Would an atomic bomb attack on people be judged as murder and a war crime? You should be the judge.
There is no doubt that the term tactical nuclear weapon is a misnomer, which is used to minimize the horror of atomic bombs. In the 1960s, Khrushchev and Kennedy were in a final countdown to start a nuclear war. 'Ban the Bomb' was a common refrain. Now, governments and the press casually refer to tactical nuclear weapons as convenient instruments of war. I pose a different question. "Would The Detonation Of Tactical Nuclear Weapons (Atomic Bombs) Against People Equal Mass Murder And War Crimes?".
These atomic bombs destroy everything in their paths: both lives and property (Figure 1). Temperatures of millions of degrees obliterate everything near the atomic explosion. As the bomb explosion blasts outward, even more death follows ("The Horror of Battlefield Tactical Nuclear Weapons - Insights Sparked by Ukraine and North Korea", click here). Only the size of these terrible bombs can be selected by any perpetrator of the bomb use.
Choosing to use a weapon of mass destruction and mass death is not a tactical choice. The terrible choice is how many people to kill.
Murder or Not? War Crime or Not?
The definition of murder varies slightly by source. However, the definition of murder invariably includes a form of 'the crime of unlawfully and unjustifiably killing another under circumstances defined by statute (as with premeditation)' (www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/murder).
The definition of a war crime is 'an act committed usually during an international war for which individual criminal liability will be imposed by a domestic or international tribunal specifically : a violation of the laws or customs of war as embodied or recognized by international treaty, court decisions, or established practice', per Merriam-Webster.
For both murder and war crimes, or murder as a war crime, laws must be broken. International laws are primarily governed by treaties.
Potential Criminals Write the Laws
The nuclear powers who own these weapons of mass destruction and death make the treaties to govern their own nuclear weapons. That is, the manufacturers of nuclear weapons decide if there will be laws to govern the use of these bombs, and they have yet to agree to not use nuclear weapons.
Treaties that curb the use of nuclear weapons have limited the production and testing of nuclear weapons. Such treaties are discussed in an "Overview of U.S. Nuclear Treaties" (ge.stanford.edu/courses/2016/ph241/long2) and "Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT)" (.un.org/disarmament/wmd/nuclear/npt). However, there have been no treaties to actually ban the use of nuclear bombs as tools of war ("Do tactical nukes break international law?", click here).
The issues concerning nuclear arms control and use are extremely complicated. We do not have the answers, but we are not even asking the questions.
Apparently, the fear or respect of each other's nuclear stockpiles, and the fear of world-wide disaster, are the linchpins that prevent the use of catastrophic nuclear bombs.
Figure 1: Hiroshima damages from a bomb that fits the explosive payload of a so-called tactical nuclear weapon
(Image by Japanese government) Details DMCA
What Do You Think?
Here is a significant question. If our leaders own the bombs and write the laws, and one nuclear bomb can massacre hundreds of thousands of people in seconds, is the use of a so-called tactical nuclear bomb murder and a war crime, or not? Although I ask the question, I do not have an enforceable answer, but my opinion is 'Yes'.
I have often heard that history is written by the victors. If this statement is true, then only time will tell if a bomb will ever be used, and only time will tell if the use of an atomic bomb to obliterate people is mass murder or a war crime.
Even so, a question of such importance should be asked before an answer is ever needed. A nuclear weapon, tactical or otherwise, should never be detonated into the lives of people.
A Nuclear Horror Op Ed Summary
Tactical nuclear weapons can wreak horrendous terror into the lives of people in a nuclear explosion. My opinion is affected by my education. My many years of Doctor's research in Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering provided insights into explosions and radiation. As a teenager, I read John Hersey's "Hiroshima" for a school assignment.
The horrific images of an atomic bomb attack in that book have stayed with me for life. Some of those terrible graphics are discussed in an earlier Op Ed, where the more graphic written and visual images have been excluded here, since some readers could be offended. Even so, this discussion portrays a grim description of a possible future for the world we live in.
The rest of this article excerpts a summary discussion from that Op Ed that I wrote to expose so-called tactical nuclear weapons that explode tremendous damages and tragedy into the lives of the victims ("The Horror of Battlefield Tactical Nuclear Weapons - Insights Sparked by Ukraine and North Korea", Click Here). Multiple news outlets refused to publish the following, shorter, and less graphic Op Ed.
The Horror of So-called Tactical Nuclear Weapons
'What happens if a battlefield tactical nuclear weapon explodes?
