Date: Mon, 17 Sep 2001 00:52:30 -0400
To: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
From: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
Subject: Recommended Reading: Nuclear War Survival Skills
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Nuclear War Survival Skills : Updated and Expanded 1987 Edition by
Cresson H. Kearny With Foreword by Dr. Edward Teller. Original
Edition Published September, 1979,by Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a
Facility of the U.S. Department of Energy.

The book is available to read online at:  <http://www.ki4u.com/free_book/>

Regards,  Matt-

Foreword by Edward Teller:

There are two diametrically opposite views on civil defense. Russian
official policy holds that civil defense is feasible even in a
nuclear war. American official policy, or at any rate the
implementation of that policy, is based on the assumption that civil
defense is useless.

The Russians, having learned a bitter lesson in the second world war,
have bent every effort to defend their people under all
circumstances. They are spending several billion dollars per year on
this activity. They have effective plans to evacuate their cities
before they let loose a nuclear strike. They have strong shelters for
the people who must remain in the cities. They are building up
protected food reserves to tide them over a critical period.

All this may mean that in a nuclear exchange, which we must try to
avoid or to deter, the Russian deaths would probably not exceed ten
million. Tragic as such a figure is, the Russian nation would
survive. If they succeed in eliminating the United States they can
commandeer food, machinery and manpower from the rest of the world.
They could recover rapidly. They would have attained their goal:
world domination.

In the American view the Russian plan is unfeasible. Those who argue
on this side point out the great power of nuclear weapons. In this
they are right. Their argument is particularly impressive in its
psychological effect.

But this argument has never been backed up by a careful quantitative
analysis which takes into account the planned dispersal and
sheltering of the Russian population and the other measures which the
Russians have taken and those to which they are committed.

That evacuation of our own citizens can be extremely useful if we see
that the Russians are evacuating is simple common sense. With the use
of American automobiles an evacuation could be faster and more
effective than is possible in Russia. To carry it out we need not
resort to the totalitarian methods of the iron curtain countries. It
will suffice to warn our people and advise them where to go, how to
protect themselves. The Federal Emergency Management Administration
contains the beginnings on which such a policy might be built.

The present book does not, and indeed cannot, make the assumption
that such minimal yet extremely useful government guidance will be
available. Instead it outlines the skills that individuals or groups
of individuals can learn and apply in order to improve their chances
of survival.

This book is not a description of civil defense. It is a guide to
"Stop-gap" civil defense which individuals could carry out for
themselves, if need be, with no expenditures by our government. It
fills the gap between the ineffective civil defense that we have
today and the highly effective survival preparations that we could
and should have a few years from now. However, if we go no further
than what we can do on the basis of this book, then the United States
cannot survive a major nuclear war.

Yet this book, besides being realistic and objectively correct,
serves two extremely important purposes. One is: it will help to save
lives. The second purpose is to show that with relatively inexpensive
governmental guidance and supplies, an educated American public
could, indeed, defend itself. We could survive a nuclear war and
remain a nation.

This is an all-important goal. Its most practical aspect lies in the
fact that the men in the Kremlin are cautious. If they cannot count
on destroying us they probably will never launch their nuclear
arsenal against us. Civil defense is at once the most peaceful and
the most effective deterrent of nuclear war.

Some may argue that the Russians could evacuate again and again and
thus, by forcing us into similar moves, exhaust us. I believe that in
reality they would anger us sufficiently so that we would rearm in
earnest. That is not what the Russians want to accomplish.

Others may say that the Russians could strike without previous
evacuation. This could result in heavy losses on their part which, I
hope, they will not risk.

Civil defense as here described will not eliminate the danger of
nuclear war. It will considerably diminish its probability.

This book takes a long overdue step in educating the American people.
It does not suggest that survival is easy. It does not prove that
national survival is possible. But it can save lives and it will
stimulate thought and action which will be crucial in our two main
purposes: to preserve freedom and to avoid war.

Edward Teller


Copyright 1999 Nuclear War Survival Skills


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