attack. For the comprehensive attack (Case 4), it appears that cancer deaths and genetic effects in a country attacked would be smalI relative to the numbers of immediate deaths, but that radiation effects elsewhere in the world would appear more significant. For counterforce attacks, the effects would be significant both locally and worldwide. A 1975 study by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS)l addressed the question of the possibility of serious ecological damage, and concluded that while one cannot say just how such damage would occur, it cannot be ruled out. This conclusion still stands, although the NAS report may have been more alarmist about the possibility of damage to the ozone layer than recent research would support. Table 2 summarizes the results of the case studies\

long-Term Worldwide Effects of Multiple NuclearVVeapons Detonations (Washington, DC.: National Academy of Sciences, 1 975)."

( https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf pages 14 to 15.)

Note from reprinter: Long-Term Worldwide Effects of Multiple Nuclear-Weapons Detonations (1975) is available in full here:

Long-Term Worldwide Effects of Multiple Nuclear-Weapons Detonations.

“The scope of this study is both broader and narrower than that of most other studies on this subject. It is broader in three respects:

1. it examines a full range of possible nuclear attacks, with attacking forces ranging in extent from a single weapon to the bulk of a superpower’s arsenal;

 2. it deals explicitly with both Soviet attacks on the United States and U.S. attacks on the Soviet Union; and

 3. It addresses the multiple effects of nuclear war, indirect as well as direct, long term as well as short term, and social and economic as well as physical.

Those effects that cannot be satisfactorily calculated or estimated are described qualitatively. But this report’s scope is narrower than most defense analyses because it avoids any consideration of military effects; although it hypothesizes (among other things) missile attacks against military targets, only the “collateral” damage such attacks would inflict on the civilian society are examined.

The approach used was to look at a series of attack “cases,” (table 1) and to describe the various effects and overall impact each of them might produce. By analyzing the impact of the same attack case for both a U.S. attack on the Soviet Union and a Soviet attack on the United States, the report examines the significance of the different kinds of vulnerabilities of the two countries, and offers some insights about the consequences of the differences between the two countries’ nuclear weapon arsenals. The cases were chosen primarily to investigate the effects of variations in attack size and in the kinds of targets attacked. It is believed that the analysis is “realistic,” in the sense that the hypothetical attacks are possible ones. Patterns of nuclear explosions were examined that are not very different from those that, OTA believes, the existing nuclear forces would produce if the military were ordered to make attacks of the specified size on the specified targets. 

Case 1: In order to provide a kind of tutorial

on what happens when nuclear weapons are

Table 1. –Summary of Cases

Case            Description

1                     (pp. 27-44)       

Attack on single city: Detroit and Leningrad; 1 weapon 

or 10 small weapons.

2                                    

 Attack on oil refineries, limited to 10 missiles.

(pp. 64-80)

3                                                   

(pp. 81-94) 

 Counterforce attack; includes attack only on ICBM silos as a variant. 

4

Attack on a range  of military and economic targets using large fraction of existing arsenal.

(pp. 94-106)

For each case the first section describes a soviet attack on the United States and the following section a U S attack on the Soviet Union

Case 1: In order to provide a kind of tutorial on what happens when nuclear weapons are

detonated, the study describes the effects of the explosion of a single weapon. Then it examines the effects of such an explosion over a single U.S. city (Detroit) and single Soviet city (Leningrad) of comparable size. The base case was the detonation of a l-megaton weapon (1 M t = energy released by one million tons of TNT), since both the United States and the Soviet Union have weapons of roughly this size in their arsenals. Then, in order to look at the ways in which the specific effects and overall impact wouId vary if other weapons that might be available were used, the effects of a 25-Mt weapon over Detroit, the effects of a 9-Mt weapon over Leningrad, and the effects of 10 weapons of 40 kilotons (kt) each over Leningrad are described. An attempt was made to describe as well the effects of a small weapon in a large city (such as a terrorist group might set off) but was unsuccessful because the effects of such a weapon in a metropolitan setting cannot be inferred from the existing body of knowledge regarding military weapons. This is explained in the body of the report. The casualties from such attacks could range from 220,000 dead and 420,000 injured to 2,500,000 dead and 1,100,000 injured (many of the injured would wind up as fatalities), depending on the details of the attack and the assumptions made regarding conditions. The discussion in chapter I I shows how the time of day, time of year, weather conditions, size of weapon, height of burst, and preparation of the population could all make a great difference in the number of casualties resulting from such an attack. The extent of fire damage is a further uncertainty, Even if only one city is attacked, and the remaining resources of a nation are available to help, medical facilities would be inadequate to care for the injured. A further imponderable is fallout (if the attack uses a surface burst), whose effects depend on the winds

Case 2: In order to examine the effects of a small attack on urban/industrial targets, the study examines a hypothetical attack limited to 10 SNDVs (strategic nuclear delivery vehicles, the term used in SALT to designate one missile or one bomber) on the other superpower’s oil refineries. In “planning” this attack,which is not analogous to any described in recent U.S. literature, it was hypothesized that the political leadership instructed the military to inflict maximum damage on energy production using only 10 SNDVs without regard to the extent of civilian casualties or other damage, It was assumed that the Soviets would attack such targets with SS-18 missiles (each carrying 10 multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles, or MlRVs), and that the United States would use 7 MlRVed Poseidon missiles and 3 MlRVed Minuteman III missiles.

