Hiroshima/Nagasaki vs conventional B-17 bombing

hiroshima facts wrote in message .. .
"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...
This will probably appear in the wrong place thanks to a buggy news server.

hiroshima facts wrote in message
"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message
. ..
hiroshima facts wrote in message
I tried to track down the 50% claim, and it apparently is based on
"Medical Effects of the Atomic Bomb in Japan" published by Oughterson
in 1956. I don't have that on hand, but I understand that on page 84,
they say that 48% of people within 2 km of ground zero were killed.
And "within 2 km of ground zero" was counted as the "affected area"
for the estimate I was quoting.
In which case the affected area being defined as significantly less than
the area of blast and fire damage. There were deaths and damage
beyond the 2 km/6,600 feet radius.

I'm guessing the estimate tried to pick the area where most of the
buildings were leveled, and came up with 2 KM. Since a modern nuclear
attack that wanted to level a city would use either large enough
warheads (or a large enough numbers of warheads) to level everything,
this seems fair to me, although perhaps I should use a more precise
term than "area affected".

Let us understand this, fair for nuclear weapons is looking at the
most damaged areas when computing lethality. Fair for conventional
weapons is looking at a much bigger area, where damage is not as
severe in places when computing lethality.

I think the comparison was using the area where most buildings were
razed to the ground in each case.

I suggest you go look up the various damage levels involved in the
different attacks instead of telling us you are "facts" when you are
supplying "thoughts". Someone decided to use 2km as the radius
to measure the lethality for the nuclear strikes but a much larger
area for the conventional strikes, skewing the results.

There are zones of far more intense damage with nukes, such as the
zone exposed to at least a 20 PSI overpressure.

Ever seen the pictures of ground zero for a 4,000 pound HE bomb,
the RAF heavy bomber standard weapon in 1944/45?

Fair also seems to be assuming multiple larger atomic attacks,

Since a modern nuclear attack would use enough nukes to achieve
whatever level of damage was desired, I don't see why it isn't fair to
consider that.

Let us understand this, it is "fair" to compare lethality of conventional
and nuclear attacks from WWII by assuming the nuclear attacks are
multiple, modern attacks. It looks like the biggest conventional raid
in WWII was around 1/3 the size of the smallest nuclear weapon used
in terms of explosive power. So now we compare delivering what,
10 to 100 times more explosive power and announce hey the bigger
strike is more lethal.

Congratulations.

Now stop comparing the lethality of conventional and nuclear attacks
from WWII which were nothing like the new "fair" standard. How
about we change the HE bombs into biowar weapons, then call
that "fair".

I also think it would also be fair to count any intensity/numbers of
conventional bombs that are within the limits of practicality for
delivering the attack.


The limit on conventional delivery of explosives is aircraft over
target, the Lancaster delivered around 10,000 pounds of
bombs, put a modern bomber on the job and the number goes
up by a factor of 4 or so. Or simply switch to a combination
of conventional bombing and missile strikes to increase the
explosive delivery rate.

Just as the WWII limitations on nuclear strikes have gone
away, keep the bomb small enough for the aircraft to survive,
the limitations on delivering conventional bombs have been
significantly reduced.

But I think with conventional bombs there will always be a large
number who will be able to successfully flee the firestorm before it
takes hold, no matter how intense the bombing.

Hamburg was so lethal because of the firestorm killing people
in otherwise safe shelters. Normally the best thing to do in an
air raid is get into a shelter. Large numbers of people running
away on the surface are going to be killed by blast, stampedes,
vehicle collisions and so on.

presumably also against unwarned populations.

I think it is reasonable to account for that. I just don't think it
accounts for *all* the difference. Also, given that a nuclear strike
can hit with very little warning, there might not be much time for a
population to prepare.

Now what are we comparing? WWII conventional air raids to
ICBMs? The IJN strike on Pearl Harbor used around 0.1 to 0.15
kt of bombs, killed 2,400 people. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima
was around 100 times more powerful, it should have killed 240,000
people at this level of lethality. Take away the people killed on the
Arizona and you still end up with the Hiroshima bomb needing to
kill around 120,000 for equivalent lethality.

Try to understand the results of air raids in WWII varied dramatically,
using 2 attacks to generalise the effects is an exercise in selective
quotation, not facts.

The two things that strike me as being unique about nukes is that they
can take out an large area rapidly, giving no time to flee once the
attack starts, and the prompt radiation kills people in the areas of
heavier damage who might otherwise survive the blast.

Again this assumes people are unprotected and ignores the fact
fleeing during an attack is likely to raise the number of dead. The
protection from blast gives good protection from radiation.

A machine gun can kill thousands of people per hour if they have
no protection.

It is also different to the measure used for Tokyo, since it does not
use dead plus homeless, substituting a 2 km circle instead. It makes
the atomic attacks look more lethal by changing the choice of
measurement. The comparison between the two as reported is
therefore invalid.
The Tokyo raid destroyed 16 square miles, which is the area of a
circle of around 2.25 miles or 3.6 km in radius, what was the death
toll like for the 2 km circle?
As far as I know, there was no concentration of deaths in the Tokyo
raid that would change the ratio if we focused on a smaller area.

Actually there were concentrations of deaths, the canals and rivers
became choked with bodies as people tried to escape the heat,
the incoming tide caused drownings.

But that is due to the geography of the target, not the nature of the
bomb. And the people only ended up in that concentration because they
ran there once the bombing started.

They ended up in the canals because the fires cut off retreat. The
districts that were cut off by fire had the higher death rates.


It all came down to whether the fires cut off people's retreat, if they
did not more people survived. There was not an even x deaths per
square mile in the "affected area", as a simple exercise in logic
the people at the fringes had a better chance of escaping.

I think it would be fair to trim off the fringe areas and count the
casualty rate in the core area.

Now we have "core area" to go with "area affected". Understand
there are plenty of raids in WWII that killed more people than the
atomic strikes per ton of explosive dropped. Even in terms of
absolute numbers killed Hiroshima comes in at 1 or 2 with Tokyo,
Nagasaki at 4 behind Hamburg at 3, Dresden at 5.

Are there *any* instances of conventional weapons ever killing more
than 8% (either of the "area affected" or the "area leveled")?

Yes night of 23/24 February 1945 RAF Bomber Command versus
Pforzheim. The city, pre war population of 80,000, had been the
target of Mosquito harassment raids by night plus some day strikes
in the order of 100 to 300 tons of bombs before the big raid. On
23/34 February 1945 some 1,740 tons of bombs caused a firestorm,
around 17,000 to 18,000 people killed on this night. This raid was
responsible for most of the damage to the city during hostilities.
Some 83% of the built up area destroyed for the war. In terms
of deaths per bomb it works out to a maximum of 1 death per 190
pounds of bombs, around 2/3 the lethality of the Hamburg firestorm.

Assuming no growth in population the Pforzheim raid's lethality works
out at 21 to 23% of the total population, but around 20% of the city
survived, so 5/4 times 21 to 22 is 26 to 28%.

Thanks. I didn't know their proportion got so high.

I presume though this has no effect on the claims about the relative
lethalities of nuclear and conventional attacks.

Simply given the reality there are only two atomic strikes to go on
and their lethality per "ton" of bomb varied so much and they were
against unwarned populations, and the variability seen in WWII
conventional bombing means claims about how much more lethal
atomic weapons can be do not have solid evidence to back them.
Hopefully it stays this way. As I said before I would expect a higher
lethality for nuclear weapons thanks to the instantaneous nature of
much of the damage and the much higher "explosive" yield, how
much higher is another question.

I don't see what lethality per ton has to do with it.

It has everything to do with it if you want to compare conventional
and nuclear attack lethalities, otherwise why not simply compare
the lethality of say 2 Zeppelins in WWI and 100 Lancasters in WWII.
No guess as to which one kills more people.

