To Be Or Not To Be? Nuclear Bomb Shelters

I was talking with someone about nuclear preparedness. He was fine with the general subject of preparedness, but balked on nuclear disaster preparedness. His reasons were something like," he would rather just die right away by not making any nuclear disaster preparations". That was instead of dying a slow death by radiation.

There are other options besides a lingering death by radiation or getting a bigger dose and dying faster. 

This is not a new reaction to me, even if it is not as common among preppers. (Preppers are people who are ready for disasters.)

I live too close to a military base that is very likely to become ground zero in a nuclear shooting match. I am so close that it makes me essentially ground zero as well. A slow lingering death from radiation is not an option for me at this time. I would be pretty much instantly incinerated. 

That does not mean that I want to ignore the realities of nuclear disasters. 

The whole world was treated to a front row seat, courtesy of international media, when Japan had their run-in with atomic energy. No war has to cause exposure to a nuclear disaster.

Even when it comes to dealing with a war-based nuclear disaster, I do not choose to opt out of the discussion. 

Human beings have been faced with "ultimate weapons", throughout our history. The long bow was regarded as such a terrible weapon that it surely would end wars. We can easily laugh at that idea now, but it was very serious at the time.

It is likely that some day people could have the same reaction to the idea of nuclear weapons being an ultimate weapon. The people at the time of the advent of the long bow, had no clue that some day nuclear weapons would, by comparison, make their fears humorous. The same could be true for ourselves and our own fears. This is no reason to dismiss nuclear war as a threat now. It is not a reason to think that nobody would ever dare to use such a horrible weapon. 

No matter how horrible the weapon, humans have always used the ultimate weapon. 

Nuclear weaponry is not likely to be an exception.

Russia and China take the idea of a nuclear war as inevitable. Both countries are matter-of-fact in building shelters to house citizens in the event of a nuclear war.

The USA has no comparable program for the general populace. There is, however, an extensive program to build shelters for "important" people, at taxpayer expense. 

It beats me why the citizens of the USA tolerate this situation and how most US citizens blithely ignore the reality of war- based nuclear disasters.

I do think the average citizen anywhere in the world should accept the reality of nuclear war happening in the near future and prepare themselves for it. The people of the USA, being citizens of a prominently nuclear-weaponized-country, have more reason for this than the average citizen of most other countries.

If you live in the USA, it behooves you to prepare for nuclear war, if you are preparing for any kind of disaster. I have the links here on this blog, including an entire book on how to build a nuclear shelter. Please use it, or get the information elsewhere. I don't think  "important" people who push buttons to start nuclear wars should be the only ones to survive the nuclear wars.