05/05/09 HW

1) Who was Herman Kahn and what were some of the main ideas in his book, On Thermonuclear War?

Herman Kahn was a man who wrote a book describing his ideas on a Nuclear War, if ocurred, and what he believes the U.S. should do if and when a nuclear bomb drops on the United States. One main idea that Kahn had, according to his book, was that nuclear war was definitely possible. His second idea was that the war was winnable. Throughout the first chapter of his book, it describes possible scenarios of what could happen after the bomb dropped.

2) What is your reaction to his ideas so far?

I don't like the idea of a nuclear war but I at least commend Kahn for thinking about possible ways of working with the idea of a nuclear war. This whole story reminds me of the game, Fallout 3, in which you are a person who had been living in an underground vault your whole life while a nuclear war had been going on outside on the surface. Eventually, you leave the vault and realize that the Earth has now become a desolate wasteland where the amount of radiation you take in can affect how long you have to live as much as being chased down by mutants that survived the bomb. An underground vault might be a better idea than just waiting for it to happen like what Kahn suggests because you still would have your body unaffected and birth defects would not occur from radiation as well.