No matter how much conventional explosive is dropped on a city, a lot
of people are still going to be able to flee the raid once it starts.
This is something that nukes can overcome.

Sigh, to minimise casualties move people before or after the raid,
not during it, keep shelters away from flammable areas, keep the
people in the shelters during the raid. Movement during a raid is
obscured by smoke and dust and exposes people to shrapnel,
blast, stampedes and rapidly changing conditions, the "bridge" to
safety being hit for example, the confusion as landmarks are
destroyed or obscured.

In WWII the lethality of conventional attacks varied widely, starting
large fires was the usual way of killing large numbers of people,
incendiary bombs were the best way to start fires. The WWII
nuclear attacks were at least 3 times more powerful in explosive
terms than the biggest conventional raid, but the biggest conventional
raid was not the most lethal, in either absolute terms or deaths per ton
of bombs used.

So far instead of supplying facts you are supplying opinions and
showing a great lack of knowledge about the results of conventional
air raids. Then you bias the definitions to make the nuclear attacks
look more dangerous.

Geoffrey Sinclair
Remove the nb for email.

"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...

I suggest you go look up the various damage levels involved in the
different attacks instead of telling us you are "facts" when you are
supplying "thoughts". Someone decided to use 2km as the radius
to measure the lethality for the nuclear strikes but a much larger
area for the conventional strikes, skewing the results.


OK, here is my version, based on damage levels:

Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.

I expect that this will result in 99.9999% casualties amongst any part
of the populace within the 100 PSI zone that is not inside an
inconspicuous 100 PSI blast shelter.

Had WWII continued, our weapons output in early 1946 should have been
able to produce enough A-bombs every three months to achieve that
level of destruction over an area of 3.5 square miles.


I expect that no conventional weapons attack, from any era you choose,
could achieve that level of casualties.




Fair also seems to be assuming multiple larger atomic attacks,

Since a modern nuclear attack would use enough nukes to achieve
whatever level of damage was desired, I don't see why it isn't fair to
consider that.

Let us understand this, it is "fair" to compare lethality of conventional
and nuclear attacks from WWII by assuming the nuclear attacks are
multiple, modern attacks. It looks like the biggest conventional raid
in WWII was around 1/3 the size of the smallest nuclear weapon used
in terms of explosive power. So now we compare delivering what,
10 to 100 times more explosive power and announce hey the bigger
strike is more lethal.

Congratulations.

Since nuclear weapons have to potential to provide much more explosive
power than can be achieved by conventional weapons, and thus kill far
more people than can be achieved by conventional weapons, I think it
is fair to note this when comparing nukes to conventional weapons.

You seem to be simultaneously acknowledging this fact and taking issue
with me for also stating it.




Now stop comparing the lethality of conventional and nuclear attacks
from WWII which were nothing like the new "fair" standard. How
about we change the HE bombs into biowar weapons, then call
that "fair".

I acknowledge that bioweapons are equal to nukes in killing people.
They are considered WMDs for very good reason.

It would also be possible to combine bioweapons with conventional
weapons, and get the casualty levels and property destruction that a
nuke would produce.




presumably also against unwarned populations.

I think it is reasonable to account for that. I just don't think it
accounts for *all* the difference. Also, given that a nuclear strike
can hit with very little warning, there might not be much time for a
population to prepare.

Now what are we comparing? WWII conventional air raids to
ICBMs?

I think nukes have more potential to spring a sudden attack on a
population than conventional weapons do, at any level of technology.

This will probably appear in the wrong place thanks to a buggy news server

hiroshima facts wrote in message . ..
"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...

I suggest you go look up the various damage levels involved in the
different attacks instead of telling us you are "facts" when you are
supplying "thoughts". Someone decided to use 2km as the radius
to measure the lethality for the nuclear strikes but a much larger
area for the conventional strikes, skewing the results.

OK, here is my version,

No this is not a version, this is a change of subject, from the fact
the definitions were changed when comparing the lethality of
WWII nuclear and conventional attacks.

based on damage levels:

Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.

I see, bomb shelters that are conspicuous, direct hit, I presume
you have noticed the accuracy of the nuclear weapons strikes,
the aiming points were missed. I presume you have noticed the
average accuracy of WWII bombers dropping from 30,000 feet.
I presume all the aircraft release together and achieve a perfect
bombing pattern, with no weapon caught in the blast of another
before it detonates.

Direct hits presumably mean ground bursts?

Why not parachute commandos in with machine guns and line
up the population and just shoot them? It seems as realistic.

Note deliberately targeting air raid shelters is more than any
air force did in WWII, also such structures would best be
attacked by armour piercing bombs.

I expect that this will result in 99.9999% casualties amongst any part
of the populace within the 100 PSI zone that is not inside an
inconspicuous 100 PSI blast shelter.

It is becoming clear that your assumptions are nuclear weapons
incredibly bad, definitions altered to suit. You can explain how
come 7% of the people caught within 1,000 feet survived the
real attacks despite no warning but you have decided to announce
only 1 survivor in a million for your hypothetical attack?

Had WWII continued, our weapons output in early 1946 should have been
able to produce enough A-bombs every three months to achieve that
level of destruction over an area of 3.5 square miles.

The Tokyo fire storm raid destroyed nearly 16 square miles or nearly
25% of all buildings in the city.

Right so we have nuclear attacks delivering 60 to 100,000 kt being
compared to conventional attacks delivering around 5% the explosive
yield. Furthermore the aircrew delivering the nuclear attacks have
superb intelligence and well above average accuracy, no weather
problems, interceptions, mechanical failures and so on.

The bomb tonnage delivered by the 20th Air Force looks like this,
month, tonnage

Jun-44 547
Jul-44 209
Aug-44 252
Sep-44 521
Oct-44 1,669
Nov-44 2,205
Dec-44 3,661
Jan-45 3,410
Feb-45 4,020
Mar-45 15,283
Apr-45 17,492
May-45 24,285
Jun-45 32,542
Jul-45 43,091
Aug-45 21,873

Now add the arrival of the previously European based bomber units
to the 1946 attacks if we are going to talk 1946, including RAF units.
After all there was still 75% of Tokyo to go.

I expect that no conventional weapons attack, from any era you choose,
could achieve that level of casualties.

This is hardly surprising, since the nuclear attacks are simply
allowed to be so good and so much bigger than the attacks
they are being compared to. The result was in before the
experiment was run.

Fair also seems to be assuming multiple larger atomic attacks,

Since a modern nuclear attack would use enough nukes to achieve
whatever level of damage was desired, I don't see why it isn't fair to
consider that.

Let us understand this, it is "fair" to compare lethality of conventional
and nuclear attacks from WWII by assuming the nuclear attacks are
multiple, modern attacks. It looks like the biggest conventional raid
in WWII was around 1/3 the size of the smallest nuclear weapon used
in terms of explosive power. So now we compare delivering what,
10 to 100 times more explosive power and announce hey the bigger
strike is more lethal.

Congratulations.

Since nuclear weapons have to potential to provide much more explosive
power than can be achieved by conventional weapons, and thus kill far
more people than can be achieved by conventional weapons, I think it
is fair to note this when comparing nukes to conventional weapons.

Try again, fair is comparing lethality versus the effort expended,
tonnage of explosives used for example, not by changing the
definitions.

You seem to be simultaneously acknowledging this fact and taking issue
with me for also stating it.

Now stop comparing the lethality of conventional and nuclear attacks
from WWII which were nothing like the new "fair" standard. How
about we change the HE bombs into biowar weapons, then call
that "fair".

Now stop comparing the lethality of conventional and nuclear attacks
from WWII which were nothing like the new "fair" standard. How
about we change the HE bombs into biowar weapons, then call
that "fair".

I acknowledge that bioweapons are equal to nukes in killing people.
They are considered WMDs for very good reason.

I suggest rather than changing the subject you start to analyse why
you need to bias the results in favour of nuclear weapons.

