Quote:
Originally Posted by Legbreaker
The main problem the US has is water. If water could be supplied by rainfall or irrigation, many problems would be almost immediately solved (or at least when the harvest came in).
Yes there are other factors, but water really is the big one as illustrated in Kidnapped.
Howling Wilderness also reiterates this point in the description of the Great Lakes region - rainfall has fallen about half normal, but they're still able to grow significant amounts of food.
With the drastically reduced population (roughly half pre-war), total food production would be sufficient to feed the country, if only they could get it to rain! The first group that solves the water problem (or is lucky enough to occupy an area that receives decent and sustained rainfall) is going to have a huge advantage over the coming years. This is one of the reasons the information on the tapes in Satellite Down is so valuable.
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To have that kind of drought affect the whole country you would have to have had a much worse exchange than happened - you basically need to disrupt the Gulf Stream and the El Nino and the hurricane cycle - and if they had used that many nukes I doubt there would have been many survivors at all - especially since to disrupt the Gulf Stream on any large scale you basically would have to blow a bunch of holes straight thru Florida
and it would take several failed winters, not just one or two to drain lakes, ponds and especially rivers to where they couldn't be used for irrigation - and you can pull water out of them in multiple ways that have nothing to do with needing electrical power - if the Ancient Egyptians, Babylonians and Persians could do it so could a farmer in Nebraska or Virginia
especially with the loss already of half the population - that would have already reduced greatly the pressure on the water supply
the drought is basically a deux ex machina to kill off any chance of the US rising again in time to threaten the French hegemony from the 2300 game - one that anyone who can do math can see would reduce the US not just a howling wilderness but an almost totally depopulated one
simple math - 3/4 of the remaining population cant be fed and takes on the 1/4 that can be fed - and destroys basically all the remaining food and fields that make that food in the process - its called everyone dies - especially once the typhus epidemic from all those dead bodies lying around kills off anyone who actually survives all the fighting - starving people don't usually make good grave diggers
like I said if I want to play that game I will fire up Fallout or dig out my old copy of Aftermath
but I prefer to play Twilight as a military game that has fun aspects where you interact with whats left of civilization trying to rebuild - not fighting in the burning wreckage for the last can of beans left in Illinois or Iowa