Nuclear attack planning base--1990

The NAPB-90 project was an in-house project of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) carried out over a year and a half from early 1985 to 1986. The project was coordinated by the Office of Emergency Management Programs, State and Local Programs and Support Directorate, and involved professionals and experts from FEMA directorates and offices, other Federal departments and agencies, and the private sector. The NAPB-90 is an estimate of the potential physical effects of a nuclear attack on the population of the United States in terms of the degree of the potential risk. Three types of potential nuclear attack effects risks and the areas and populations affected by each are defined: The direct effects risk from blast overpressure generated by the explosion of a nuclear weapon; The potential thermal and secondary blast-ignited fire risk created by the combined effects of blast overpressure damage and the thermal pulse or fireball of a weapon; and The fallout risk from radiation generated by surface-burst weapons. The development of the planning base followed detailed studies of all aspects of nuclear attack planning, but despite such efforts specific confidence limits cannot be assigned to either implicit or explicit assumptions used regarding targeting, weapon yields and designs, heights of burst, and delivery system accuracy and reliability. In short, NAPB-90 does not (and cannot) claim total realism.