It would also be possible to combine bioweapons with conventional
weapons, and get the casualty levels and property destruction that a
nuke would produce.

It is also possible to achieve, with conventional weapons, the sorts of
lethalities that were seen in the nuclear attacks. It was also quite
possible to have minimal loss of life in a major conventional attack.
These are the results of thousands of WWII bombing raids. Trying
to selectively choose results and definitions to make the 2 nuclear
attacks look more lethal is foolish, after all in absolute terms
Nagasaki was around 1/2 the casualties, and in explosive terms
around 2/7 the casualties. Those figures alone should give pause
to the creation of wonder nuclear strikes.

deleted bits, to the next

The limit on conventional delivery of explosives is aircraft over
target, the Lancaster delivered around 10,000 pounds of
bombs, put a modern bomber on the job and the number goes
up by a factor of 4 or so. Or simply switch to a combination
of conventional bombing and missile strikes to increase the
explosive delivery rate.

Just as the WWII limitations on nuclear strikes have gone
away, keep the bomb small enough for the aircraft to survive,
the limitations on delivering conventional bombs have been
significantly reduced.

Hamburg was so lethal because of the firestorm killing people
in otherwise safe shelters. Normally the best thing to do in an
air raid is get into a shelter. Large numbers of people running
away on the surface are going to be killed by blast, stampedes,
vehicle collisions and so on.

presumably also against unwarned populations.

I think it is reasonable to account for that. I just don't think it
accounts for *all* the difference. Also, given that a nuclear strike
can hit with very little warning, there might not be much time for a
population to prepare.

Now what are we comparing? WWII conventional air raids to
ICBMs?

deleted text, to the next

"The IJN strike on Pearl Harbor used around 0.1 to 0.15
kt of bombs, killed 2,400 people. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima
was around 100 times more powerful, it should have killed 240,000
people at this level of lethality. Take away the people killed on the
Arizona and you still end up with the Hiroshima bomb needing to
kill around 120,000 for equivalent lethality.

Try to understand the results of air raids in WWII varied dramatically,
using 2 attacks to generalise the effects is an exercise in selective
quotation, not facts."

I think nukes have more potential to spring a sudden attack on a
population than conventional weapons do, at any level of technology.

I would have thought the sudden attack ability comes down to the
delivery system, aircraft, ICBM, shipping container, truck, and the
warning system in place to detect the approaching delivery system.
There are clear examples from WWII of populations ignoring
warnings until it was too late because the bombers had previously
always attacked somewhere else.

The rest of the post is simply deleted text,

Again this assumes people are unprotected and ignores the fact
fleeing during an attack is likely to raise the number of dead. The
protection from blast gives good protection from radiation.

A machine gun can kill thousands of people per hour if they have
no protection.

Now we have "core area" to go with "area affected". Understand
there are plenty of raids in WWII that killed more people than the
atomic strikes per ton of explosive dropped. Even in terms of
absolute numbers killed Hiroshima comes in at 1 or 2 with Tokyo,
Nagasaki at 4 behind Hamburg at 3, Dresden at 5.

It has everything to do with it if you want to compare conventional
and nuclear attack lethalities, otherwise why not simply compare
the lethality of say 2 Zeppelins in WWI and 100 Lancasters in WWII.
No guess as to which one kills more people.

Sigh, to minimise casualties move people before or after the raid,
not during it, keep shelters away from flammable areas, keep the
people in the shelters during the raid. Movement during a raid is
obscured by smoke and dust and exposes people to shrapnel,
blast, stampedes and rapidly changing conditions, the "bridge" to
safety being hit for example, the confusion as landmarks are
destroyed or obscured.

In WWII the lethality of conventional attacks varied widely, starting
large fires was the usual way of killing large numbers of people,
incendiary bombs were the best way to start fires. The WWII
nuclear attacks were at least 3 times more powerful in explosive
terms than the biggest conventional raid, but the biggest conventional
raid was not the most lethal, in either absolute terms or deaths per ton
of bombs used.

So far instead of supplying facts you are supplying opinions and
showing a great lack of knowledge about the results of conventional
air raids. Then you bias the definitions to make the nuclear attacks
look more dangerous.

Geoffrey Sinclair
Remove the nb for email.

On Fri, 2 Apr 2004 15:43:00 +1000, "Geoffrey Sinclair"
wrote:


Now add the arrival of the previously European based bomber units
to the 1946 attacks if we are going to talk 1946, including RAF units.


Quite, with AIR plans for 1000 odd Avro Lincolns coming to the party.

ISTR also talk of making them inflight refuelable.



greg

--
Cast in the name of God. Ye not guilty.

"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...
This will probably appear in the wrong place thanks to a buggy news server


Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.

I see, bomb shelters that are conspicuous, direct hit, I presume
you have noticed the accuracy of the nuclear weapons strikes,
the aiming points were missed.

Visual bombing gave reasonable accuracy. Good enough to get an A-bomb
close enough to hit any shelter that was noticed.




I presume you have noticed the
average accuracy of WWII bombers dropping from 30,000 feet.
I presume all the aircraft release together and achieve a perfect
bombing pattern, with no weapon caught in the blast of another
before it detonates.

The bombers could release together, or they could fly in one bomb
every few minutes. It would work either way.




Direct hits presumably mean ground bursts?

Yes. All the bombs in my example were ground bursts.




Why not parachute commandos in with machine guns and line
up the population and just shoot them? It seems as realistic.

Ground bursts were a perfectly realistic option using 1945 nuclear
technology.




Note deliberately targeting air raid shelters is more than any
air force did in WWII, also such structures would best be
attacked by armour piercing bombs.

A nearby groundburst from an A-bomb would be quite effective.




I expect that this will result in 99.9999% casualties amongst any part
of the populace within the 100 PSI zone that is not inside an
inconspicuous 100 PSI blast shelter.

It is becoming clear that your assumptions are nuclear weapons
incredibly bad, definitions altered to suit.

My assumptions are that nuclear weapons are incredibly effective.
They are perfectly capable of producing a 100 PSI shock.




You can explain how
come 7% of the people caught within 1,000 feet survived the
real attacks despite no warning but you have decided to announce
only 1 survivor in a million for your hypothetical attack?

None of the survivors experienced a 100+ PSI overpressure.

Everyone within the 100 PSI overpressure area in my example does
experience such a blast wave. In addition, many of them would be
directly exposed to fireball plasma, and to incredibly intense
radiation.

I included the one-in-a-million survivor just to be conservative in my
estimate.




Had WWII continued, our weapons output in early 1946 should have been
able to produce enough A-bombs every three months to achieve that
level of destruction over an area of 3.5 square miles.

The Tokyo fire storm raid destroyed nearly 16 square miles or nearly
25% of all buildings in the city.

Right so we have nuclear attacks delivering 60 to 100,000 kt being
compared to conventional attacks delivering around 5% the explosive
yield.

My example used about 1,000kt total explosive power.




Furthermore the aircrew delivering the nuclear attacks have
superb intelligence and well above average accuracy, no weather
problems, interceptions, mechanical failures and so on.

The bomb tonnage delivered by the 20th Air Force looks like this,
month, tonnage

Jun-44 547
Jul-44 209
Aug-44 252
Sep-44 521
Oct-44 1,669
Nov-44 2,205
Dec-44 3,661
Jan-45 3,410
Feb-45 4,020
Mar-45 15,283
Apr-45 17,492
May-45 24,285
Jun-45 32,542
Jul-45 43,091
Aug-45 21,873

Now add the arrival of the previously European based bomber units
to the 1946 attacks if we are going to talk 1946, including RAF units.
After all there was still 75% of Tokyo to go.

I saw nothing in any three month period that would equal 1,000kt worth
of explosive.




I expect that no conventional weapons attack, from any era you choose,
could achieve that level of casualties.

This is hardly surprising, since the nuclear attacks are simply
allowed to be so good and so much bigger than the attacks
they are being compared to. The result was in before the
experiment was run.

