6 Responses

1. Very educational indeed. I never knew about the French tests in the Sahara, and never would have guessed the total number of tests would be so high. The frequency in the 1960s was so great that the video’s audio approached a perverse sort of music…

2. Michael, I think a drop in explosions from the end of the Cold War can be observed in the period 1989-1998.. but agree it would be great to see the data continued to present day.

   Chris you are right – this may well be the most educational video ever. I’m sure viewers will take away different insights – but it should be required viewing – for everyone.

   1. “Michael, I think a drop in explosions from the end of the Cold War can be observed in the period 1989-1998.. but agree it would be great to see the data continued to present day.”

      I think there have only been those recent nuclear tests in NK since 1998.

3. While unsettling, this video suggests unintended consequences of agreements like the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Might foreign powers, as well has home governments, underestimate the variance in nuclear quality and (more importantly) control by newly-acquiring countries with less opportunity for, er, practice?

4. 1) This makes North Korea look a little less paranoid. Which I didn’t know was possible.

   2) Note the geography: Each power uses its colonies (Pacific, Central Asian, African) for this purpose.

   3) If someone had asked you to guess the number of nuclear explosions the occurred between 1945 and 1998, would you have gone as high as 2,053? Me neither.

5. Unsettling.

   It would actually have been very interesting to see this extended beyond 1998. Did the disintegration of the Soviet Union make any difference? And if so, what difference?