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Accidental Nuclear War: A Timeline of Close Calls

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
aerostable_slug 6y ago
How would an accident in Greenland precipitate general war? These kinds of hysterics don't help when analyzing a rather serious issue.
- atlasunshrugged 6y ago
  I think part of it was just highlighting how often accidents occur and showing that with these weapons it could quickly lead to a huge response
- Synaesthesia 6y ago
  It says right there >A radar alert from Thule, Greenland was sent to NORAD, announcing the detection of dozens of Soviet missiles launched for the United States
  - likpok 6y ago
    There was another accident in Greenland where a plane crashed carrying nuclear weapons. The nuclear weapons did not have a nuclear detonation, but the conventional explosives inside did.
  - aerostable_slug 6y ago
    Yes, years before the accidental crash I'm talking about.
- happytoexplain 6y ago
  Use of the term "hysteric(al)" is a huge red flag for me. I virtually never see it applied reasonably. In this case, the article is simply outlining a history of the issue. The Greenland case is relevant and interesting.
  - aerostable_slug 6y ago
    I used the term specifically because their claims about the Thule crash don't add up. A nuclear detonation at Thule wouldn't mean general war (hackles would be raised but lots of other phenomenologies would be used as part of the warning, verification, and attack characterization processes). EDIT: Also, at the distance the crash was from the base, assuming a weapon detonated on impact the facilities would have experienced ~1 psi of overpressure. I strongly suspect they'd still be operational afterwards.
nickt 6y ago
It’s mentioned in the article and I recommend reading “Command and Control” by Eric Schlosser if you want to scare yourself half to death by reading about how careless we’ve been with our “toys”. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6452798-command-and-control https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6452798-command-and-cont...
Synaesthesia 6y ago
We should really move towards nuclear disarmament, these weapons need to go, we have been lucky so far, but we will not continue to be. It's playing with fire.
- i_haz_rabies 6y ago
  I was on team total disarmament for a long time, but now I think very clear no-first-strike policies, limited arsenals, no automated controls, and clear, transparent, and multifactor launch decision chains are the way to go. Nukes are terrifying, but I think it's pretty clear that they have also put a lid on major international conflict. We're not putting the genie back in the bottle... so we may as well put the bottle in a bulletproof glass cage and keep it under heavy guard.
  - TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
    They've put the lid on direct military superpower conflict, so far, with some very close calls. But there's been plenty of indirect superpower conflict, and in the last couple of decades this has moved into disinfo/infowar and direct cyberwar. You might think this is less dangerous. But instead of ruined smoking cities you end up with governments run by foreign interests which are hostile to their own populations, supported by extravagant disinfo efforts designed to create confusion, paranoia, fear, and distrust. That genie is going to be even harder to put back in its bottle.
    - i_haz_rabies 6y ago
      Even if you can trace a direct line from "nukes preventing global conventional war" to our current mess of misinformation and cyberwar, is taking the lid off a hot war between China and the US (for example) the better alternative?
  - pmiller2 6y ago
    Lots of nasty viruses are literally inside bulletproof cages and under heavy guard inside high level biocontainment facilities, but there have still been instances where they've gotten out of the lab. (This is not a reference to SARS-CoV-2.) Any time you're relying on humans not to do something that technically can be done, over a long enough period of time, someone eventually will probably do it. Disarmament puts much larger barriers in place than locking them up and putting walls of red tape around them.
openasocket 6y ago
It's close calls like these that make me especially concerned that North Korea now has nuclear weapons. MAD works fine, as long as you assume both sides are perfectly rational and competent. But even when countries put great effort into safety and control, accidents happen. And sometimes the only thing that stops Armageddon is someone using common sense, and remembering that the other side is human too. North Korea is well known for cutting corners, and they have a population largely insulated from the outside world, under strict totalitarian rule. When their radar malfunctions and says a dozen nukes are inbound, how likely is it that some officer is going to realize that just doesn't make any sense, and go against orders trying to confirm it?
- wahern 6y ago
  Yep. That MAD prevents nuclear strikes is an absolute article of faith at this point, used to reject unease outright; not an objective, practical calculus. Like all natural phenomena there will be exceptions and deviations. A nuclear incident is inevitable. The real question to my mind is whether the benefit of nuclear deterrence suppressing non-nuclear conflict is greater than the cost that will be incurred from MAD failures/exceptions. But that's an almost impossible question to answer today. Still, it's a more honest perspective. I suspect we don't look at in this way because the public would almost certainly decide (perhaps irrationally) that they're far more afraid of a nuclear strike than the slow slaughter of conventional warfare, creating pressure to discard nuclear weapons entirely.
- duxup 6y ago
  Yeah with MADD it seems like only a matter of time when somethings fail (human(s) tech, combination) and a catastrophic mistake is made. Too many situations started, and were saved simply by happenstance or imperfect information. IIRC during the Cuban missile crisis local Russian commanders had the authorization to launch if they felt the US was invading. Because of course, you couldn't have a deterrent if you weren't able to launch during a communication blackout. Of course that also meant that any given accident or misunderstanding could lead to a launch and full scale response. Control of starting the war was now in the hands of folks with even less information... MADD seems to guarantee a war as much as deter it.
- 6y ago
beebmam 6y ago
Nuclear proliferation brings us closer to mass atrocity and I worry deeply about it
dfsegoat 6y ago
Related: Fail-Safe (1962) is a fictional novel where attack codes are transmitted to a group of US bombers on airborne alert (standing by to attack the USSR) - due to the failure of an electrical component. I think it's still very relevant in this day and age. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fail-Safe_(novel)#Plot_summary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fail-Safe_(novel)#Plot_summary
aerostable_slug 6y ago
Related: an excellent Sandia Labs documentary on various close calls we've had and how the United States learned from those events and engineered a variety of safeguards: https://share-ng.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/always_never/ https://share-ng.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/alw... It's an highly recommended overview of many of the issues surrounding accidental — or unauthorized — nuclear explosions (it was originally made for internal use at the Lab).
dirtyid 6y ago
Disarmament isn't going to happen but maybe setup several redundant globally accessible early detection systems based off common technologies, so everyone can be absolutely sure launches are not malfunctions. This may involve unpleasant tech transfers, but eliminating any opportunity for miscommunication seems worthwhile.
redis_mlc 6y ago
It's interesting how out-of-date the HN comments are on this topic, since there are current threats: - Russia has a doomsday system that will launch its weapons if there's radio transmission silence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand - Russia also has 100 MT undersea weapons near New York, which means there will be no warning when detonated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status-6_Oceanic_Multipurpose_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status-6_Oceanic_Multipurpose_... - Xi has threatened to launch at the US if anything happens to the Three Gorges Dam. (The CCP released an animated video of nuking a US naval base.)