Nuclear weapons are allowed to be so much bigger because they ARE so
much bigger.

Had the war continued into 1946, our bomb output would have been
332.42 kilotons per month (although no single bomb would be over
50kt).




Since nuclear weapons have to potential to provide much more explosive
power than can be achieved by conventional weapons, and thus kill far
more people than can be achieved by conventional weapons, I think it
is fair to note this when comparing nukes to conventional weapons.

Try again, fair is comparing lethality versus the effort expended,
tonnage of explosives used for example, not by changing the
definitions.

It is fair to note that by providing much more tonnage of explosive
than could ever be provided by conventional weapons, nuclear weapons
can kill far more people.




Now stop comparing the lethality of conventional and nuclear attacks
from WWII which were nothing like the new "fair" standard. How
about we change the HE bombs into biowar weapons, then call
that "fair".

I acknowledge that bioweapons are equal to nukes in killing people.
They are considered WMDs for very good reason.

I suggest rather than changing the subject you start to analyse why
you need to bias the results in favour of nuclear weapons.

I have no need to bias anything. Nuclear weapons are far more deadly
than conventional weapons on their own, with no need of bias.




It is also possible to achieve, with conventional weapons, the sorts of
lethalities that were seen in the nuclear attacks.

How much conventional explosive do you think it would take to kill 50%
of the people in a 2km radius?

In article ,
(hiroshima facts) wrote:

"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message
...
This will probably appear in the wrong place thanks to a buggy news
server


Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.




I presume you have noticed the
average accuracy of WWII bombers dropping from 30,000 feet.
I presume all the aircraft release together and achieve a perfect
bombing pattern, with no weapon caught in the blast of another
before it detonates.

The bombers could release together, or they could fly in one bomb
every few minutes. It would work either way.



Before assuming that you can salvo nuclear weapons, or drop them in
formation, read up a bit on the "dense pack" model of ICBM basing. Also
consider the winds after the first burst.

Howard Berkowitz wrote in message ...

Before assuming that you can salvo nuclear weapons, or drop them in
formation, read up a bit on the "dense pack" model of ICBM basing. Also
consider the winds after the first burst.


I don't think they would be dropped quite *that* close to each other
in my example. And if we waited a few minutes between each drop, all
the really intense neutron activity would have diminished.

hiroshima facts wrote in message . ..
"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...
This will probably appear in the wrong place thanks to a buggy news server


deleted text,

"No this is not a version, this is a change of subject, from the fact
the definitions were changed when comparing the lethality of
WWII nuclear and conventional attacks."

Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.

I see, bomb shelters that are conspicuous, direct hit, I presume
you have noticed the accuracy of the nuclear weapons strikes,
the aiming points were missed.

Visual bombing gave reasonable accuracy. Good enough to get an A-bomb
close enough to hit any shelter that was noticed.


Ah yes, the myth of accurate visual bombing persists. Presumably
the atomic attacks have agreements with the rain gods so clouds
will not interfere with the clockwork precision attacks being used
in these make nuclear weapons look as bad as possible scenarios.

As an aside when the 8th Air Force measured accuracy in the final
4 months of 1944 it found in good visibility 64.3% of bombs landed
within 1/2 a mile, 91.5% within 3 miles. So a ground burst 1/2 a
mile away (1 in 3 bombs) is considered good enough to destroy
underground shelters, another myth.

The above accuracies were from around 20 to 25,000 feet. Moving
from a bombing altitude of 20,000 feet to 30,000 feet roughly doubled
the average error. The rate of increase in error went up as altitude
went up. The bombing errors at 20,000 feet were around 4/3 those at
10,000 feet on average.

I presume also the shape of the nuclear bombs will be altered to give
them the needed aerodynamic qualities to maximise accuracy

I presume you have noticed the
average accuracy of WWII bombers dropping from 30,000 feet.
I presume all the aircraft release together and achieve a perfect
bombing pattern, with no weapon caught in the blast of another
before it detonates.

The bombers could release together,

Ah yes the wonder hyper precision attack force, formation
bombing when the aircraft are dispersed to achieve the
wonder bomb pattern with no problems for the aircraft in the
middle to escape the blasts.

or they could fly in one bomb
every few minutes. It would work either way.

Ah yes, one wonders why more WWII attacks were not done like
this, maybe the chance for the defences to intercept individual
bombers? Maybe the way dust and smoke from the first strikes
played a part, dodge that mushroom cloud, go left at the next
mushroom cloud, now where are those landmarks again?

Direct hits presumably mean ground bursts?

Yes. All the bombs in my example were ground bursts.


Well that cuts down the casualties given topography, the shielding
effects of hills, see Nagasaki for a good example, and the energy
wasted digging a crater, as well as upping the chances of the
bomb failing to explode.

Why not parachute commandos in with machine guns and line
up the population and just shoot them? It seems as realistic.

Ground bursts were a perfectly realistic option using 1945 nuclear
technology.


Ah a change of subject, from giving the attackers far greater abilities
than historical, just ignore WWII experience, go with the 1930's the
bomber will always get through, and destroy civilisation.

Note deliberately targeting air raid shelters is more than any
air force did in WWII, also such structures would best be
attacked by armour piercing bombs.

A nearby groundburst from an A-bomb would be quite effective.

So how close and how big does a blast have to be in your
opinion to destroy an underground shelter?

I expect that this will result in 99.9999% casualties amongst any part
of the populace within the 100 PSI zone that is not inside an
inconspicuous 100 PSI blast shelter.

It is becoming clear that your assumptions are nuclear weapons
incredibly bad, definitions altered to suit.

My assumptions are that nuclear weapons are incredibly effective.
They are perfectly capable of producing a 100 PSI shock.


It is becoming clear that your assumptions are nuclear weapons
incredibly bad, definitions altered to suit.

You can explain how
come 7% of the people caught within 1,000 feet survived the
real attacks despite no warning but you have decided to announce
only 1 survivor in a million for your hypothetical attack?

None of the survivors experienced a 100+ PSI overpressure.

So we are talking about the 7% of people within 1,000 feet
who survived so presumably we are talking about the nuclear
explosions being within less than 1,000 feet of each other.

Everyone within the 100 PSI overpressure area in my example does
experience such a blast wave. In addition, many of them would be
directly exposed to fireball plasma, and to incredibly intense
radiation.

Presumably after being carefully staked out on the ground, in an
area of no cover etc.

I included the one-in-a-million survivor just to be conservative in my
estimate.


This is becoming very funny, we have the arrival of the nuclear
cluster bomb, multiple bursts so close together people are caught
well within the lethal blast radius of the individual bombs. What is
the radius being used for this 100 PSI overpressure?

Had WWII continued, our weapons output in early 1946 should have been
able to produce enough A-bombs every three months to achieve that
level of destruction over an area of 3.5 square miles.

The Tokyo fire storm raid destroyed nearly 16 square miles or nearly
25% of all buildings in the city.

Right so we have nuclear attacks delivering 60 to 100,000 kt being
compared to conventional attacks delivering around 5% the explosive
yield.

Oops my mistake above should be tons, not kilotons.

My example used about 1,000kt total explosive power.

This is good, given the larger atomic strike in WWII was 25 kt, so
we have 40 such weapons being used to make a 1 Megaton attack.

This will be launched in crystal clear weather, with no interceptions,
no interference from fires already started, with accurate intelligence
as to air raid shelters, with precision unheard of in WWII and is
still unheard of for free falling bombs from 30,000+ feet, against an
unwarned population, and so on.

Since we are now moving into mass produced weapons the problems
of fusing and weapons assembly need to be made clear. When the
allies inspected the unexploded bombs dropped on German oil
installations they found around 15% had not exploded, many due to
the tails falling off, but also fuses. A 2.5% failure rate would be 1
unexploded nuclear weapon per 40 weapon strike.