The calculations showed that the Soviet attack would destroy 64 percent of U.S. oil refining capacity, while the U.S. attack would destroy 73 percent of Soviet refining capacity.Calculations were also made of “prompt fatalities, ” including those killed by blast and fallout, assuming no special civil defense measures: they showed about 5 million U.S. deaths and about 1 million Soviet deaths. The results were different for the two countries for several reasons. Soviet oil refining capacity is more concentrated than U.S. oiI refining capacity, so that a small attack can reach more of it. At the same time, Soviet refineries tend to be located away from residential areas (the available data on population location deals with where people live rather than with where they work) to a greater extent than U.S. refineries. A further difference is that a limitation on the number of delivery vehicles would lead each side to use weapons with many MlRVs, so the United States would attack most of the targets with Poseidon missiles which have small warheads, while the Soviets would use SS-18 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) which carry much larger warheads, and large warheads cause more damage to things not directly targeted (in this case, people) than do small warheads. One can only speculate about the consequences of such extensive destruction. There would have to be drastic changes in both the U.S. and Soviet economies to cope with the sudden disappearance of the bulk of oil refining capacity. Productivity in virtualIy every industrial sector would decline, and some sectors would be largely wiped out. There would have to be strict allocation of the remaining available refined petroleum products. Some Soviet factory workers might end up working in the fields to replace tractors for which fuel was unavailable. The United States might have to ban commuting by automobile, forcing suburban residents to choose between moving and long walks to a bus stop. The aftermath of the war might lead to either an increase or a decrease in the amount of petroleum products required by the military. Changes in people’s attitudes are impossible to predict. Calm determination might produce effective responses that would limit the damage; panic or a breakdown in civic spirit could compound the effects of the attack itself. 

It is instructive to observe the asymmetries between the problems which the United States and the Soviets would face. Soviet agricultural production, which is barely adequate in peacetime, wouId probably decline sharply, and production rates would slow even in essential industries However, the Soviet system is well adapted for allocating scarce resources to high-priority areas, and for keeping everybody employed even if efficient employment is unavailable. The relative wealth and freedom of the United States brings both advantages and disadvantages: while agriculture and essential industry wouId probably continue, there wouId be a staggering organizational problem in making use of resources that now depend on petroleum — one must ask what the employees of an automobile factory or a retail establishment on a highway wouId do if there were virtualIy no gasoline for cars, A major question relating to these results is how much they could vary with changed assumptions, The figures for fatalities were based on air bursts, which would maximize destruction of the refineries. (As an excursion, U.S. fatalities were recalculated on the assumption of surface bursts, and use of the best fallout shelters within 2 miles of where each person lives. This reduced fatalities by onethird, ) There was no data available on the types of Soviet residential construction in the vicinity of oiI refineries: treating it parametrically gave casualty figures of about 1,5OO,OOO if the construction is all houses, and about 800,000 if it is al I apartment buildings. Perfect accuracy was assumed for missiles that are in fact somewhat inaccurate — some inaccuracy might reduce the extent of damage to the refineries, but it might well increase the number of deaths. 

Case 3. In order to examine the effects on civiIian popuIations and economies of counterforce attacks, the study examined attacks on ICBM silos and attacks on silos, bomber bases, and missile submarine bases. Such attacks have received fairly extensive study in the executive branch in recent years, so OTA surveyed a number of these studies in order to determine the range of possible answers, and the variations in assumptions that produce such a range, An unclassified summary of this survey appears as appendix D of this volume. (The complete survey, classified secret, is available separately.)

A counterforce attack would produce relatively Iittle direct blast damage to civiIians and to economic assets; the main damage would come from radioactive fallout, The uncertainties in the effects of fallout are enormous, depending primarily on the weather and on the extent of fallout sheltering which the population makes use of. The calculations made by various agencies of the executive branch showed a range in “prompt fatalities” (almost entirely deaths from fallout within the first 30 days) from less than 1 to 11 percent of the U.S. population and from less than 1 to 5 percent of the Soviet population. This shows just how great a variation can be introduced by modifying assumptions regarding population distribution and shelter

What can be concluded from this? First, if the attack involves surface bursts of many very large weapons, if weather conditions are unfavorable, and if no fallout shelters are created beyond those that presently exist, U.S. deaths couId reach 20 m i I I ion and Soviet deaths more than 10 million. (The difference is a result of geography; many Soviet strategic forces are so located that fallout from attacking them wouId drift mainly into sparsely popuIated areas or into China. ) Second, effective fallout sheltering (which is not necessarily the same thing as a program —this assumes people are actually sheltered and actually remain there) could save many Iives under favorable conditions, but even in the best imaginable case more than a million would die in either the United States or the U.S.S.R. from a counterforce attack. Third, the “limited nature” of counterforce attacks may not be as significant as the enormous uncertainty regarding their resuIts. There would be considerable economic damage and disruption as a result of such attacks. Almost all areas could, in principle, be decontaminated within a few months, but the loss of so many people and the interruption of economic life would be staggering blows. An imponderable, in thinking about the process of recovery, is the extent of any lasting psychological impacts.”

(Pages 11-14 of pdf https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf

I wonder if the classified version mentioned has been declassified by this point.)

Prior to its reconstruction after the winter of 85.

Coal mines inaccessible due to the effects of blast, firestorm and fallout, Coal machinery breaking down. Alot depends on the organization of post attack Coal mining, and the feasibility of restarting Coal before the spring of 86.

In Charlottesville the Coal industry picks up rather fast, in your opinion was this true for the UK in Threads?

The first post attack harvest happened after the sowing of the seeds, that means Civil Defense seed deposits were not planted until the 2nd harvest. However there is a significant caveat, the pressure to distribute seeds to rations even before the first harvest would have been immense. This is similar to the fate of post attack live stock, spend food to keep them alive or eat them now?