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

How would an accident in Greenland precipitate general war? These kinds of hysterics don't help when analyzing a rather serious issue.

atlasunshrugged 6y ago
I think part of it was just highlighting how often accidents occur and showing that with these weapons it could quickly lead to a huge response
Synaesthesia 6y ago
It says right there >A radar alert from Thule, Greenland was sent to NORAD, announcing the detection of dozens of Soviet missiles launched for the United States
- likpok 6y ago
  There was another accident in Greenland where a plane crashed carrying nuclear weapons. The nuclear weapons did not have a nuclear detonation, but the conventional explosives inside did.
- aerostable_slug 6y ago
  Yes, years before the accidental crash I'm talking about.
happytoexplain 6y ago
Use of the term "hysteric(al)" is a huge red flag for me. I virtually never see it applied reasonably. In this case, the article is simply outlining a history of the issue. The Greenland case is relevant and interesting.
- aerostable_slug 6y ago
  I used the term specifically because their claims about the Thule crash don't add up. A nuclear detonation at Thule wouldn't mean general war (hackles would be raised but lots of other phenomenologies would be used as part of the warning, verification, and attack characterization processes). EDIT: Also, at the distance the crash was from the base, assuming a weapon detonated on impact the facilities would have experienced ~1 psi of overpressure. I strongly suspect they'd still be operational afterwards.

nickt 6y ago

It’s mentioned in the article and I recommend reading “Command and Control” by Eric Schlosser if you want to scare yourself half to death by reading about how careless we’ve been with our “toys”. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6452798-command-and-control https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6452798-command-and-cont...