Just remember folks throw away all the perfects above and just
chant how bad nuclear weapons are, even though someone who
hides behind an assumed name needs to cook the books to prove it.

Furthermore the aircrew delivering the nuclear attacks have
superb intelligence and well above average accuracy, no weather
problems, interceptions, mechanical failures and so on.

The bomb tonnage delivered by the 20th Air Force looks like this,
month, tonnage

Jun-44 547
Jul-44 209
Aug-44 252
Sep-44 521
Oct-44 1,669
Nov-44 2,205
Dec-44 3,661
Jan-45 3,410
Feb-45 4,020
Mar-45 15,283
Apr-45 17,492
May-45 24,285
Jun-45 32,542
Jul-45 43,091
Aug-45 21,873

Now add the arrival of the previously European based bomber units
to the 1946 attacks if we are going to talk 1946, including RAF units.
After all there was still 75% of Tokyo to go.

I saw nothing in any three month period that would equal 1,000kt worth
of explosive.

Yet again we have someone giving their preferred outcome a
helping hand and trying to pretend the "competitor" will not also
improve.

Instead we have a 1 megaton atomic attack, 40 times the biggest
attack in WWII, with more precision than any WWII attack short of
those low level types, skip bombing ships or sending bombs through
the walls of Gestapo HQs.

It looks as though the peak month in the war in Europe saw around
150,000 tons of bombs dropped. The above figures for the 20th air
force were without any transferred units. How many Japanese cities
would be left by the time the nuclear weapons for the 1,000 kt strike
would be ready?

I expect that no conventional weapons attack, from any era you choose,
could achieve that level of casualties.

This is hardly surprising, since the nuclear attacks are simply
allowed to be so good and so much bigger than the attacks
they are being compared to. The result was in before the
experiment was run.

Nuclear weapons are allowed to be so much bigger because they ARE so
much bigger.

Ah yes, just ignore the way the definitions have been altered to make
them look even worse.

Had the war continued into 1946, our bomb output would have been
332.42 kilotons per month (although no single bomb would be over
50kt).

The above wonder attack at 1,000 kt would therefore take 3 months
supply of weapons once production reached this level, if indeed it
could do so in 1946.

I like the two digits precision when calculating yields given the 10%
variation in estimates of the yields of the weapons used.

Since nuclear weapons have to potential to provide much more explosive
power than can be achieved by conventional weapons, and thus kill far
more people than can be achieved by conventional weapons, I think it
is fair to note this when comparing nukes to conventional weapons.

Try again, fair is comparing lethality versus the effort expended,
tonnage of explosives used for example, not by changing the
definitions.

It is fair to note that by providing much more tonnage of explosive
than could ever be provided by conventional weapons, nuclear weapons
can kill far more people.

Especially if those weapons can be delivered with far better
accuracy than achieved historically and the methods for computing
lethality can be rigged in favour of the weapons.

Now stop comparing the lethality of conventional and nuclear attacks
from WWII which were nothing like the new "fair" standard. How
about we change the HE bombs into biowar weapons, then call
that "fair".

I acknowledge that bioweapons are equal to nukes in killing people.
They are considered WMDs for very good reason.

I suggest rather than changing the subject you start to analyse why
you need to bias the results in favour of nuclear weapons.

I have no need to bias anything. Nuclear weapons are far more deadly
than conventional weapons on their own, with no need of bias.

This is becoming funny, after setting up a hyper precision attack,
after altering the definitions to make the weapons look more lethal
the claim is no bias. If the weapons are that much more deadly there
is no need to rig the results.

The RAF used 2.7kt to kill 40,000 people at Hamburg, call it 3kt, now
multiply by 333 to give the RAF a 1,000 kt strike. Other attacks could
drop 3kt bombs and kill only a few people. Rather than trying to
understand this we have the attempts to use 2 (nuclear) strikes and
extrapolate them using the sort of precision and weather the modern
USAF would be envious of and multiplying the explosive yields by a
factor of 40 or more.

After all the Nagasaki bomb was around 10 times the explosive yield
of the Hamburg raid and killed fewer people. Yet we have a strike at
40 times the Nagasaki yield going in and casualties going up about
linearly, but then it is assumed to be a perfect strike.

It is also possible to achieve, with conventional weapons, the sorts of
lethalities that were seen in the nuclear attacks.

How much conventional explosive do you think it would take to kill 50%
of the people in a 2km radius?

I presume you have forgotten Pforzheim? I presume you have forgotten
40,000 deaths at Hamburg with less than 3,000 tons of bombs?

Oh sorry, I forgot, nuclear weapons are bigger bangs, so we now go
to those killed in the blast radius of an individual bomb, but wait I can
drop thousands of conventional bombs, each lethal to humans within
so many feet, so I can make up my 2km by 2km by pi area that way,
just adding the 100 PSI blast areas of individual bombs together,
all against an unwarned population out in the open (fragmentation
bombs come to mind), or my precision guided AP bombs on those
well known and marked air raid shelters, in perfect weather, with no
interceptions, smoke problems etc. etc.

The rest of the post is simply deleted text,

It was also quite
possible to have minimal loss of life in a major conventional attack.
These are the results of thousands of WWII bombing raids. Trying
to selectively choose results and definitions to make the 2 nuclear
attacks look more lethal is foolish, after all in absolute terms
Nagasaki was around 1/2 the casualties, and in explosive terms
around 2/7 the casualties. Those figures alone should give pause
to the creation of wonder nuclear strikes.

The limit on conventional delivery of explosives is aircraft over
target, the Lancaster delivered around 10,000 pounds of
bombs, put a modern bomber on the job and the number goes
up by a factor of 4 or so. Or simply switch to a combination
of conventional bombing and missile strikes to increase the
explosive delivery rate.

Just as the WWII limitations on nuclear strikes have gone
away, keep the bomb small enough for the aircraft to survive,
the limitations on delivering conventional bombs have been
significantly reduced.

Hamburg was so lethal because of the firestorm killing people
in otherwise safe shelters. Normally the best thing to do in an
air raid is get into a shelter. Large numbers of people running
away on the surface are going to be killed by blast, stampedes,
vehicle collisions and so on.

The IJN strike on Pearl Harbor used around 0.1 to 0.15
kt of bombs, killed 2,400 people. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima
was around 100 times more powerful, it should have killed 240,000
people at this level of lethality. Take away the people killed on the
Arizona and you still end up with the Hiroshima bomb needing to
kill around 120,000 for equivalent lethality.

Try to understand the results of air raids in WWII varied dramatically,
using 2 attacks to generalise the effects is an exercise in selective
quotation, not facts.

I would have thought the sudden attack ability comes down to the
delivery system, aircraft, ICBM, shipping container, truck, and the
warning system in place to detect the approaching delivery system.
There are clear examples from WWII of populations ignoring
warnings until it was too late because the bombers had previously
always attacked somewhere else.

Again this assumes people are unprotected and ignores the fact
fleeing during an attack is likely to raise the number of dead. The
protection from blast gives good protection from radiation.

A machine gun can kill thousands of people per hour if they have
no protection.

Now we have "core area" to go with "area affected". Understand
there are plenty of raids in WWII that killed more people than the
atomic strikes per ton of explosive dropped. Even in terms of
absolute numbers killed Hiroshima comes in at 1 or 2 with Tokyo,
Nagasaki at 4 behind Hamburg at 3, Dresden at 5.

It has everything to do with it if you want to compare conventional
and nuclear attack lethalities, otherwise why not simply compare
the lethality of say 2 Zeppelins in WWI and 100 Lancasters in WWII.
No guess as to which one kills more people.

Sigh, to minimise casualties move people before or after the raid,
not during it, keep shelters away from flammable areas, keep the
people in the shelters during the raid. Movement during a raid is
obscured by smoke and dust and exposes people to shrapnel,
blast, stampedes and rapidly changing conditions, the "bridge" to
safety being hit for example, the confusion as landmarks are
destroyed or obscured.