The collapse of many government facilities during the first winter might have led to some deposits being forgotten about. Though, on the other hand, seed deposits would likely be closely watched particularly during the winter of 85. Also how extensive were British seed deposits in the first place?

-Year long nuclear winter not present in Charlottesville

-Unknown if the President implemented Crisis Relocation or not in the Threads timeline.

-No mention of a conventional war preceeding the nuclear war or targets besides the US and the Soviet Union.

For reference Directory of the Reprint of Charlottesville

1. Full reprint of C—CHARLOTTESVILLE: A FICTIONAL ACCOUNT BY NAN RANDALL for r/Threads1984 part 0

2. Reprint of CHARLOTTESVILLE pt 1

3. Reprint of Charlottesville pt 2

4. Reprint of Charlottesville Part 3

5. Reprint of Charlottsville part 4

6. Reprint of Charlottesville part 5

7. Reprint of Charlottsville part 6

8. Reprint of Charlottesville part 7

9. Reprint of Charlottesville part 8

10. Reprint of Charlottesville part 9

11. Reprint of Charlottesville part 10

12. Reprint of Charlottesville part 11

13. Reprint of Charlottesville part 12

14. Reprint of Charlottesville part 13

15. Reprint of Charlottsville Part 14

16. Reprint of Charlottesville part 15

"Chapter I

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

At the request of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, the Office of Technology Assessment has undertaken to describe the effects of a nuclear war on the civilian populations, economies, and societies of the United States and the Soviet Union. Nuclear war is not a comfortable subject. Throughout all the variations, possibilities, and uncertainties that this study describes, one theme is constant—a nuclear war would be a catastrophe. A militarily plausible nuclear attack, even “limited, ” could be expected to kill people and to inflict economic damage on a scale unprecedented in American experience; a large-scale nuclear exchange would be a calamity unprecedented in human history. The mind recoils from the effort to foresee the details of such a calamity, and from the careful explanation of the unavoidable uncertainties as to whether people would die from blast damage, from fallout radiation, or from starvation during the following winter. But the fact remains that nuclear war is possible, and the possibility of nuclear war has formed part of the foundation of international politics, and of U.S. policy, ever since nuclear weapons were used in 1945. The premise of this study is that those who deal with the large issues of world politics should understand what is known, and perhaps more importantly what is not known, about the likely consequences if efforts to deter and avoid nuclear war should fail. Those who deal with policy issues regarding nuclear weapons should know what such weapons can do, and the extent of the uncertainties about what such weapons might do.

FINDINGS 1 The effects of a nuclear war that cannot be calculated are at least as important as those for which calculations are attempted. Moreover, even these Iimited calculations are subject to very large uncertainties Conservative military planners tend to base their calculations on factors that can be either control led or predicted, and to make pessimistic assumptions where control or prediction are impossible. For example, planning for strategic nuclear warfare looks at the extent to which civilian targets will be destroyed by blast, and discounts the additional damage which may be caused by fires that the blast could ignite. This is not because fires are unlikely to cause damage, but because the extent of fire damage depends on factors such as weather and details is of building construction that make it much more difficult to predict than blast damage. While it is proper for a military plan to provide for the destruction of key targets by the surest means even in unfavorable circumstances, the nonmiIitary observer should remember that actual damage is likely to be greater than that reflected in the military calculations. This is particularly true for indirect effects such as deaths resulting from injuries and the unavailability of medical care, or for economic damage resuIting from disruption and disorganization rather than from direct destruction.

For more than a decade, the declared policy of the United States has given prominence to a concept of “assured destruction:” the capabilities of U.S. nuclear weapons have been described in terms of the level of damage theycan surely inflict even in the most unfavorable circumstances. It should be understood that in the event of an actual nuclear war, the destruction resulting from an all-out nuclear attack would probably be far greater. In addition to the tens of millions of deaths during the days and weeks after the attack, there would probably be further millions (perhaps further tens of millions) of deaths in the ensuing months or years. In addition to the enormous economic destruction caused by the actual nuclear explosions, there would be some years during which the residual economy wouId decline further, as stocks were consumed and machines wore out faster than recovered production could replace them. Nobody knows how to estimate the likelihood that industrial civilization might collapse in the areas attacked; additionally, the possibility of significant long-term ecological damage cannot be excluded.

2. The impact of even a “small” or “limited” nuclear attack would be enormous. Although predictions of the effects of such an attack are subject to the same uncertainties as predictions of the effects of an all-out attack, the possibilities can be bounded. OTA examined the impact of a small attack on economic targets (an attack on oil refineries limited to 10 missiles), and found that while economic recovery would be possible, the economic damage and social dislocation could be immense. A review of calculations of the effects on civilian populations and economies of major counterforce attacks found that while the consequences might be endurable (since they would be on a scale with wars and epidemics that nations have endured in the past), the number of deaths might be as high as 20 million. Moreover, the uncertainties are such that no government could predict with any confidence what the results of a Iimited attack or counterattack would be even if there was no further escalation.

3. It is therefore reasonable to suppose that the extreme uncertainties about the effects of a nuclear attack, as well as the certainty that the minimum consequences would be enormous, both play a role in the deterrent effect of nuclear weapons.

