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From: mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor)
Newsgroups: net.tv.da,net.politics
Subject: Re: Worse than Nuclear War
Message-ID: <509@dciem.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 27-Nov-83 17:05:13 EST
Article-I.D.: dciem.509
Posted: Sun Nov 27 17:05:13 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 27-Nov-83 19:30:15 EST
References: <141@ut-ngp.UUCP>
Organization: D.C.I.E.M., Toronto, Canada
Lines: 21

What scares me worse than the possibilty of nuclear war is the potential
use of chemical and/or biological weapons.  Imagine the release of a 
short-lived (say 2-3 days) virus that incapacitates and kills.  The U.S.
and/or U.S.S.R. could blanket the other with such nasties which would
kill as many people as horribly as using nukes, with the side benefit of
not turning the area into a radioactive wasteland.
=============
When you are talking about the death of civilization, it doesn't
matter much which is worse. But at least biological or chemical
warfare leaves the prospect of survival for SOME higher forms
of life, and possibly even some human life. Nuclear war provides
little such prospect, so it ought to be considered worse.

Perhaps the life-forms around the black smokers in the deep Pacific
might survive a nuclear war, and might evolve intelligence again
in half-a-billion years, but that doesn't make me too much happier
about nuclear war.
-- 

Martin Taylor
{allegra,linus,ihnp4,uw-beaver,floyd,ubc-vision}!utcsrgv!dciem!mmt