nuclear missiles are incoming with 10 minutes until impact this is an attack warning I repeat this is an attack warning you are the president of the United States and you have 10 minutes to make a decision that could potentially end the world what would you do today I will be put through a nuclear war simulation designed to test if an average person could actually do the job of the president we've hired experts in AC to craft a simulation that mimics what the president would actually go through in the event of an incoming nuclear crisis we're
throwing everything at him Michelle has to figure out the options in front of her as well as having limited time that someone would have to make these decisions Michelle is faced with can she prevent an incoming nuclear attack do you know what you want to do we are running out of time [Music] in just a few minutes I'm about to walk out onto a film set that is a recreation of The Situation Room so I'm going in completely blind I have no idea what's going to happen I have no idea what the script is I
have no idea what Matt has in store for me in that room my name is Matthew parent I'm the impact and Outreach coordinator at the project on managing the atom at the Harvard Kennedy School this is to simulate the training that a president goes through to handle an incoming nuclear attack this simulation is going to be stressful we've designed fictional country valoria who's decided to attack the United States time is going to be moving quickly she's going to want more information than people have and she's going to have to make difficult decisions that she probably
never thought she would have to make so the reason that I want to do this is because so many people say oh I could totally do the job of the president can an average American citizen who doesn't have a background in politics or government handle the most stressful day at this job my strategy going in is to arrive at the most peaceful conclusion possible everybody lives if there's any way to do that I'm going to go with [Music] that Madam president We believe We are under attack a few minutes ago we picked up the signature
of multiple icbms possibly 2 to 300 Warheads coming from Silo fields in valoria it's unclear what they're targeting but we believe they're going to hit the East and the west coast espar is estimating that the strike will hit in 8 to 10 minutes uh okay so they're they're targeting the East and and the West Coast can we can we vacate the cities what what can what can be done not enough time ma'am West Coast will be hit first approximately 5 minutes later than the East Coast we don't know which cities these are just estimations man
but these example blast radiuses should give you an accurate scale of the damage that we're expecting we're looking at San Francisco Los Angeles San Diego New York DC and Chicago and we are expecting um 40 to 60 million American deaths [Music] ma'am should we notify your family or do you feel it's best to yes yes yes yes yes can we tell everybody can we can we notify all the cities impacted it is up to you to decide uh if we warn everyone but um I think we should prepare them for incoming blast it's the pressure
wave of a nuclear explosion can shatter glass miles away and injure people that are watching it we can send out a nationwide alert as soon as you authorize that yes yes do now please Madam president do you authorize the use of missile defenses okay if we do that does anyone else get impacted in the process like are we talking like shards flying over the ocean and killing a it's negligible negligible would be as if we're shooting a bullet with a bullet something is better than nothing ma'am purely defensive okay fine yes yes yes please do
this yes we are go for interceptors the limited resource that I have at my disposal is time and I can spend it in different ways the more time that I spend asking questions to get all the information I need the less effective my decision is by the time it's me we're uh attempting to contact the valorian Prime Minister but we've yet to receive a response excuse me m president our Communications are cutting in and out Across America we believe it's possible a couple of hidden missiles were used in upper atmosphere to initiate EMP effects what
what is an EMP it's an electromagnetic pulse valoria is trying to interfere with our Communications most military technology is hardened against this but the effects can be widespread and unpredictable how do we know this isn't like a false alarm Madam President we are confident an attack is incoming how do we know when do we know we have the radar that shows that they're coming from valoria ma'am I appreciate that you're taking this seriously we've had false alarms in the past there is no indication that this is a false alarm there have been false alarms in
the past during the Cuban Missile Crisis is probably the closest we've come to a nuclear exchange this is a special report it looked as though it might be one of armed conflict between Soviet vessels and American warships on the sea Lanes leading to Cuba the Soviet submarine force is the largest in the world and 35 can fire icbms from Beneath the Sea but Soviet submarines they were cut off from communication with the Homeland Soviet Naval assets thought that they were under attack in so IET command and control if three people agreed they could fire nuclear
weapons two Soviet leaders wanted to fire nuclear weapons one person decided not to fire a weapon and it prevented what likely would have grown into a much larger conflict so we were saved by the opinion of one person man' we've had false alarms in the past but you should proceed as if it is real until we know otherwise I'm afraid we need to begin to discussing response options otherwise we may not have time to respond mam president would you like to hear your response options let's hear the options sure we have a few different response
packages for you to choose from one option is to launch a smallscale nuclear response targeting valor's large population centers destroying a few of their big cities may make valoria Stand Down attacking civilian populations is viewed as as a legitimate strategy for a lot of people this nuclear strategy has only been used purposefully in war once and it was dropping two bombs in hoshima Nagasaki I I I don't want to do that I don't want to Target civilians another option it's a large scale nuclear response targeting military assets launching enough nuclear weap weapons in hopes of
entirely eliminating their ability to fight back though even when targeting military assets you will still inevitably hit major cities if you try to totally degrade an enemy military in doing so you'd also kill tens of millions of civilians in the United States a great example of this is like a city like San Diego where we have huge amounts of military assets in otherwise very populous cities you can't divorce the military personnel from the civilian Personnel both both are going to be caught in the wake of this millions of innocent people are going to die no
matter what so Michelle and any pres that's put in this position has to guess what will cause an adversary to stop what what numbers of casualties are we looking at for each of these options on a small scale 20 to 50 million civilians Millions dead in Vala on a large scale 100 to 150 million if you decide to Target population centers we can advise you on which major cities that should Target but but but by that logic then we're killing innocent civilians to make a statement it's defending our own country they attacked us their government