In WWII the lethality of conventional attacks varied widely, starting
large fires was the usual way of killing large numbers of people,
incendiary bombs were the best way to start fires. The WWII
nuclear attacks were at least 3 times more powerful in explosive
terms than the biggest conventional raid, but the biggest conventional
raid was not the most lethal, in either absolute terms or deaths per ton
of bombs used.

So far instead of supplying facts you are supplying opinions and
showing a great lack of knowledge about the results of conventional
air raids. Then you bias the definitions to make the nuclear attacks
look more dangerous.

Geoffrey Sinclair
Remove the nb for email.

"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...

Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.

I see, bomb shelters that are conspicuous, direct hit, I presume
you have noticed the accuracy of the nuclear weapons strikes,
the aiming points were missed.

Visual bombing gave reasonable accuracy. Good enough to get an A-bomb
close enough to hit any shelter that was noticed.


Ah yes, the myth of accurate visual bombing persists. Presumably
the atomic attacks have agreements with the rain gods so clouds
will not interfere with the clockwork precision attacks being used
in these make nuclear weapons look as bad as possible scenarios.

They could always scrub the raid if the weather didn't cooperate.




I presume also the shape of the nuclear bombs will be altered to give
them the needed aerodynamic qualities to maximise accuracy

No. I was using WWII technology, which didn't have such.




I presume you have noticed the
average accuracy of WWII bombers dropping from 30,000 feet.
I presume all the aircraft release together and achieve a perfect
bombing pattern, with no weapon caught in the blast of another
before it detonates.

The bombers could release together,

Ah yes the wonder hyper precision attack force, formation
bombing when the aircraft are dispersed to achieve the
wonder bomb pattern with no problems for the aircraft in the
middle to escape the blasts.

The area being blasted doesn't seem so great that an aircraft in the
middle couldn't escape.




Ah yes, one wonders why more WWII attacks were not done like
this, maybe the chance for the defences to intercept individual
bombers?

They could have decoy aircraft fly in each time a bomb was dropped.




Maybe the way dust and smoke from the first strikes
played a part, dodge that mushroom cloud, go left at the next
mushroom cloud, now where are those landmarks again?

The mushroom clouds themselves can become landmarks.




Well that cuts down the casualties given topography, the shielding
effects of hills, see Nagasaki for a good example, and the energy
wasted digging a crater, as well as upping the chances of the
bomb failing to explode.

I am not sure that topography would be that significant that close to
a nuclear explosion.

I am skeptical that the bomb would fail to explode. I'd think a
reliable contact fuse could be devised using WWII technology. If not,
an extremely close range proximity fuse would work.




Ground bursts were a perfectly realistic option using 1945 nuclear
technology.


Ah a change of subject, from giving the attackers far greater abilities
than historical,

I see no basis for saying that WWII technology could not achieve a
ground burst.




So how close and how big does a blast have to be in your
opinion to destroy an underground shelter?

Depends on the shelter's blast resistance. A 49kt bomb would have a
blast overpressure of 200 PSI at 1,000 feet.




Everyone within the 100 PSI overpressure area in my example does
experience such a blast wave. In addition, many of them would be
directly exposed to fireball plasma, and to incredibly intense
radiation.

Presumably after being carefully staked out on the ground, in an
area of no cover etc.

The 100+ PSI overpressure, followed by 1,777+ MPH winds, would do a
good job of removing any cover that might protect against the 200,000+
rads of penetrating radiation that people would experience, unless
they were in a shelter designed to resist it.




This is becoming very funny, we have the arrival of the nuclear
cluster bomb, multiple bursts so close together people are caught
well within the lethal blast radius of the individual bombs. What is
the radius being used for this 100 PSI overpressure?

For a 37kt groundburst, 0.228416 mile.




This is good, given the larger atomic strike in WWII was 25 kt, so
we have 40 such weapons being used to make a 1 Megaton attack.

By 1946, we would have been able to produce 37kt bombs at a rate of
7.76 per month. And we would have been able to produce some
additional 18kt bombs at a rate of 2.516667 per month. The material
for the 18kt bombs could have been used instead to produce 49kt bombs,
but at a much lower rate.

I used a three-month production of 18kt and 37kt bombs. However, I
was conservative in my initial figures, and the specified level of
damage could be achieved by the 37kt bombs alone. This would give the
US the opportunity to forgo the 18kt bombs and make some 49kt ones for
use against bunkers.




Just remember folks throw away all the perfects above and just
chant how bad nuclear weapons are, even though someone who
hides behind an assumed name needs to cook the books to prove it.

I am cooking nothing. These ARE the levels of damage that nukes can
provide.




It looks as though the peak month in the war in Europe saw around
150,000 tons of bombs dropped.

Which was less than half of the explosive output that our A-bomb
program would have been able to produce once it got going.




How many Japanese cities would be left by the time the
nuclear weapons for the 1,000 kt strike would be ready?

However many cities we chose to spare from conventional bombing.




The above wonder attack at 1,000 kt would therefore take 3 months
supply of weapons once production reached this level, if indeed it
could do so in 1946.

It would have reached that level of production. And yes, I used three
months of production.




Especially if those weapons can be delivered with far better
accuracy than achieved historically and the methods for computing
lethality can be rigged in favour of the weapons.

Nothing is rigged. 100 PSI overpressure, 1777 MPH winds, 200000 rads
of radiation, and (for many people in the targeted area) exposure to
fireball plasma, all tend to produce very high fatality rates.




This is becoming funny, after setting up a hyper precision attack,
after altering the definitions to make the weapons look more lethal
the claim is no bias. If the weapons are that much more deadly there
is no need to rig the results.

There is no rigging of results. Just an accurate statement of the
destructive force produced by nuclear weapons.




It is also possible to achieve, with conventional weapons, the sorts of
lethalities that were seen in the nuclear attacks.

How much conventional explosive do you think it would take to kill 50%
of the people in a 2km radius?

I presume you have forgotten Pforzheim? I presume you have forgotten
40,000 deaths at Hamburg with less than 3,000 tons of bombs?

Oh sorry, I forgot, nuclear weapons are bigger bangs, so we now go
to those killed in the blast radius of an individual bomb, but wait I can
drop thousands of conventional bombs, each lethal to humans within
so many feet, so I can make up my 2km by 2km by pi area that way,
just adding the 100 PSI blast areas of individual bombs together,
all against an unwarned population out in the open (fragmentation
bombs come to mind), or my precision guided AP bombs on those
well known and marked air raid shelters, in perfect weather, with no
interceptions, smoke problems etc. etc.

So how many conventional bombs do you think it would take to achieve
that?

hiroshima facts wrote in message . ..
"Geoffrey Sinclair" wrote in message ...

deleted text,

"No this is not a version, this is a change of subject, from the fact
the definitions were changed when comparing the lethality of
WWII nuclear and conventional attacks."

Using nukes, it is possible to subject a city to multiple groundbursts
resulting in at least 100 PSI overpressure throughout a large area.
Bomb shelters that are conspicuous enough to be detected by
reconnaissance flights can be targeted for a direct hit.

I see, bomb shelters that are conspicuous, direct hit, I presume
you have noticed the accuracy of the nuclear weapons strikes,
the aiming points were missed.

Visual bombing gave reasonable accuracy. Good enough to get an A-bomb
close enough to hit any shelter that was noticed.

Ah yes, the myth of accurate visual bombing persists. Presumably
the atomic attacks have agreements with the rain gods so clouds
will not interfere with the clockwork precision attacks being used
in these make nuclear weapons look as bad as possible scenarios.

They could always scrub the raid if the weather didn't cooperate.

This is becoming absolutely hysterical, the USAAF found that
bombing from 20 to 25,000 feet around 1 day in 5 was suitable
for clear visual bombing, furthermore even with the better weather
forecasts available over Europe only 2/3 of the visual bombing
weather forecasts proved accurate. Look up the problems the
20th Air Force had with Japanese weather.

