Can the US survive multiple nuclear attacks on Washington D.C., New York City, LA, Fort Knox and Nappa Vally?

Question

Can we recover fast enough to keep our society a free nation? How quickly would our government be able to respond to such a crisis at this time. If it happened today, could we expect a Katrina like response from our leaders.

Answer 1

We are ready to respond before the first bomb drops! But we would have a hard time recovering form such massive attacks. The carnage would be terrible. Not only would those places you named be destroyed but it would affect the entire nation. The fallout would extend for miles & millions more would be killed or too sick to help themselves or others. One would hope that the response would be quicker & a lot more involved than the Katrina mess. Of course with the Nation's capital gone, who knows.

Answer 2

As a nuclear hardness and sustainment engineer, our nuclear response would be fast and deadly accurate, therefore the targets would be on our very hardened nuclear silos first, which are away from major population centers. Our military is extremely effective in responding fast, harsh, and accurate, and in clean-up and rebuilding infrastructure (airstrips, bridges, etc.)

Most of the targets you mention have substantial morale value, but a hit on DC would not cripple our nation's leadership; most of the time our leaders are elsewhere (the State of the Union address being the principle exception to that). Those targets would only be attacked if unmonitored nuclear material was delivered by hand (instead of ballistically, by missile), so as to prevent identification of the group responsible for the attack. Since we carefully monitor all Uranium and other fissile materials, the source of the weapon would be identified very quickly by fast field testing, and lightning investigations would yield targets for a fierce counter-attack.

Our nation would not be free from fear (see 9/11 effects) for many years and a depression would likely ensue again. Additional security measures in response to the attacks would further erode our freedoms, but I do not expect Americans to be the kind of people to surrender to a foreign power under any condition, so our sovereignty would not be threatened, if that is the kind of freedom of interest.

Besides, why did you choose Fort Knox as a nuclear target? I see no value at all in hitting Fort Knox, unless you think that radioactive gold is a bad thing; jk, it would be cleaned quickly like everything else. Perhaps you are just living in fear of the "nuclear terrorist," which is just "a few hairs short" of living the nightmare of the conspiracy theorist.

In the case of nuclear attacks, I assure you that the military would respond quickly and effectively in cleaning-up the nuclear mess (being highly trained in NBC, nuclear/chemical/biological warfare). BTW, the federal response would have been much faster and more effective if the local leaders, most notably the corrupt and arrogant mayor of New Orleans had stepped out of the way completely.

Answer 3

The U.S. could survive, but it would be a very long, and slow rise back up. I don't think there is any nation currently capable of even launching such a strike. If there is, it is doubtful that all of the strikes would be successful. This would not be a pretty sight and would be far worse than anything Katrina did. The government would be hard pressed to aid in recovery in any affected areas.

Answer 4

First of all, you should NOT rely on the government to take care of you!

A lot of the Katrina problems *should* have been handled on a local and statewide basis, but that's neither here nor there at this point.

Our government is too large of a bureaucracy to move quickly. Period. Hell, I work at a small university, and our bureaucracy is so bad that an "emergency hire" took more than six weeks to process. But no, the government will not be able to respond quickly. Look how poorly we did on 9/11 - or during that Northeastern Blackout. When the **** hits the fan, I prefer to take care of myself instead of waiting for "help" that may never appear, and when it does, it's such a quagmire that it's not really "help" at all.

That's why Americans need to quit looking to the government to "help" us and start looking to ourselves.

"If you think you can trust the government, ask an Indian"

Answer 5

Yes, whatever would this country do without DC, LA, and NYC.....LOL!! The rest of us would throw a party, declare the day Independence Day 2, then carry on as normal.

Not sure where you were going with Nappa...you that dependent on wine? And we've been off of the gold standard for years....Fort Knox ain't that big a target....

Answer 6

You sound like a terrorist or a liberal. I cant decide. Do you think its going to matter if all those cities get hit... Moron. Katrina was not a nuclear attack it was a hurricane. People had the means to get out of the way and refused even after multiple warnings. If you are referring to the lack of local Govt. response, you are probably right. If your refering to the Federal Govenment there will only be one response and then it wont matter.

Answer 7

I doubt anyone would survive or very few if a city was hit by multiple nuclear warheads. If the initial explosion didn't kill them the radiation fallout would.

Answer 8

Sure. But, most importantly, I'll survive, 'cause I'm in the Midwest.

Ha. But, seriously, I hope no people anywhere are dumb enough to start a nuclear war. If they are, we might as well kiss our a.sses and the planet Earth goodbye.

Answer 9

We could never recover from an attack on all those delicious grape vinyards of the Napa Valley.
Roving bands of mutant winos would rule California and come slowly eastward looking for cheese and crackers.... and brains.

Answer 10

doubt it... the best response most states not affected will hear...welcome to Canada eh and don't forget mutants will be able to get free health care. better this response than a bush response eh!