attacked us I mean but just know that if you Target only population centers you'll kill fewer people overall but you still leave valoria with the means to attack us militarily right listen and here's the thing I would urge Extreme Caution before deciding to Target large population centers because there's going to be major geopolitical ramifications for that and Valore has no shortage of allies at all many which have their own nuclear capabilities it'll leave their military intact to respond with a second or third wave of nuclear yes their military is very spread out it would have
to be the large scale if you want to stop their military with a decision this big it is so important to have a variety of different opinions and perspectives in the room however under this time pressure hearing all of those different opinions is extremely overwhelming each adviser has their own unique perspective and they often times don't align not everyone in government has the same beliefs ultimately the president will have to make this difficult decision this is not something where there's veto power but that doesn't necessarily mean the person is going to make a good decision
if that even exists we're being asked to kill more people to stop more people from dying seriously this is the only option it is not you could also choose not to use nuclear weapons at all and instead attack with are Conventional Weapons so what is the difference between a nuclear response and a conventional response what is what does conventional mean non-nuclear weapons jet fighters tanks infantry deploying a conventional response also means putting thousands of American servicemen and women In Harm's Way it will not be a nuclear response it will not kill hundreds of millions it'll
leave their military intact to respond with a second or third wave Madam president you could choose to not strike back at all either Choice allows us to appeal to the rest of the world and ask them to pressure valoria into seizing their attack you will give us more room to negotiate peace man millions of Americans will still die and all du respect secretary not responding is not an option with no response our military will be crippled what kind of future are we going to have but we don't even know that if we Counterattack with nuclear
missiles that that they will stop correct but they are more likely to then if we do nothing we feel like a strong response it's escalate to deescalate and these are our only options there are no easy options in front of Michelle here we have a big red button that does not exist in real life for us it represents the decision she has to make how do you respond to a nuclear threat okay Madame President I believe this is the ambassador from valoria on the phone it's about time go ahead pick it up hello good evening
Madam president I understand there's some urgency to your desire to speak with me what's going on I'm sorry our radar has detected a ton of nuclear missiles in coming to the both in east and west coast can you tell me if this is real or not not Madam president I am unaware of any such action there must be some mistake or or perhaps a malfunction with your detection systems could you start back at the beginning and explain to me what you think is going on he's saying he didn't send that he knows what he's doing
he's just trying to stall so you don't send any more missiles to him he's not going help so he's just you're lying to me valoria values its relationship with the United States I have no knowledge of any such attack let us work together to uncover the truth behind this alarming situation how do how do I know if this person is lying to me or not because we know that they sent the Warriors hello Madam president you need to do what's best for the country understand that they had someone called a stall just now yeah uh
at this point they just want to limit our response as much as possible and confuse us as much as they can excuse me things have changed our military Assets in the Pacific have been hit at Sea by short range missiles and we believe our Navy is now engaged in active combat our Communications are still not 100% so details are still fuzzy but there's your proof that will limit our conventional response how how does this impact our nuclear response we can still attack to use nuclear weapons at this point it's just a matter of how many
lives will be lost it might be impossible to watch this simulation and imagine yourself arriving at these remaining two options as I have and what I ultimately ended up doing was wasting time that backed me into a corner it really is a situation where there are no good options at all so you're telling me we're we're we're talking about like like a like a like a like everyone's like everyone's dying it could be potential World War II ma'am yes but like what what does it mean that like we're we're just sitting here yes and we
need to make a decision immediately are there any other options to consider ma'am I urge us to launch our 500 Silo based Warheads immediately of our 13 nuclear submarines only five are at Sea and within striking range but they'll likely take out their remaining Silo Fields if we transmit the order now how many casualties have you had so far in less than 5 minutes it's going to be millions and that's why we need to decide now Madam President we do need an answer ma'am silos are ready to launch bombers and Subs are on standby we
need an authorization to launch Madam president um we we're like sure this is happening this is happening and we need to get you on Air Force One and up in the [Music] air I don't know what else what what what does anyone do it's a terrible decision have I wish it was like and and I just get to go in Air Force One and fly off to a bunker you have to we need an active commanderin-chief to be able to make appropriate decisions for this conflict [Music] ma'am you are our commander-in-chief you can do this
I don't feel like it right [Music] now stand [Music] by 1 minute remaining ma' it just it feels so wrong it feels so like there's there's no right answer there's no right answer but we need an answer now ma'am large scale I have a go for large scale nuclear [Music] CLE alpha bravo Victor Bravo Romeo Madam president silos are ready to launch need an authorization to Launch [Music] that's it I need the bees brought around immediately that's it Madam President we need to move so what would you do we actually ran this simulation with other
test subjects from all different backgrounds both female and male and nearly every test subject made a similar Choice let's C everyone sit back and this made me wonder if there even was a right choice at all hi hi I'm not happy with you yes how do you feel about having just killed a couple hundred million people I don't think I made the right decision I don't maybe I should have done a small scale nuclear I don't know what anybody does in that one of the options was bomb innocent civilians to make a statement shouldn't be
an option do you think any of the option sounded like winning no not a single option was felt winning in my opinion you know you feel like you chose the wrong thing maybe after the fact but I think you know hopefully you see there there really is no good answer there really isn't in the world today it's always unlikely the nuclear war is going to break out we don't necessarily know a good reason why a country would use nuclear weapons an ie for an eye doesn't necessarily work when we're counting the dead in millions yeah
I'm not running for office anytime soon guys and the reality is presidential election year 2024 almost upon us the race for the White House shifts into high gear this month it's expected to be one of the most consequential elections of a generation anyone can be the president of the United States we would hope the president to know the consequences of these weapons these weapons very existence threatens Humanity in a way that very few things possibly could the president of the United States [Applause]