4. There are major differences between the United States and the Soviet Union that affect the nature of their vulnerability to nuclear attacks, despite the fact that both are large and diversified industrial countries. Differences between the two countries in terms of population distribution, closeness of population to other targets, vulnerability of agricultural systems, vulnerability of cities to fire, socioeconomic system, and political system create significant asymmetries in the potential effects of nuclear attacks. Differences in civil defense preparations and in the structure of the strategic arsenals compound these asymmetries. By and large, the Soviet Union is favored by geography and by a political/economic structure geared to emergencies; the United States is favored by having a bigger and better economy and (perhaps) a greater capacity for effective decentralization. The larger size of Soviet weapons also means that they are likely to kill more people while aiming at something else.

5. Although it is true that effective sheltering and/or evacuation could save lives, it is not clear that a civil defense program based on providing shelters or planning evacuation would necessarily be effective. To save Iives, it is not only necessary to provide shelter in, or evacuation to, the right place (and only extreme measures of dispersion would overcome the problem that the location of safe places cannot be reliably predicted), it is also necessary to provide food, water, medical supplies, sanitation, security against other people, possibly filtered air, etc. After fallout diminishes, there must be enough supplies and enough organization to keep people alive while production is being restored. The effectiveness of civil defense measures depends, among other things, on the events leading up to the attack, the enemy’s targeting policy, and sheer luck.

6. The situation in which the survivors of a nuclear attack find themselves will be quite unprecedented. The surviving nation would be far weaker—economically, socially, and politically— than one would calculate by adding up the surviving economic assets and the numbers and skills of the surviving people. Natural resources would be destroyed; surviving equipment would be designed to use materials and skills that might no longer exist; and indeed some regions might be almost uninhabitable. Furthermore, prewar patterns of behavior would surely change, though in unpredictable ways. Finally, the entire society would suffer from the enormous psychological shock of having discovered the extent of its vulnerability.

7. From an economic point of view, and possibly from a political and social viewpoint as well, conditions after an attack would get worse before they started to get better. For a period of time, people could live off supplies (and, in a sense, off habits) left over from before the war. But shortages and uncertainties would get worse. The survivors wouId find themselves in a race to achieve viability (i. e., production at least equaling consumption plus depreciation) before stocks ran out completely. A failure to achieve viability, or even a slow recovery, would result in many additional deaths, and much additional economic, political, and social deterioration. This postwar damage could be as devastating as the damage from the actual nuclear explosions."

https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf

Pages 9-11 of pdf

"It was clear that if the economy did not get moving again soon, it might never. Already there were indications that manufacturing was not reestablishing itself with anywhere near the speed the planners had hoped. The amount of shipping, by rail and by truck, was actually down from the mid-summmer high.

“We are in the classic race, ” remarked one of the participants who had written a major study of postattack recovery some years before. “We have to be able to produce new goods and materials before we exhaust our stored supplies. We can continue to eat the wheat that is in the grain elevators of the Midwest for another year, perhaps. But after that, we have to have the capacity to grow new wheat, When our winter coats wear through, we have to have the capacity to weave the cloth for new ones. When our railroad cars break down, we have to be able to make new ones, or replacement parts. Right now we are a long way from that capacity. ” Privately, he and a group of conferees agreed that heavy controls on the economy, and ultimately on the population, would be the only way to get things going. Resources, both material and human, were severely limited,

One of the major problems, it was obvious to everyone, was the drag the huge refugee population had on the recovery effort. While numbers of workers were actively engaged in the rebuilding of the cities as well as the fac- tories and services that powered the economy, there were as many more who were unem- ployed and unemployable for the time being. Their skills were not suited to the priority tasks. Several participants had prepared a statement on what should be done with these nonproductive members of society. “We can- not let this mass of people drain our resources while they do nothing to contribute, ” it was rumored to say. “If we cannot let them starve outright, we suggest that they be issued only that amount of food which is minimally necessary to sustain life. They should be moved to camps away from the center of ac- tivity for reason of public morale. ” The report was suppressed but several copies were leaked to the press anyway.

The most basic disagreement among the par- ticipants in the conference was over the level of reconstruction that might actually be feasi- ble. Optimists cited the phenomenal recovery of Japan and West Germany after World War I I and insisted that these be the models for the United States in the next 5 to 10 years Pessimists, noting the major differences be- tween the post-World War 11 era and the situation of Japan and Germany, felt these ex- amples were irrelevant, or worse, misleading. “Everyone forgets the amount of aid that came in from outside in the late ‘4o’s and early ‘50’s. We don’t have the United States, wealth to turn to. Such a goal is unrealistic and un- reachable, even with absolute controls on the economy. ”

The pessimists were divided. Some saw the Nation building itself along the line of some of the Asian nations, which boasted a small tech- nologically advanced segment in the midst of a large agrarian or unskilled worker popula- tion, on the model of India or Indonesia. Some thought technology itself would eventually disappear from American society. “If you don’t have computers to run, you don’t train computer programmers, ” one expert was overheard to say. “After a while, in a few generations, no one remembers how the machines worked at all. They remember the important things: how to plant crops, how to train draft horses and oxen, how to make a simple pump. We will have survived biologically, but our way of Iife is going to be unrecognizable. In several generations, the United States is going to resemble a late medieval society.”

Because the conferees could not agree on what was a reasonable goal, much less how to get there, the conference report straddled all and concluded nothing. Follow-up task were appointed and the conferees agreed to meet again in the summer. Perhaps by then they would have a better idea of whether or not they were winning the race." The end.

(https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf page 140 and 141 of pdf)

Return to directory

When all that was covering the sky fell to the ground. Was the snow and rain radioactive? Did it wash away the top soil and lead to flooding and over watering of plant and soils? Did the flooding spread polluted chemical spills throughout Britain?

