NUCLEAR WAR

Press, Volume CI, Issue 30007, 17 December 1962, Page 14

NUCLEAR WAR

Assessment Ry U.S. (N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) PARIS, Dec. 15. The United States has enough atomic missiles to be able to survive a surprise nuclear attack and then launch a counter-attack that would wipe out the existing Soviet society, informed American sources said in Paris today. The assessment of the relative nuclear strength of the two countries was given to America’s allies during the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Council session in Paris. Soviet and Western allied ground forces on the frontier in Europe were about equal, although Russia probably could build its forces up more quickly in an emergency. Effect of War In Warsaw, Marshal Semyon Timoshenko, a Soviet war hero, today told the Congress of International Resistance Fighters that according to some estimates a future nuclear war may cost 800 million lives. Marshal Timoshenko, who is heading the Soviet delegation to the congress, said that according to experts, stocks of nuclear weapons now represented 25.000 megatons—12j million times the strength of the bomb released over Hiroshima.