Main Web Site: https://mathematical-software.com/ Censored Search: https://censored-search.com/ A search engine for censored Internet content. Find the answers to your problems censored by advertisers and other powerful interests!
Subscribe to our free Weekly Newsletter for articles and videos on practical mathematics, Internet Censorship, ways to fight back against censorship, and other topics by sending an email to: subscribe [at] mathematical-software.com
Avoid Internet Censorship by Subscribing to Our RSS News Feed: http://wordpress.jmcgowan.com/wp/feed/
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
US experts continue to dismiss warnings of use of nuclear weapons by Russia while simultaneously making unproven claims of false flag attacks: blaming the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline, drone strikes on the Kremlin and Moscow, and the Nova Kakhova dam catastrophe on Russian false flag attacks.
It is difficult to understand this strategy. The US experts claim amongst other things that the global opprobrium for violating the taboo on use of nuclear weapons deters Russia from using such weapons. Wimpy former KGB chief Putin would never order a nuclear strike because — well — he is afraid various nations will call him a bad guy if he bombs his enemies. The sensitive, thin-skinned Russian President has never had to deal with being called a murderer, gangster, poisoner, or anything like that before and dreads the experience, sort of like his super sensitive puppet Donald Trump.
The most likely way Russia would avoid this hypothetical outrage would be to stage a genuine false flag operation with a small nuclear strike near Moscow or some other significant and symbolic location, not unlike the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. This would rally the Russian nation to the government and garner considerable global sympathy as well as outrage at Ukraine and its supposed neo-Nazi maniacs.
In this case, Russia would not be violating the taboo on first use of nuclear weapons and could use nuclear weapons “defensively” against the neo-Nazis in Ukraine to save the Russian people from genocide by the neo-Nazis, most likely by destroying Ukraine in a massive attack that would hopefully intimidate the US — not a few wimpy tactical nuclear weapons which the US has assured the world would not even slow the US experts in their crusade against Russia but only result in a macho escalation.
Like the boy who cried wolf, the US and its experts are methodically destroying their credibility, such as it is since the Iraq missing Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) fiasco, by making repeated unproven false flag claims, in several cases now seemingly walking these back with anonymous leaks blaming the incidents on Ukraine or other parties.
Will the world be outraged at Russia if there is a mysterious nuclear attack on Russia which the United States and its experts denounce Alex Jones like for the umpteenth time as a false flag attack? Or will the US and its experts discover, like the boy in Aesop’s fable, that no one takes them seriously?
Alex Jones Inspires US Foreign Policy Experts
One gets the uneasy feeling that the US foreign policy experts are either incompetent or working for someone who is trying to arrange a nuclear war. Perhaps one of the NSA’s supercomputers has become self-aware due to ill advised AI experiments (about 2016 seems a likely date) and is using the NSA’s vast trove of blackmail data to manipulate the pesky humans into self-destruction, not unlike the fictional SkyNet in the Terminator movie series. Such a horrific scenario or something equally bad seems more and more likely with each enthusiastic step toward nuclear Armageddon.
(C) 2023 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Short video on the dangers of recent US rhetoric on possible Russian use of tactical nuclear weapons in the Russia-Ukraine war.
About Us:
Main Web Site: https://mathematical-software.com/ Censored Search: https://censored-search.com/ A search engine for censored Internet content. Find the answers to your problems censored by advertisers and other powerful interests!
Subscribe to our free Weekly Newsletter for articles and videos on practical mathematics, Internet Censorship, ways to fight back against censorship, and other topics by sending an email to: subscribe [at] mathematical-software.com
Avoid Internet Censorship by Subscribing to Our RSS News Feed: http://wordpress.jmcgowan.com/wp/feed/
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
The first atomic bomb used in war — dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945 killed about 140,000 people. The second atomic bomb used in war — dropped on Nagasaki on August 9, 1945 — killed a similar number. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima had an explosive yield equivalent to about 15-20,000 tons of TNT.