Where is the USAAF direct line to the weather gods?

Deleted text,

As an aside when the 8th Air Force measured accuracy in the final
4 months of 1944 it found in good visibility 64.3% of bombs landed
within 1/2 a mile, 91.5% within 3 miles. So a ground burst 1/2 a
mile away (1 in 3 bombs) is considered good enough to destroy
underground shelters, another myth.

The above accuracies were from around 20 to 25,000 feet. Moving
from a bombing altitude of 20,000 feet to 30,000 feet roughly doubled
the average error. The rate of increase in error went up as altitude
went up. The bombing errors at 20,000 feet were around 4/3 those at
10,000 feet on average.

I presume also the shape of the nuclear bombs will be altered to give
them the needed aerodynamic qualities to maximise accuracy

No. I was using WWII technology, which didn't have such.

So the nuclear weapons will achieve great accuracy despite being
dropped from 30,000+ feet and without doing much to make them
aerodynamic.

I presume you have noticed the
average accuracy of WWII bombers dropping from 30,000 feet.
I presume all the aircraft release together and achieve a perfect
bombing pattern, with no weapon caught in the blast of another
before it detonates.

The bombers could release together,

Ah yes the wonder hyper precision attack force, formation
bombing when the aircraft are dispersed to achieve the
wonder bomb pattern with no problems for the aircraft in the
middle to escape the blasts.

The area being blasted doesn't seem so great that an aircraft in the
middle couldn't escape.

lets see now 40 nuclear weapons set to go off around 2,000 feet
from each other. 1 in the middle, next circle at 2,000 feet so say 14
weapons there, then at 4,000 feet so say 28 weapons there.

Bomber moving at say 360 mph, or 1 mile every 10 seconds, 528
feet per second. Now it comes down to time for the bomb to drop
and its explosive yield.

Ah yes, one wonders why more WWII attacks were not done like
this, maybe the chance for the defences to intercept individual
bombers?

They could have decoy aircraft fly in each time a bomb was dropped.


The ignorance you are displaying in order to try and make up
these absurd scenarios is quite amazing. A single decoy?
How about a formation with escorts with all the friendly fire
risks that means.

Maybe the way dust and smoke from the first strikes
played a part, dodge that mushroom cloud, go left at the next
mushroom cloud, now where are those landmarks again?

The mushroom clouds themselves can become landmarks.


The hysterical idea the mushroom clouds are landmarks, simply
assume they are all in the correct spot I presume and they do
not count for dust and smoke when obscuring the target.

Well that cuts down the casualties given topography, the shielding
effects of hills, see Nagasaki for a good example, and the energy
wasted digging a crater, as well as upping the chances of the
bomb failing to explode.

I am not sure that topography would be that significant that close to
a nuclear explosion.

I like this effort to assume yet again that topography can be
ignored given the results at Nagasaki.

I am skeptical that the bomb would fail to explode. I'd think a
reliable contact fuse could be devised using WWII technology. If not,
an extremely close range proximity fuse would work.

One day you may notice the large number of UXBs in all wars,
mass produced fuses fail, armourers fail to load them correctly,
the bomb hits at an incorrect angle, the valve electronics in
proximity fuses shatter and so on. This is reality.

Ground bursts were a perfectly realistic option using 1945 nuclear
technology.

Ah a change of subject, from giving the attackers far greater abilities
than historical,

Deleted text,

just ignore WWII experience, go with the 1930's the
bomber will always get through, and destroy civilisation.

I see no basis for saying that WWII technology could not achieve a
ground burst.


Ah a change of subject, from giving the attackers far greater abilities
than historical, just ignore WWII experience, go with the 1930's the
bomber will always get through, and destroy civilisation.

It is quite simple, if the bombers had the sort of abilities postulated
for these theoretical nuclear strikes, and the targets that defenceless,
then WWII would have been over years before any nuclear weapons
would have been built. Indeed there would be little call for them, given
the results of conventional bombing.

So how close and how big does a blast have to be in your
opinion to destroy an underground shelter?

Depends on the shelter's blast resistance. A 49kt bomb would have a
blast overpressure of 200 PSI at 1,000 feet.


So we have the bombers dropping bombs around 1,000 to 1,500 feet
apart, and a miss in the order of 1,000 feet becomes significant, the
8th air force figures, for 3 boxes of bombers from 29,000 feet was
an average error of 1,605 feet expected.

Everyone within the 100 PSI overpressure area in my example does
experience such a blast wave. In addition, many of them would be
directly exposed to fireball plasma, and to incredibly intense
radiation.

Presumably after being carefully staked out on the ground, in an
area of no cover etc.

The 100+ PSI overpressure, followed by 1,777+ MPH winds, would do a
good job of removing any cover that might protect against the 200,000+
rads of penetrating radiation that people would experience, unless
they were in a shelter designed to resist it.

Yes folks, the population are all on the surface walking around, and the
shelters with all that concrete are transparent to the radiation produced.

By the way 1,777 MPH? how about 1,800 MPH at a given distance,
after all could it not be a 1,776 MPH wild, or 1,778 MPH?

This is becoming very funny, we have the arrival of the nuclear
cluster bomb, multiple bursts so close together people are caught
well within the lethal blast radius of the individual bombs. What is
the radius being used for this 100 PSI overpressure?

For a 37kt groundburst, 0.228416 mile.

My we have a spreadsheet jockey present it seems, this translates to
1,206 feet 0.4368 inches. Presumably at standard atmospheric
pressure and temperature? So at 1,606 feet 0.4369 inches the people
start to survive in much greater numbers? How about given the realities
of physics and uncertainties weapons yields in we say around 1,200 feet?

This is good, given the larger atomic strike in WWII was 25 kt, so
we have 40 such weapons being used to make a 1 Megaton attack.

deleted text,

"This will be launched in crystal clear weather, with no interceptions,
no interference from fires already started, with accurate intelligence
as to air raid shelters, with precision unheard of in WWII and is
still unheard of for free falling bombs from 30,000+ feet, against an
unwarned population, and so on.

Since we are now moving into mass produced weapons the problems
of fusing and weapons assembly need to be made clear. When the
allies inspected the unexploded bombs dropped on German oil
installations they found around 15% had not exploded, many due to
the tails falling off, but also fuses. A 2.5% failure rate would be 1
unexploded nuclear weapon per 40 weapon strike."

By 1946, we would have been able to produce 37kt bombs at a rate of
7.76 per month. And we would have been able to produce some
additional 18kt bombs at a rate of 2.516667 per month. The material
for the 18kt bombs could have been used instead to produce 49kt bombs,
but at a much lower rate.

Yet again we have this wonder precision,

7.76 is 93.12 bombs in 12 months, what was the 0.12 bomb about?
2.516667 is 30.2 bombs in 12 months, what was the 0.2 bomb about?

Like any mass production line it takes time to ramp up production,
if you are serious then in around the end of year 2 or early year 3
you are producing around as much in a month as during all of year
1. Assuming a nice linear delivery schedule is against the laws of
mobilisation. Also do not forget things like accidents or fires causing
delays in production.

I used a three-month production of 18kt and 37kt bombs. However, I
was conservative in my initial figures, and the specified level of
damage could be achieved by the 37kt bombs alone. This would give the
US the opportunity to forgo the 18kt bombs and make some 49kt ones for
use against bunkers.

You are not being conservative you are assuming so many "perfects"
it is showing appalling ignorance of bombing raids, you are busily
playing with mathematical models to absurd levels of precision.

Just remember folks throw away all the perfects above and just
chant how bad nuclear weapons are, even though someone who
hides behind an assumed name needs to cook the books to prove it.

I am cooking nothing. These ARE the levels of damage that nukes can
provide.


