The labour Leader thread...

Tefal said:
(lol at nuclear winter though you realise we've set off more nukes than our entire arsenal?)
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Yes, in the sea of an open area.

The issue is the ash generated from burning cities which causes the real issue.

The other points you raised are simply with the benefit of hindsight, had the cold war ended in a nuclear war we would not be here to discuss this point, on the other hand had it ended in a conventional war the human race would still exist.
 
Tefal said:
lol at nuclear winter though you realise we've set off more nukes than our entire arsenal?
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Rofl - it seems you don't even know the theory behind nuclear winter.

If you'd have bothered to check, even if it was just wikipedia, then you wouldn't be making yourself look silly.

Having said that, I don't subscribe to the nuclear winter theory - I think the effects are over estimated and any resultant temperature drop would be minimal and short term.
 
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amigafan2003 said:
Rofl - it seems you don't even know the theory behind nuclear winter.

If you'd have bothered to check, even if it was just wikipedia, then you wouldn't be making yourself look silly.

Having said that, I don't subscribe to the nuclear winter theory - I think the effects are over estimated and any resultant temperature drop would be minimal and short term.
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Regarding that, a 2007 NASA study came to the following conclusion.

"A global average surface cooling of –7 °C to –8 °C persists for years, and after a decade the cooling is still –4 °C (Fig. 2). Considering that the global average cooling at the depth of the last ice age 18,000 yr ago was about –5 °C, this would be a climate change unprecedented in speed and amplitude in the history of the human race. The temperature changes are largest over land ... Cooling of more than –20 °C occurs over large areas of North America and of more than –30 °C over much of Eurasia, including all agricultural regions."
 
[TW]Fox;28631959 said:
I don't think he heard you :p
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I did, but the answer is in my previous reply and I haven't got the time to go into more detail - this forum is distracting enough as it is. Plus it's clear that no matter what my response is, it wont satisfy him so I'm not going to waste my breath.
 
amigafan2003 said:
Having said that, I don't subscribe to the nuclear winter theory - I think the effects are over estimated and any resultant temperature drop would be minimal and short term.
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There are many many variables to it - a relatively small amount that was pushed to the right level of the atmosphere could have a big effect or lots and lots of ash, etc. that clung to lower levels might have negligible effect - prevalent wind, structure of aquifers/groundwater, terrain, detonation height, etc. can all change the (overall) environmental impact aspect hugely.

I think the only thing that is pretty much certain is that if Russia and the US went full out and flung every single one of their nukes at each other the results would be significant to catastrophic globally, not so much our own arsenal.
 
With 255 warheads we should be able to come close to the estimated 100 cities burning to create the required ash/residue to significantly impact upon the global temperature - specifically in our key agricultural regions essentially starving the population of the earth.

The point I was making earlier is quite simply, we are viewing our existing situation based upon the premise that we will not have a nuclear war in the future - but judging by the amount of time we've had it & the prospect of other nations developing them this may change. The absence of conventional warfare as a benefit in the short-term may be irrelevant if the end result of our existing situation is something resembling another ice-age.

It may be a net benefit in the future, it may also be the exact mindset which results in our downfall as a species. Really the only way of prevent nuclear war is to get another better as a species & move away from developing weapons capable of self-destruction. I'm not saying it's definitely going to beneficial if we remove them all, just that the default stance is a choice within it'self, one which has it's own consequences which may be less desirable than we've seen so far.
 
Moses said:
Well, no. Because in that scenario we'd have the escalation of conventional forces, etc. Think back to the Cold War when the thing stopping the Russians rolling across Europe were our nukes. You'd have Russia taking back the Baltic states, etc... given they'd know there's NOTHING the rest of the World could do short of starting a full scale world war.
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^ This.

There was no way a conventional war between NATO and the USSR wouldn't have escalated into a tactical nuclear then strategic nuclear war.

I would rather have it and not need it, then need it and not have it.
 
Jono8 said:
Why is firing a nuke so black and white (or obviously black in your case)

It can be argued that whilst obviously horrific, the bombs dropped on Japan ended a war that could have gone on for ages and killed countless more people than the bombs themselves did.
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Ignoring the fact that many of the victims were just as likely to be non combatants, let's also not forget that Japan was unable to respond in kind. In present day circumstances, the situation involving a would be antagonist, would be completely different and the example you give to justify the use of nukes would be inapplicable.
 
elmarko said:
With 255 warheads we should be able to come close to the estimated 100 cities burning to create the required ash/residue to significantly impact upon the global temperature - specifically in our key agricultural regions essentially starving the population of the earth.
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Based on some rough jottings if fired for optimal effect our supposed current active warheads would only be sufficient to turn approx 22.5 major cities into sizeable firestorms - unlike Russia and China whose nukes are designed to make a big splash the current US and UK (given its mostly the same tech) arsenal are "relatively" surgical. (Would also depend a bit on the composition of the city - Japan's cities in WW2 tended to be quite densely packed and constructed from light, highly flammable materials like wood, paper, etc. which made for favourable conditions for a firestorm).

elmarko said:
The point I was making earlier is quite simply, we are viewing our existing situation based upon the premise that we will not have a nuclear war in the future - but judging by the amount of time we've had it & the prospect of other nations developing them this may change. The absence of conventional warfare as a benefit in the short-term may be irrelevant if the end result of our existing situation is something resembling another ice-age.

It may be a net benefit in the future, it may also be the exact mindset which results in our downfall as a species. Really the only way of prevent nuclear war is to get another better as a species & move away from developing weapons capable of self-destruction. I'm not saying it's definitely going to beneficial if we remove them all, just that the default stance is a choice within it'self, one which has it's own consequences which may be less desirable than we've seen so far.
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That is a point that should always be considered and debated - as things stand I think the balance is generally good on that aspect unless another arms race kicks off.
 