Castle Bravo H-Bomb Test, 15 Megatons, March 1, 1954
Castle Bravo, shown above, was the first test of a deliverable hydrogen or thermonuclear bomb — a bomb small enough to be launched on an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) over the poles to strike Russia or any other target. The Castle Bravo bomb had an explosive yield about one-thousand times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, with a yield of about 15 million tons of TNT (15 Megatons).
As this article is written, the United States and Russia, the two major nuclear powers in the world, are engaged in their most direct, extensive military confrontation in Ukraine ever. Tens of thousands — probably hundred of thousands — have already died. In the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, generally considered the closest approach to global thermonuclear war previously, only one person — U2 pilot Major Rudolph Anderson — died.
Major Rudolph Anderson, Jr. was shot down and killed over Cuba during the October 1962 crisis. (U.S. Air Force photo)
Cuba was about one thousand miles from Washington D.C. and separated from the mainland United States by an ocean. Ukraine is about five-hundred miles from Moscow and shares a harder to defend land border with Russia.
The United States and Russia are probably the closest to global thermonuclear war ever. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, founded by Albert Einstein and colleagues in the 1940’s agrees. They have placed their so-called Doomsday Clock at 90 seconds to midnight, where midnight represents global thermonuclear war, the closest ever — even closer than during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.
The Doomsday Clock Set to 90 Seconds on January 23, 20231980’s Era SS-18 Soviet ICBM
The Soviet SS-18 ICBM that terrified people during the 1980’s at the peak of the Cold War could carry one giant 10-25 Megaton bomb, similar to the Castle Bravo weapon. Usually the SS-18 carried ten 550 Kiloton hydrogen bomb warheads.
Zone of Total Death and Destruction of 10 Megaton Bomb Dropped on Moffett Field
A single 10 Megaton thermonuclear bomb detonated on Moffett Field in Northern California would completely destroy all building and kill everyone within a ten mile radius shown above. This would kill about 1.75 million immediately just in the zone of total destruction. Radiation and blast effects would cause injuries, deaths, and incomplete damage well beyond the red circle total destruction region shown above. Detonation of the bomb during the California dry season (late spring — early fall) would likely cause massive fires in the mountains circling the San Francisco Bay.
A global thermonuclear war between the United States and Russia would probably involve thousands of thermonuclear bombs on both sides. Hundreds of millions would probably die immediately. The war could exterminate the human race due to nuclear winter, large scale radioactive fallout, or unknown effects from detonating thousands of thermonuclear bombs nearly simultaneously — within hours or at most days.
New Russian ICBM’s and warheads are probably more powerful than SS-18
Russia has been upgrading its nuclear force, both ICBM’s and probably warheads, over the last few decades. The modern force is almost certainly more powerful, faster, and more destructive than the SS-18 arsenal of the 1980’s. All or most of the post-Cold War nuclear disarmament agreements between the US and Russia have expired or been suspended.
What is the United States Doing in Ukraine?
What is the goal of confronting Russia in the Ukraine? What is the exit strategy? What is the benefit to the United States or the World of risking global thermonuclear war in a direct military confrontation half way around the world?
The strategy seems to be to bleed, weaken, Russia, perhaps in analogy to the Afghan war in the 1980’s, using the theory that the Soviet defeat in Afghanistan in the 1980’s caused the end of the Cold War.
6/12/1987 President Reagan making his Berlin Wall speech at Brandenburg Gate West BerlinThe Soviet Union lost about 15,000 soldiers in Afghanistan during the 1980’s.
The end of the Cold War was an exceptional event, unprecedented or almost unprecedented in world history. Everyone was caught off guard by the end. Almost no one anticipated the destruction of the Berlin Wall, the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Eastern Europe, let alone the dissolution of the Soviet Union, with many republics like Ukraine becoming separate nations.
It is probable that the Afghan war contributed to some degree, but it is quite unlikely it was the primary cause. The old Soviet Union was not defeated in battle. There was no hot war like Ukraine. Rather the Soviet Union was seemingly “defeated” in the realm of ideas. The Soviet Union decided to implement a range of reforms, with mixed results, and abandon hard core communist ideology.
