Global Famine after Nuclear War*

            The world as we know it could end any day as a result of an accidental nuclear war between the United States and Russia.  The fires produced by attacks on cities and industrial areas would generate smoke that would blow around the world, persist for years, and block out sunlight, producing a nuclear winter.  Because temperatures would plunge below freezing, crops would die and massive starvation could kill most of humanity.  Even a nuclear war between new nuclear states, such as India and Pakistan, could produce climate change unprecedented in recorded human history and massive disruptions to the world’s food supply. 

            Climate and crop model simulations, as well as analogs, support this theory.  The myth of nuclear deterrence has allowed nuclear weapons to persist for too long.  However, as a result of international negotiations pushed by civil society led by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), and referencing this work, the United Nations passed the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) on July 7, 2017.  On December 10, 2017, ICAN accepted the Nobel Peace Prize, and the TPNW came into force on January 22, 2021.  However, the United States and the other eight nuclear nations have yet to sign this treaty.

            This topic is scary and depressing.  One natural reaction is denial.  As Mark Twain said, “Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.”  But there is one thing you can do, which is to join the Physicists Coalition for Nuclear Threat Reduction, http://physicistscoalition.org/, a project to engage and activate the U.S. physics community.  Originally sponsored by the American Physical Society, partnered with the APS Office of Government Affairs, with support from the Carnegie Corporation, it is open to all scientists and works to lobby the U.S. government to take actions to lessen the threat of nuclear war.