Talk in the press of a possible use of tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine and North Korean nuclear weapons missile testing ignites an interest in this explosive topic'. A Hiroshima-sized atomic bomb falls into the classification of tactical nuclear weapons (Figure 2).
'The press, nuclear industry representatives, and regulators continue to downplay this horror. For example, the term 'airburst' has also recently been applied by the press to atomic bombs, making these weapons sound more like common fireworks. These atomic bombs are detonated in the air to ensure that more lives are extinguished.
Figure 2: Nuclear explosion payloads
(Image by U.S. NRC and Leishear Engineering, LLC, 'The Horror of Battlefield Tactical Nuclear Weapons - Insights Sparked by Events In Ukraine and North Korea') Details DMCA
A Definition of So-called Tactical Nuclear Weapons?
Tactical nuclear weapons, also called nonstrategic nuclear weapons, are generally designed for battlefield use and have a shorter range than strategic, or long-range, nuclear weapons, which are designed to directly attack an adversary's homeland. Some analysts describe tactical nuclear weapons as intended to win a battle, while strategic weapons are intended to win a war.' 'Bottom line: there is no universal definition of tactical nuclear weapons' (Union of Concerned Scientists, "What Are Tactical Nuclear Weapons", .ucsusa.org/resources/tactical-nuclear-weapons).
Even though the exact definition of tactical nuclear weapons is unclear, one fact is clear. Artillery and short-range missile tactical weapons have the capabilities to destroy cities and kill hundreds of thousands of people - in a matter of seconds. Reports in the press state that such weapons would be easily detectable, but nuclear weapons capable of destroying cities are available in the size of an artillery shell'.
Nuclear Arsenals
'Considering the complex issues that are facing us, mention of the worldwide nuclear arsenal is warranted. 'The United States and Russia hold 90% of the world's stockpile of almost 13,000 nuclear weapons. Neither has the capability to wipe out the other's nuclear arsenal in an initial attack. Both countries understand that any use of strategic nuclear weapons would invite a nuclear counterattack and the potential of a civilization-ending nuclear exchange' (Union of Concerned Scientists, "What Are Tactical Nuclear Weapons").
Nuclear war alarms are being raised throughout the world, and so-called tactical weapons are still referred to as 'even smaller, tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine' ("How Biden's Three Most Powerful Forces Are Playing Nuclear Poker with Putin", click here). These atomic bombs are weapons of mass destruction and horrible deaths. How can members of the press and government continue to minimize the horror of nuclear weapon blasts against humankind? What is wrong with us?
Weapons of Death and Destruction
Weapons of mass destruction overwhelm the senses when trying to understand the full scope of anguish and death. Technically, the full scope of destruction and radioactive fallout cannot be known in advance for so-called tactical nuclear weapons. Pulling the tail of the nuclear dragon can be extremely dangerous, given that the size of this dragon of war is not known.
A nuclear bomb mushroom cloud is a common image in our lives, and the press diminishes the dread of the term tactical nuclear weapon. Such a monstrous bomb is designed to instantaneously snuff out and destroy so many lives. Words cannot convey to us the shear horror of these tactical and strategic bombs that rip through flesh, shatter bones, vaporize people, and burn people to death.
Tactical Nuclear Weapons = Nuclear Horror
A single so-called tactical nuclear weapon can kill every man, woman and child in a city. A tactical weapon can explode ferocious damage into the lives of the victims. A tactical weapon can be small to reduce the number of mass killings, a nuclear bomb can be fired from cannons, and a single so-called tactical bomb can detonate more than six times the explosive force of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima'.
With respect to the Russia - Ukraine war, 'will a 'great power' such as Russia commit such a mass horror of misery and death? Would such a use of nuclear weapons be a despicable atrocity? Would such a use of nuclear weapons be tantamount to mass murder? Would such a use of nuclear weapons be tantamount to a war crime? These are scary times, and dismissing tactical nuclear weapons as a reasonable means of establishing 'power' is beyond reason.
TNT equivalents for tactical nuclear weapons range from a fraction of a kiloton to more than a hundred kilotons of TNT, Hiroshima exploded at 15 kilotons of TNT, and Nagasaki exploded at 21 kilotons of TNT. That is, a single tactical nuclear weapon can devastate an entire city or only part of that city, depending on the payload of the chosen destructive force, and depending on the targeted population.
The purposes of tactical nuclear weapons are to kill people, to instill fear, to win battles in war, and to destroy property. Nuclear horror is a stark and inevitable consequence of these goals if achieved'.
(Article changed on Oct 27, 2022 at 8:29 AM EDT)