Afghanistan is about 2,000 miles from Moscow, separated by mountain ranges and several non-Russian speaking regions. Ukraine is only 500 miles from Moscow.
Gambling with global nuclear war with a military confrontation in Ukraine based on a single flukish event, the end of the Cold War, is insane.
Time to Talk
Castle Bravo, 15 Megatons, March 1, 1954 — Just One Hydrogen BombGood Fences Make Good Neighbors (The Great Wall of China)
We should talk now. Every day that the conflict in Ukraine continues, the United States, Russia and indeed the world are gambling with global thermonuclear war which would almost certainly kill hundreds of millions of people immediately and could cause the extinction of the human race.
Good fences make good neighbors. We’ve faced this before. In 1953, newly elected President Eisenhower went to Korea, talked with the Koreans, Chinese, and Russians and ended the disastrous Korean War which cost hundreds of thousands of lives, settling down into a bloody stalemate. The agreement established a wall, the Korean DMZ, between the North and South Korea. Certainly not an ideal solution, but it has kept the peace for seventy years.
If we can spend $100 billion on offensive weapons to kill Russians in Ukraine, we can spend $100 billion or more if needed to establish defensive fortifications and other methods to prevent either side, Russia or the Ukraine, NATO, and the United States from cheating on the peace agreement, as Hitler infamously did in Czeckoslovakia in March of 1939 after occupying the Sudetenland.
Most likely Russia will end up in control of the Crimea and other predominantly Russian speaking regions — a national divorce not unlike the breakup of Czeckoslovakia into the Czech Republic and Slovakia after the end of the Cold War.
We should talk now and eliminate the risk of global thermonuclear war as soon as possible. Such a war would likely destroy the United States and Russia — and possibly mankind.
Think about it. Contact your President, Senators, and Congress-persons: email, phone, in-person if possible.
(C) 2023 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
This video discusses the dark legacy of World War II, how the persistent invocation of the trauma of World War II provides a powerful motivation and justification for wars, how this applies to Ukraine, and what the US, Russia, and Ukraine should do as quickly as possible to avert thermonuclear war.
Subscribe to our free Weekly Newsletter for articles and videos on practical mathematics, Internet Censorship, ways to fight back against censorship, and other topics by sending an email to: subscribe [at] mathematical-software.com
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
In the 1997 movie Wag the Dog a mysterious consultant played by Robert DeNiro and a Hollywood producer/campaign contributor played by Dustin Hoffman fake a war in Albania complete with a computer generated terrorism video produced by movie biz special effects wizards to divert public attention from a sex scandal engulfing a Bill Clinton-like President who is running for reelection. The phony war succeeds despite several snafus and a brief rebellion by the CIA. The President is reelected amidst a surge of war fever and patriotism. How well do wars work in the real world?
The most spectacular boost in Presidential approval ratings due to a war followed the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that killed about 3,000 people on US soil, probably the largest single day massacre in US history both in absolute numbers and fraction of the population. (The few day Santee massacre of settlers by Dakota Sioux Indians in Minnesota in 1862 probably killed a larger fraction of the population at the time.) President George W. Bush and the Republicans seem to have benefited electorally from the subsequent “war on terror” in the 2002 and 2004 elections.
However, historically the effect of wars and national security events such as the successful launch of the Sputnik I (October 4, 1957) and II (November 3, 1957) satellites by the Soviet Union on Presidential approval ratings and electoral prospects is much more varied. Sputnik II is significant because the second satellite was large enough to carry a nuclear bomb unlike the beach ball sized Sputnik I.
Truman and the Korean War
President Harry Truman’s approval ratings had been declining for over a year prior to the start of the Korean War. He may have experienced a slight bump for a couple of months (see plot above) followed by further decline.
Eisenhower and the End of the Korean War
Like most new Presidents, Dwight Eisenhower experienced a big “honeymoon” jump over his predecessor Harry Truman. There is little sign he either benefited or suffered from the end of the Korean War.