Synaesthesia 6y ago

We should really move towards nuclear disarmament, these weapons need to go, we have been lucky so far, but we will not continue to be. It's playing with fire.

i_haz_rabies 6y ago
I was on team total disarmament for a long time, but now I think very clear no-first-strike policies, limited arsenals, no automated controls, and clear, transparent, and multifactor launch decision chains are the way to go. Nukes are terrifying, but I think it's pretty clear that they have also put a lid on major international conflict. We're not putting the genie back in the bottle... so we may as well put the bottle in a bulletproof glass cage and keep it under heavy guard.
- TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
  They've put the lid on direct military superpower conflict, so far, with some very close calls. But there's been plenty of indirect superpower conflict, and in the last couple of decades this has moved into disinfo/infowar and direct cyberwar. You might think this is less dangerous. But instead of ruined smoking cities you end up with governments run by foreign interests which are hostile to their own populations, supported by extravagant disinfo efforts designed to create confusion, paranoia, fear, and distrust. That genie is going to be even harder to put back in its bottle.
  - i_haz_rabies 6y ago
    Even if you can trace a direct line from "nukes preventing global conventional war" to our current mess of misinformation and cyberwar, is taking the lid off a hot war between China and the US (for example) the better alternative?
- pmiller2 6y ago
  Lots of nasty viruses are literally inside bulletproof cages and under heavy guard inside high level biocontainment facilities, but there have still been instances where they've gotten out of the lab. (This is not a reference to SARS-CoV-2.) Any time you're relying on humans not to do something that technically can be done, over a long enough period of time, someone eventually will probably do it. Disarmament puts much larger barriers in place than locking them up and putting walls of red tape around them.

openasocket 6y ago

It's close calls like these that make me especially concerned that North Korea now has nuclear weapons. MAD works fine, as long as you assume both sides are perfectly rational and competent. But even when countries put great effort into safety and control, accidents happen. And sometimes the only thing that stops Armageddon is someone using common sense, and remembering that the other side is human too. North Korea is well known for cutting corners, and they have a population largely insulated from the outside world, under strict totalitarian rule. When their radar malfunctions and says a dozen nukes are inbound, how likely is it that some officer is going to realize that just doesn't make any sense, and go against orders trying to confirm it?

wahern 6y ago
Yep. That MAD prevents nuclear strikes is an absolute article of faith at this point, used to reject unease outright; not an objective, practical calculus. Like all natural phenomena there will be exceptions and deviations. A nuclear incident is inevitable. The real question to my mind is whether the benefit of nuclear deterrence suppressing non-nuclear conflict is greater than the cost that will be incurred from MAD failures/exceptions. But that's an almost impossible question to answer today. Still, it's a more honest perspective. I suspect we don't look at in this way because the public would almost certainly decide (perhaps irrationally) that they're far more afraid of a nuclear strike than the slow slaughter of conventional warfare, creating pressure to discard nuclear weapons entirely.
duxup 6y ago
Yeah with MADD it seems like only a matter of time when somethings fail (human(s) tech, combination) and a catastrophic mistake is made. Too many situations started, and were saved simply by happenstance or imperfect information. IIRC during the Cuban missile crisis local Russian commanders had the authorization to launch if they felt the US was invading. Because of course, you couldn't have a deterrent if you weren't able to launch during a communication blackout. Of course that also meant that any given accident or misunderstanding could lead to a launch and full scale response. Control of starting the war was now in the hands of folks with even less information... MADD seems to guarantee a war as much as deter it.
6y ago

beebmam 6y ago

Nuclear proliferation brings us closer to mass atrocity and I worry deeply about it

dfsegoat 6y ago

Related: Fail-Safe (1962) is a fictional novel where attack codes are transmitted to a group of US bombers on airborne alert (standing by to attack the USSR) - due to the failure of an electrical component. I think it's still very relevant in this day and age. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fail-Safe_(novel)#Plot_summary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fail-Safe_(novel)#Plot_summary

aerostable_slug 6y ago

Related: an excellent Sandia Labs documentary on various close calls we've had and how the United States learned from those events and engineered a variety of safeguards: https://share-ng.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/always_never/ https://share-ng.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/alw... It's an highly recommended overview of many of the issues surrounding accidental — or unauthorized — nuclear explosions (it was originally made for internal use at the Lab).

dirtyid 6y ago

Disarmament isn't going to happen but maybe setup several redundant globally accessible early detection systems based off common technologies, so everyone can be absolutely sure launches are not malfunctions. This may involve unpleasant tech transfers, but eliminating any opportunity for miscommunication seems worthwhile.

redis_mlc 6y ago

It's interesting how out-of-date the HN comments are on this topic, since there are current threats: - Russia has a doomsday system that will launch its weapons if there's radio transmission silence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand - Russia also has 100 MT undersea weapons near New York, which means there will be no warning when detonated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status-6_Oceanic_Multipurpose_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status-6_Oceanic_Multipurpose_... - Xi has threatened to launch at the US if anything happens to the Three Gorges Dam. (The CCP released an animated video of nuking a US naval base.)