Just remember folks throw away all the perfects above and just
chant how bad nuclear weapons are, even though someone who
hides behind an assumed name needs to cook the books to prove it.

deleted text,

"Yet again we have someone giving their preferred outcome a
helping hand and trying to pretend the "competitor" will not also
improve.

Instead we have a 1 megaton atomic attack, 40 times the biggest
attack in WWII, with more precision than any WWII attack short of
those low level types, skip bombing ships or sending bombs through
the walls of Gestapo HQs."

It looks as though the peak month in the war in Europe saw around
150,000 tons of bombs dropped.

deleted text,

The above figures for the 20th air force were without any transferred units.

Which was less than half of the explosive output that our A-bomb
program would have been able to produce once it got going.


Congratulations on noticing nuclear weapons have greater yields,
just pretend to ignore the assumptions of perfect precision delivery
of the weapons on a perfect, unwarned target as the basis for
figuring out lethality.

How many Japanese cities would be left by the time the
nuclear weapons for the 1,000 kt strike would be ready?

However many cities we chose to spare from conventional bombing.


So provide the list, the USAAF had real trouble finding such targets
by mid 1945.

The above wonder attack at 1,000 kt would therefore take 3 months
supply of weapons once production reached this level, if indeed it
could do so in 1946.

It would have reached that level of production. And yes, I used three
months of production.


So we have 1 strike per 3 months, in the mean time the conventional
bombers are delivering their standard, increasing, tonnage every month,
joined by the Navy aircraft and even battleships on coastal targets.

Especially if those weapons can be delivered with far better
accuracy than achieved historically and the methods for computing
lethality can be rigged in favour of the weapons.

Nothing is rigged. 100 PSI overpressure, 1777 MPH winds, 200000 rads
of radiation, and (for many people in the targeted area) exposure to
fireball plasma, all tend to produce very high fatality rates.


Especially if those weapons can be delivered with far better
accuracy than achieved historically and the methods for computing
lethality can be rigged in favour of the weapons.

Remember the 2km radius for the nuclear attacks but a different
definition for the conventional attacks?

This is becoming funny, after setting up a hyper precision attack,
after altering the definitions to make the weapons look more lethal
the claim is no bias. If the weapons are that much more deadly there
is no need to rig the results.

There is no rigging of results. Just an accurate statement of the
destructive force produced by nuclear weapons.


This is becoming funny, after setting up a hyper precision attack,
after altering the definitions to make the weapons look more lethal
the claim is no bias. If the weapons are that much more deadly there
is no need to rig the results.

deleted text,

The RAF used 2.7kt to kill 40,000 people at Hamburg, call it 3kt, now
multiply by 333 to give the RAF a 1,000 kt strike. Other attacks could
drop 3kt bombs and kill only a few people. Rather than trying to
understand this we have the attempts to use 2 (nuclear) strikes and
extrapolate them using the sort of precision and weather the modern
USAF would be envious of and multiplying the explosive yields by a
factor of 40 or more.

After all the Nagasaki bomb was around 10 times the explosive yield
of the Hamburg raid and killed fewer people. Yet we have a strike at
40 times the Nagasaki yield going in and casualties going up about
linearly, but then it is assumed to be a perfect strike.

It is also possible to achieve, with conventional weapons, the sorts of
lethalities that were seen in the nuclear attacks.

How much conventional explosive do you think it would take to kill 50%
of the people in a 2km radius?

I presume you have forgotten Pforzheim? I presume you have forgotten
40,000 deaths at Hamburg with less than 3,000 tons of bombs?

Oh sorry, I forgot, nuclear weapons are bigger bangs, so we now go
to those killed in the blast radius of an individual bomb, but wait I can
drop thousands of conventional bombs, each lethal to humans within
so many feet, so I can make up my 2km by 2km by pi area that way,
just adding the 100 PSI blast areas of individual bombs together,
all against an unwarned population out in the open (fragmentation
bombs come to mind), or my precision guided AP bombs on those
well known and marked air raid shelters, in perfect weather, with no
interceptions, smoke problems etc. etc.

So how many conventional bombs do you think it would take to achieve
that?

Against an unwarned population out in the open a few hundred loads
of fragmentation bombs, plus maybe a 100 precision guided AP
weapons on the well known shelters and a few hundred loads of
mixed HE and incendiary to burn the city, to ensure the injured have
little chance of escaping. Using the "bomber is perfect" school of
attack lethality calculation, no smoke problems, interceptions etc.

The rest of the post is simply deleted text,

It was also quite
possible to have minimal loss of life in a major conventional attack.
These are the results of thousands of WWII bombing raids. Trying
to selectively choose results and definitions to make the 2 nuclear
attacks look more lethal is foolish, after all in absolute terms
Nagasaki was around 1/2 the casualties, and in explosive terms
around 2/7 the casualties. Those figures alone should give pause
to the creation of wonder nuclear strikes.

The limit on conventional delivery of explosives is aircraft over
target, the Lancaster delivered around 10,000 pounds of
bombs, put a modern bomber on the job and the number goes
up by a factor of 4 or so. Or simply switch to a combination
of conventional bombing and missile strikes to increase the
explosive delivery rate.

Just as the WWII limitations on nuclear strikes have gone
away, keep the bomb small enough for the aircraft to survive,
the limitations on delivering conventional bombs have been
significantly reduced.

Hamburg was so lethal because of the firestorm killing people
in otherwise safe shelters. Normally the best thing to do in an
air raid is get into a shelter. Large numbers of people running
away on the surface are going to be killed by blast, stampedes,
vehicle collisions and so on.

The IJN strike on Pearl Harbor used around 0.1 to 0.15
kt of bombs, killed 2,400 people. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima
was around 100 times more powerful, it should have killed 240,000
people at this level of lethality. Take away the people killed on the
Arizona and you still end up with the Hiroshima bomb needing to
kill around 120,000 for equivalent lethality.

Try to understand the results of air raids in WWII varied dramatically,
using 2 attacks to generalise the effects is an exercise in selective
quotation, not facts.

I would have thought the sudden attack ability comes down to the
delivery system, aircraft, ICBM, shipping container, truck, and the
warning system in place to detect the approaching delivery system.
There are clear examples from WWII of populations ignoring
warnings until it was too late because the bombers had previously
always attacked somewhere else.

Again this assumes people are unprotected and ignores the fact
fleeing during an attack is likely to raise the number of dead. The
protection from blast gives good protection from radiation.

A machine gun can kill thousands of people per hour if they have
no protection.

Now we have "core area" to go with "area affected". Understand
there are plenty of raids in WWII that killed more people than the
atomic strikes per ton of explosive dropped. Even in terms of
absolute numbers killed Hiroshima comes in at 1 or 2 with Tokyo,
Nagasaki at 4 behind Hamburg at 3, Dresden at 5.

It has everything to do with it if you want to compare conventional
and nuclear attack lethalities, otherwise why not simply compare
the lethality of say 2 Zeppelins in WWI and 100 Lancasters in WWII.
No guess as to which one kills more people.

Sigh, to minimise casualties move people before or after the raid,
not during it, keep shelters away from flammable areas, keep the
people in the shelters during the raid. Movement during a raid is
obscured by smoke and dust and exposes people to shrapnel,
blast, stampedes and rapidly changing conditions, the "bridge" to
safety being hit for example, the confusion as landmarks are
destroyed or obscured.

In WWII the lethality of conventional attacks varied widely, starting
large fires was the usual way of killing large numbers of people,
incendiary bombs were the best way to start fires. The WWII
nuclear attacks were at least 3 times more powerful in explosive
terms than the biggest conventional raid, but the biggest conventional
raid was not the most lethal, in either absolute terms or deaths per ton
of bombs used.

So far instead of supplying facts you are supplying opinions and
showing a great lack of knowledge about the results of conventional
air raids. Then you bias the definitions to make the nuclear attacks
look more dangerous.

Geoffrey Sinclair
Remove the nb for email.