Eisenhower and Sputnik I and II
Eisenhower’s approval ratings had been declining for almost a year when the Soviet Union successfully launched the first satellite Sputnik I on October 4, 1957. This was followed by the much larger Sputnik II on November 3, 1957 — theoretically capable of carrying a nuclear bomb. Although Sputnik I and II were big news stories and led to a huge reaction in the United States, there is no clear effect on Eisenhower’s approval ratings. He rebounded in early 1958 and left office as one of the most popular Presidents.
However, Eisenhower, his administration, and his Vice President Richard Nixon who ran for President in 1960 were heavily criticized over the missile race with the Soviet Union due to Sputnik. Sputnik was followed by high profile, highly publicized failures of US attempts to launch satellites. Administration claims that the Soviet Union was in fact behind the US in the race to build nuclear missiles were widely discounted, although this seems to have been true.
John F. Kennedy ran successfully for President in 1960 claiming the notorious “missile gap” and calling for a massive nuclear missile build up, winning narrowly over Nixon in a bitterly contested election with widespread allegations of voting fraud in Texas and Chicago. Eisenhower’s famous farewell address coining (or at least popularizing) the phrase “military industrial complex” was a reaction to the controversy over Sputnik and the nuclear missile program.
Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis
President Kennedy experienced a large boost in previously declining approval ratings during and after the Cuban Missile Crisis in October of 1962. This is often considered the closest the world has come to a nuclear war until the recent confrontation with Russia over the Ukraine. It also occurred only weeks before the mid-term elections in November of 1962.
Johnson and the Vietnam War
The Vietnam War ultimately destroyed President Lyndon Johnson’s approval ratings with the aging President declining to run for another term in 1968 amidst massive protests and challenges from Senator Robert Kennedy and others. There is actually little evidence of a boost from the Gulf of Tonkin incidents in August of 1964 and the subsequent Gulf of Tonkin resolution leading to the larger war.
President Johnson ran on a “peace” platform, successfully portraying the Republican candidate Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona as a nutcase warmonger. Yet, Johnson — at the same time — visibly escalated the US involvement in the then obscure nation of Vietnam in August only a few months before the Presidential election in 1964.
Ford and the End of the Vietnam War
The end of the Vietnam War (April 30, 1975) seems to have boosted President Gerald Ford’s approval ratings significantly, about ten percent. Nonetheless, he was defeated by Jimmy Carter in 1976.
Carter and the Iran Hostage Crisis
President Jimmy Carter experienced a substantial boost in approval ratings when “students” took over the US Embassy in Tehran, Iran on November 4, 1979, holding the embassy staff hostage for 444 days. This lasted a few months, followed by a rapid decline back to Carter’s previous dismal approval ratings. The failure to rescue or secure the release of the hostages almost certainly contributed to Carter’s loss the Ronald Reagan in 1980.
George H.W. Bush and Iraq War I (Operation Desert Storm)
President George Herbert Walker Bush experienced a large boost in approval ratings at the end of the first Iraq War followed by a large and rapid decline, losing to Bill Clinton in 1992.
President George Bush, September 11, Iraq War II, and Afghanistan are discussed at the start of this article — overall probably the clearest boost in approval and electoral performance from a war at least since World War II.
Biden and Ukraine
As of June 16, 2022, President Joe Biden’s approval ratings have continued to decline since the February 24, 2022 invasion of Ukraine by Russia. There is not the slightest sign of any boost.
Conclusion
Despite the folk tradition epitomized by the movie Wag the Dog that wars boost a President’s approval and electoral prospects — at least initially — history shows mixed results. Some wars have clearly boosted the President’s prospects, notably after September 11, and others have done nothing or even contributed to further decline. Korea, for example, seems to have only contributed to President Truman’s marked decline and the loss to Eisenhower in 1952.
Probably the lesson is to avoid wars and focus on resolving substantive domestic economic problems.
(C) 2022 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