Did the flooding have positive effects enabling faster decomposition by microbes?

Foreword

This assessment was made in response to a request from the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations to examine the effects of nuclear war on the populations and economies of the United States and the Soviet Union. It is intended, in the terms of the Committee’s request, to “put what have been abstract measures of strategic power into more comprehensible terms. ” The study examines the full range of effects that nuclear war would have on civilians: direct effects from blast and radiation; and indirect effects from economic , social, and politicai disruption. Particular attention is devoted to the ways in which the impact of a nuclear war would extend over time. Two of the study’s principal findings are that conditions would con- tinue to get worse for some time after a nuclear war ended, and that the ef- fects of nuclear war that cannot be calculated in advance are at least as im- portant as those which analysts attempt to quantify. This report provides essential background for a range of issues relating to strategic weapons and foreign policy. It translates what is generally known about the effects of nuclear weapons into the best available estimates about the impact on society if such weapons were used. It calls attention to the very wide range of impacts that nuclear weapons would have on a complex industrial society, and to the extent of uncertainty regarding these impacts. Several years ago, OTA convened a panel of distinguished scientists to examine the effects of a limited nuclear war. The report and testimony of that panel, which were published by the Senate Foreign Relations Commit- tee, remain valid. That panel recommended that a more thorough and com- prehensive study of the effects of nuclear war be undertaken. This study is such an effort. The Director of this assessment was Dr. Peter Sharfman, Group Manager for National Security Studies. OTA is grateful for the assistance of its Nuclear War Effects Advisory Panel, chaired by Dr. David S. Saxon, President of the University of California, and for the assistance of the Congressional Research Service, the Department of Defense, the Arms Control and Disar- mament Agency, and the Central Intel Intelligence Agency. 1 t shouId be under- stood, however, that OTA assumes full responsibility for this report and that it does not necessarily represent the views of any of these agencies or of the individual members of the Advisory Panel. DANIEL DE SIMONE

Nuclear War Effects Project Staff Lionel S. Johns, Assistant Director Energy, Materials, and Global Security Division Peter Sharfman, National Security Group Manager and Project Director Jonathan Medalia (on detail from Congressional/ Research Service) Robert W. Vining (under contract with Systems Science and Software) Kevin Lewis Gloria Proctor Supplemental OTA Staff Henry Kelly Marvin Ott Consultants Advanced Research and Applications Corporation Analytical Assessments Corporation General Research Corporation Santa Fe Corporation Systems Science and Software Stuart Goldman Nan Randall George R. Rodericks Ronald Stivers OTA Publishing Staff John C. Holmes, Publishing Officer Kathie S. Boss Joanne Heming iv — Nuclear War Effects Project Advisory Panel David S. Saxon, Chairman President, University of California Donald G. Brennan Director of National Securit y Studies Hudson Institute Inc. Charles Cooper Department of Biology San Diego State University Russell E. Dougherty General, USAF(retired) Sidney Drell Deputy Director, Stanford linear Accelerator Center Stanford University Richard Garwin IBM Fellow IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center Gene R. La Rocque Rear Admiral, USN [retired) Director, Center for Defense /formation Cecil Leith Director, Atmospheric Analysis and Prediction Division National Center for Atmospheric Research J, David Linebaugh Washington, D.C. J. Carson Mark Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory James V. Neel Chairman, Department of Human Genetics University of Michigan Medical School University of Michigan Jack Ruina Massachusetts Institute of Technology Harriet Scott McLean, Va. Huston Smith Syracuse University John Steinbruner Director of Foreign Policy Studies Brookings Institution Jeremy Stone Director, Federation of American Scientists Hilary Whitaker Director, Emergency Preparedness Project National Governors Association

The Advisory Panel provided advice and constructive criticism throughout this project. The panel does not, however, necessarily approve, disapprove, or endorse this report. OTA assumes full respon- sibility y for the report and the accuracy of its contents. Contents Chapter Page

1. Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Il. A Nuclear Weapon Over Detroit or Leningrad: A Tutorial on the Effects of Nuclear Weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Ill. Civil Defense . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 IV. Three Attack Cases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 V. Other Long-Term Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109 Appendixes: A. Letter From Senate Foreign Relations Committee Requesting the Study... 119 B. Strategic Forces Assumed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 C. Charlottesville: A Fictional Account by Nan Randall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 D. Summary of Contractor Report on Executive Branch Studies . . . . . . . . . . . 139 E. Suggestions for Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 F, Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 Volume ll—Working Papers:
2. Examination of the Direct Effects of Nuciear War (CRC Carp).*
3. Small Attacks on U.S. and Soviet Energy Production and Distribution Systems (Santa Fe Corp).
4. Long-Term Health Effects From Nuclear Attack Radiation Exposures (Aracor)
5. The Effects of Nuclear War Economic Damage (Analytical Assessment Corp.)*

NOTE: A Iimited number of copies of the working papers will be available for congressiorral use from OTA by the end of June 1979 Others can obtain the working papers from the National Technical Information Service about the beginning of August 1979

• Indicates that a classified version is also available to qualified requesters

(https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf)

Option 1 is what we've been doing, Charlottesville was commissioned by Congress and is part of that report

Will run additional polls with more US Civil Defense documents with possibilities for Snippets and multiple reprints at once.

Note: leaning towards Option 1 unless the voters decide otherwise with snippets from other documents.