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I don't think we should renew trident. It costs a lot of money that could be better spent elsewhere. Britain and France are the only countries in Europe with nuclear weapons and the rest of Europe are managing fine. It's not like Germany is doing badly without them.

I think the world should be working towards disarmament of all weapons eventually, obviously this is a long time away but like how guns are illegal in most countries which works well, we should eventually have that on a global scale, including governments once everyone is friends.

We don't have to worry about being nuked by China or Russia as we do so much business with them that they don't want us gone. The cold war is over.

The biggest risk is some nutter getting hold of them and us having nuclear weapons isn't going to stop that and they don't work as a deterrent against someone like that.

Also I feel that telling other countries that they can't have nuclear weapons when we do is slightly hypocritical.
 
Eurofighter said:
I don't think we should renew trident. It costs a lot of money that could be better spent elsewhere. Britain and France are the only countries in Europe with nuclear weapons and the rest of Europe are managing fine. It's not like Germany is doing badly without them.

I think the world should be working towards disarmament of all weapons eventually, obviously this is a long time away but like how guns are illegal in most countries which works well, we should eventually have that on a global scale, including governments once everyone is friends.

We don't have to worry about being nuked by China or Russia as we do so much business with them that they don't want us gone. The cold war is over.

The biggest risk is some nutter getting hold of them and us having nuclear weapons isn't going to stop that and they don't work as a deterrent against someone like that.

Also I feel that telling other countries that they can't have nuclear weapons when we do is slightly hypocritical.
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Surely its better to have them and not need them, than not have them and need them. Considering the long leed time on trident submarine replacement no one can say with certainty that another cold war scenario doesn't occur. and with Russia renewing and even expanding on it's nuclear weapons delivery systems we'd be crazy not to atleast maintain are current capability.

Telling other coountries not to develop nuclear weapons isn't hypocritical considering they signed the non-proliferation treaties stating they would not develop them.

As far as i see it the negatives are masively outweighted by the positives. and for that very reason i could not vote for a labour party under corbyn. The insanity of admitting he wouldn't press the button shocked me, especially for a potential future prime minister.
 
The fact he admitted he wouldn't push the button has all but cemented the fact he'll never be PM. While most of us expect that any PM wouldn't actually do it (can they even do it without U.S. say so?), he's came out and looked like a bottle job. He looks weak and I wouldn't trust him on the defence of our country. Does he think if we remove our weapons then Russia and China are going to follow suit? Guy lives in a fantasy land of student union politics.
 
Shampoo said:
The fact he admitted he wouldn't push the button has all but cemented the fact he'll never be PM. While most of us expect that any PM wouldn't actually do it (can they even do it without U.S. say so?), he's came out and looked like a bottle job. He looks weak and I wouldn't trust him on the defence of our country. Does he think if we remove our weapons then Russia and China are going to follow suit? Guy lives in a fantasy land of student union politics.
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We can do it without us say so, they gave up on trying to do that before selling us the prior poseidon generation in the 60's.

i'd love us all to disarm nuclear weapons, but doing it unilateraly would be insane. I wouldn't want to have to rely on allies for a nuclear deterrent. I think nuclear weapons get a bad rep. Without them, i think nato and the warsaw pact would have gone to war in the 1940's, with a disastrous out come either that, or most of europe would be part of the ussr.

Considering defense of its citizens is a governments first responsibility. I just couldn't see corbyn as prime minister. For me, this one issue alone is a deal breaker for voting for labour.

And that's not forgetting that the decision to go ahead with building the trident replacement will be taken next year. So by 2020 cancalling would waste a massive amount of money.
 
Eurofighter said:
I think the world should be working towards disarmament of all weapons eventually, obviously this is a long time away but like how guns are illegal in most countries which works well, we should eventually have that on a global scale, including governments once everyone is friends.
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Eventually does not mean straight away though. Or in the next decade. With more countries developing nuclear capabilities it's certainly a brave* move for an existing nuclear capable country to abandon their weapons.



*There are many other words that could be used here.
 
Eurofighter said:
I don't think we should renew trident. It costs a lot of money that could be better spent elsewhere. Britain and France are the only countries in Europe with nuclear weapons and the rest of Europe are managing fine. It's not like Germany is doing badly without them.
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Except for a small thing called NATO, right?
 
Eurofighter said:
I don't think we should renew trident. It costs a lot of money that could be better spent elsewhere. Britain and France are the only countries in Europe with nuclear weapons and the rest of Europe are managing fine. It's not like Germany is doing badly without them.

I think the world should be working towards disarmament of all weapons eventually, obviously this is a long time away but like how guns are illegal in most countries which works well, we should eventually have that on a global scale, including governments once everyone is friends.

We don't have to worry about being nuked by China or Russia as we do so much business with them that they don't want us gone. The cold war is over.

The biggest risk is some nutter getting hold of them and us having nuclear weapons isn't going to stop that and they don't work as a deterrent against someone like that.

Also I feel that telling other countries that they can't have nuclear weapons when we do is slightly hypocritical.
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1. Germany was occupied by the Soviets for decades.
2. It now exists under the protection of the NATO nuclear umberella
3. Many non-nuclear states have been invaded. No nuclear states have been invaded.
4. Trade does not change anything! Someone said the same thing before WWI. It was nonsense then and it's nonsense now.
5. Yes it is hypocritical. What is wrong with that?
 
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