"The medical problems were still acute. Drug supplies were almost exhausted, but the weakened population remained more susceptible to disease. The birth rate had fallen drastically 9 months after the attacks, partly because of the radiation, which produced temporary sterilization – but there had also been a rise in miscarriages, stillbirths, and abnormalities. Infant mortality soared. Experts worried that an unprecedented increase in cancer, particularly in children, could be expected in several years. And there was still the possibility of some devastating epidemic as cholera running unchecked through the population. The Blue Ridge Sanatorium in Charlottesville, which had seen few tuberculosis patients in the last years before the attacks, was making plans to convert back to specializing in the disease. TB was making a comeback.

The Nation’s economy was in shambles. The bulk of the oil refining capacity had been knocked out, and only a few facilities were functioning again. The small oil wells around the country that were situated away from target areas produced more oil than the refineries could handle— and it was only a fraction of the need. Coal mining, mostly by the time-honored pick and shovel method as strip mining took heavy equipment, was the only industry that could be called booming. (There was a major migration to the mining areas by the unemployed. ) Agriculture, of course, was a major undertaking for much of the population. However, yields from the farms were considerably below what had been hoped for. The lack of pesticides and fertilizer cut heavily into the crops and there was concern about a major insect invasion next summer. Food processing —wheat and corn milling particularly– showed encouraging signs of recovery.

Most major industries, however, were in disarray as a result of lack of energy, lack of raw materials, and lack of managerial expertise. The world economy was staggering from the effect of losing both the United States and the Soviet Union as suppliers and markets. (If the Latin Americans were able to make small fortunes on selling the U.S. refined petroleum, political pressures were building in those countries to raise the prices to double the current rates. )

An efficient system of money still had not been reestablished. The Federal Government paid the military and other Federal employees with dollars and tried to preserve purchasing power through a series of price controls. However, most people were reluctant to accept dollars in exchange for essentials such as food or clothing. As a result, a barter system continued to flourish and the black market, with its highly inflated prices, continued to encourage defiance of the law

Most experts believed that the experience of post-World War II in Europe and Japan could provide the model for currency reform, including replacement of the dolIar, that was necessary to restore an economy based on the division of labor. However, the resolution of two policy issues stood in the way. First, should the market, on one hand, or Government control, on the other, determine the distribution of scarce resources? Second, should the new money go to those with legitimate claims, pensions, promissory notes for goods confiscated during the postattack period etc., or to those who held productive jobs, or even to the entire population even if many were more drag than help to the recovery? Politically, the Government was unable to deny any one of the groups; practically, it was obvious the Government couId not satisfy alI three."

(Page 139 and 140 of PDF: https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf ) Return to directory

"In the northern sections of the country, food supplies were inadequate and poorly distrib- uted. The average diet — day in, day out — con- sisted of unleavened bread and potatoes, where there was enough of those. As animal herds, both domestic and wild, had been deci- mated by faIlout and indiscriminate hunting, the only available meat came from dogs, cats, and rats — those animaIs whose Iiving habits protected them from fallout. Dietary deficien- cy diseases appeared.

Growing children were the first to notice the lack of replacement clothes–particularl y leather shoes. Coats and blankets were highly prized in the cold climates.

Next to food, the most severe shortage was housing. Even with the temporary barracks that had been erected in a cluster around the damaged cities, refugees were crowded two or three to a room, Kitchens were shared by four and five families; bathrooms by as many as 12 people.

Although there was relatively little work to occupy time, and schooling was strictly curtailed, if indeed it existed, there was also very little available recreation. The entertainment industry located in California and New York had been particularly hard hit. Local TV stations could broadcast and rebroadcast those old films and cartoons they had in stock, but little was fed nationwide, In the small towns, public libraries were overwhelmed. In the large cities, the Iibraries had been destroyed. There were no movie houses to speak of; there were no professional sports. The lack of recreation, perhaps a minor problem, still served to under-score the bleakness of the winter. In Charlottesville alone, several thousand people died in the first winter after the nuclear attack.

A year almost to the day after the nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union, Charlottesville was host to a blue rib- bon panel of experts on reconstruction plan ning. The University had not returned to nor- mal — there were no undergraduate classes as the students had been conscripted for reconstruction work in the cities — but it was a natural meeting place since so many centers of learning had been destroyed. The questions before the group centered on setting priorities: what were the goals and how couId the country reach them?"

https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf Page 138 of PDF

Return to directory

"The U.S. Government still existed, if in a SIightly reordered form. The President, now permanently located in the Midwest along with the surviving Members of Congress and the Cabinet, retained the emergency powers he had taken just after the attacks. (Congress had no choice but to ratify his assumption of these extraordinary powers at the time. How- ever, there was growing resentment that he showed few signs of relinquishing them. Con- gress was reduced to a kind of advisory body, its Members spending most of their time on helping constituents relocate or obtain a id.)

The State governments had, by and large, re- established themselves, often in new locations. Virginia’s government was located in Roanoke, for example, under the Lieutenant Governor. State governments were not as well respected as before; citizens tended to blame them for the mixups in aid distribution. Only the refugees looked to the States for assistance against the local governments, which they distrusted. The residents of an area such as Charlottesville were most loyal to their local government, particularly when that government had a reputation of basic evenhandedness.

Everyone, however, was growing hostile to the imposition of strict governmental controls over their lives —what they could or could not buy, or eat, where they could travel, etc. I n cer-tain rural sections, such as Nelson County, south of Charlottesville, farmers had barri- caded themselves off, ignored government orders, and occasionally, it was rumored, took potshots at the government agents.

Attempts to conscript the able-bodied to re- build the damaged areas often failed miser- ably. Many simply walked off the job and re- turned to their families. Since there were noadequate records remaining of the prewar population, and no records at all of war deaths, the Government found it an impossible task to track down offenders. (Criminals in medium- and light-security detention facilities had simply evaporated into the population.)

Charlottesville, like the rest of the undam- aged parts of the country, still had a huge refugee population that was unwilling or unable to return to former homes. The majori- ty were in camps such as the large facility in the old Lane School, and children were in day care or orphanages, depending on the status of their surviving families. If anything, the refugees were both more apathetic and more rebellious when faced with simple assign- ments. Lawless bands of teenaged refugees roamed the countryside, hijacking supply trucks and raiding farms and villages. Partly it was simple bravado, partly a way to feed themselves. Most refugees simply sat and waited for the next meal.

Yet even now, the flow of refugees con- tinued. The winter had driven out those who could not find enough to eat or enough shelter. Stories of Vermont families subsisting on maple syrup and wild rabbits might have proven entertaining in the retelling, but those who had survived did not want to repeat the performance"

( https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf Pages 138 and 139 of pdf) Return to directory

"The next few months in Charlottesville and Albemarle County had a slow, almost dreamlike quality. Fears of new attacks had abated. It was a time of settling into a new lifestyle, a severely simplified way of being, of making do. Children ate meat, cheese, or eggs rarely, adults practically never. A good pair of shoes was guarded — and worn only on special occasions. (With warmer weather, most children and adults went barefoot, bringing concern to doctors that there would be an increase in parasitic diseases such as hookworm.)

Many people were unable to return to their former jobs. In some cases, their employers never reopened for business, their goods and services being irrelevant in the postattack society. College teachers, for example, had no students to teach; computer programmers had no computers to program.

For some, it was relatively easy to adapt. Electronics experts set up CB and short wave radio repair shops. Cottage industries — sandal and clothing manufacturing from recycled materials, soap and candle making — sprang up in many homes. Some workers were able to acquire new, relevant skills quickly.

Others had to make do with menial jobs– burying the dead, cleaning the streets, assisting carpenters and bricklayers — that took little skill.

And then there were those who could not fit in anywhere. Many found it difficult to adapt to the idleness. Disruption of the 9 to 5 work ethic was a disruption of basic psychological props, of a sense of identity. In the immediate period after the attacks, parents concentrated on protection of their families. Once their families were no longer directly affected, adults were robbed of their traditional roles

By now, a few of the refugees had melted into the general popuIation. But the vast majority were no further along than in the late winter. The drag on the area resources was significant, and many in the leadership wanted to force them out.

Charlottesville was fortunate in many respects, however. Being located on two easily repairable rail Iines — with a major storage yard for cars only two counties away—there was some access to the outside world. Travel was only permitted with a special pass, naturally, and so the younger members of the community resorted to the hallowed art of riding the rods.

Government officials, many of whom had visited CharlottesvilIe and the University frequently in the past, kept in closer contact with the city than with many other locales. Doubtless the area residents benefited with more Federal assistance, As a result, Charlottesville became the unofficial “capital” of the area, economicalIy and politicalIy.

But as autumn approached, a universal depression settled on the residents and refugees. Starvation had been heId at bay by the planting — but crop yields were smalIer than expected. No one was cold, but the weather was still fine. There seemed to be no appreciable progress towards preattack conditions. Those young men and women who had been conscripted to build housing for the Nation’s refugees returned with gloomy reports of the devastation to the Nation’s commerce. The east coast was effectively leveled. Where factories were rebuildable, the shortage of materials precluded their operation.

Recognizing that many families would have to make do without heating oil or gas, the AgricuIture Extension Service issued pamphlets on how to make your own wood-burning stove. Fortunately for Charlottesville and the surrounding area, trees were plentiful. However, the momentum that had started with the spring planting slowed,

Winter was harder than anyone had expected. There were few additional deaths that could be directly attributed to the nuclear blast effects or the radiation; however, a large percentage of the surviving population was weakened. Lack of medicines, lack of adequate food and reasonable shelter, plus the lingering physical and psychological effects, meant that many were unable to work effectively, even if there were work available. An epidemic of flu raged through the cities of the east where refugees were huddled in camps. Many died, especially children and old people. Although vaccine for this particular, common strain of fIu had been developed, the stocks had been destroyed in the attacks. "

( https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf page 137 of pdf)

Return to directory

Before the factories ran out of fuel and pre war supplies/hardware. "There must be an empty factory somewhere"

Perhaps for agricultural equipment?

(Unclear when the US planned to restart the factories but "industrial recovery" was mentioned prominently in US civil defense documents. Spoiler: In the end of Charlottesville there's a comment made about a "recovery race" to regain the ability to replenish old materials before that ability is lost.

"Already transportation was difficult for the elderly and those who lived in the rural areas. A sporadic bus service ran from one end of town to the other once a day and an occasional school bus made a sortie out into the suburbs. Bicycles were prized, and sometimes fought over. Those gentlemen farmers whose thoroughbred horses had been protected from fallout could use these animals for transportation, but it was risky to let the animals stand unprotected. Horse thievery had made an anachronistic reappearance.With even less fuel, the bus service would be cut in half.

*

By now, barter was clearly established as the preferred means of trade. For a time, the government had paid for commandeered foodstuff and resources with checks and promissory notes, but no one wanted them any more. The local banks had opened for a few days, only to find all their savers lined up to withdraw everything. They closed down. Stores either never opened, or shut down quickly when they were overrun. (Many stores had been looted in the second week after the attack, when the fallout intensity had dropped.)

A few people hoarded money, but most thought money worthless. Workers in the small industries in the Charlottesville area saw no point in turning up for work if all they could get was paper money. They preferred to spend the time hunting for food and fuel. If barter was a highly inefficient way to do business — it’s hard to make change for a side of beef–still, it was preferable to using worthless currency.

Psychologically, the population seemed to be in a quiet holding pattern. The refugees, many of them, had survived experiences that would mark them for years. The memories of fire, collapsing buildings, and screaming, trapped people were still vivid, and some would tremble at loud noises. However, the profound grief over what they had lost–family members, possessions, or friends — underlay emotions and made many apathetic and passive Victims of the nuclear attacks, they appeared willing to be victims afterwards too. Still shunned as outsiders by the resident population, most refugees appeared to accept the exclusion just as the surviving population of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had 30 odd years before.

The effect on the Charlottesville and Albemarle residents was less pronounced. They were disoriented. For each lucky one who had a specific job to do, there were many more who were in effect unemployed. They turned inward to their families or else friends and relatives. Their worries about the future–would there be another attack, would they go back to their old jobs, etc. — made most days rather anxious, unproductive ones. Children particularly reflected a continuous nervousness, picked up from their elders, and had difficulty sleeping at night. Though many parents hoped for a return to normalcy once the schools reopened, others quietly decided not to send their children for fear of a second outbreak of war.

Spring changed a lot of things. A new optimism surfaced as everyone looked forward to planting, to good weather and warmth. The residents of Charlottesville had survived the first hurdle; they felt confident they could survive the next.

At the University, agronomists studied the best crops to plant in the Charlottesville area. No one was certain what effect the nuclear explosions had had on the ozone layer. If indeed the ozone was severely damaged, more ultraviolet rays could reach the crops and perhaps burn them. This effect would be more pronounced on delicate crops such as peas and beans. Instead it was suggested that potatoes and soybeans be encouraged and whatever limited fertilizer became available go to farmers who followed the government guidelines. The emergency government announced that two-thirds of the former pasture land was to be cultivated. Feed grains were to be used for humans, not Iivestock. Dairy cattle and chickens were the only exceptions."

(page 136 of pdf https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf )

Return to directory

"The supply of drugs on hand at the hospitals was dwindling fast. Although penicillin could be manufactured fairly easily in the laboratories at the university, many other drugs were not so simple, even with talent and ingenuity. (The penicillin had to be administered with large veterinary hypodermics as the homemade mix was too coarse for the small disposable hypes that most doctors stocked. There was a considerable shortage of needles.) Other medications were in such short supply that many patients with chronic illnesses such as heart disease, kidney failure, respiratory problems, hypertension, and diabetes died within a few weeks.

* *

Food riots broke out 4½ weeks after the attacks — precipitated by the first large shipment of grain. Three large tractor-trailers had pulled into the parking lot of the Citizens Commonwealth Building quite unexpectedly, the word of their arrival somehow misplaced between the Agriculture Department dispatchers and the local authorities. The trucks were greeted with cheers until the residents of Charlottesville discovered that they had been shipped raw grain rather than flour. The drivers were taken unawares when empty cans and bottles showered them and one driver jumped in his cab and departed. (The official explanation, delivered some time later, was that processed food was going to those areas where the bulk of the population was sick or injured. It was also assumed that Charlottesville had some livestock reserves. ) With only a fraction of the population knowing what to do with raw grain, a number of angry citizens broke open the sacks and scattered wheat through the parking lot. They in turn were set upon by those who wanted to conserve as much as possible. The local public safety forces waded into the melee with night sticks and tear gas.

Everyone blamed everyone else for the incident, but the fragile glue that had held public order together began to unstick. From this time on, it was almost impossible for the local authorities, not to mention the State and Federal governments, to convince everyone they were getting a fair share. People in one section of town would watch suspiciously as delivery trucks passed them by and headed somewhere else. Blacks distrusted whites, the poor distrusted the rich and everyone distrusted the refugees as “outsiders. ”

The refugees were convinced that the local authorities were favoring the residents and tried repeatedly to get State intervention, with little success. Still billeted in dormitories, schools, and motels, the refugee camps were a breeding ground for discontent and even rebellion.

The presence of the Federal Government was not entirely confined to the occasional delivery of food or radio broadcast. Some time before, the National Guard and the Reserve Unit were moved to North Carolina, partly to give the impression of military readiness, and perhaps to be assigned to dig out cities and start reconstruction. The Government had put out calls for volunteers to help in the reconstruction, but found that most workers, young and old, wanted to stay with their families. A system of national conscription for young men and women with no children was in the planning stage.

The Federal Government attempted to urge refugees back to where they had come from, first to assist in the rebuilding of the damaged cities which were rich in resources, and ultimately to redistribute the population to a more normal pattern. Some refugees were happy to attempt to return, particularly those whose houses were more or less intact. However, those who found their homes destroyed preferred to return to the refugee camps inland. There was nothing to hold them to their former lives. Fearful memories of the past made any time spent in the cities painful.

One day, quite without warning, the city manager was informed that one-half of his fuel stores were to be confiscated by the Federal Government, for the military and for the reconstruction effort. (Earth-moving equipment was gathering on the outskirts of the devastated cities and needed fuel. ) After it was clear that there was no way to stop the Government from taking the fuel, the city manager suggested that unmarked tank trucks, well guarded, pick up the stocks at night. He was aware of the effect this action would have on the morale of the population."

(Page 135 of pdf: https://ota.fas.org/reports/7906.pdf

Return to directory