A note on the nukes (and to see if I can quote correctly
)...
2004 : Israel retaliated to a chemical attack by nuking half of Libyan cities. It worked (Rulebook, Target: Wastelands).
2006 : North Korea launched one missile at Japan. It didn't work (Rulebook).
2009 : SAIM commando had the Lone Eagle of fame launched at Russia. It didn't work (Rulebook).
2030 : India and Pakistan fires nukes in Kashmir. It worked (Shadows of Asia).
2056 : Ares brings a tactical nuke to Chicago. It worked (well, more or less, Burning Bright, Bug City).
France conducts regular underground nuclear testing off the coast of French Guiana (SOTA:2064).
2064 : Winternight has magically modified nuke exploding all over the world (System Failure).
Unfortunately I cannot remember what happened in
Find Your Own Truth, when the nuke failed (year/how/why)
Post-Awakening, there's a higher rate of nukes "working." With two being "magically modified" in one form or another. Pre-Awakening, both the failed launches...well nukes don't detonate like conventional munitions. There is a chance that critical mass would be obtained from a crash, but unlikely. The Corebook just says the North Korean nuke "didn't detonate" and being a relatively new nuclear power, it could have been filled with stuffed drop-bears and just called a nuke by the war mongering propaganda machines of Japan and N. Korea or it could have had a faulty design, someone could have forgotten to install the fission/fusionable material (or other component), we are talking North Korea here. With the Lone Eagle incident, to a far far lesser degree the same issues might arise, but there could also be the issue that SAIM didn't have the arming code, just the launch code (though I don't know enough about the US missiles to know with any certainty that there are two codes, arming/launching, or if they're one and the same, or something entirely different). The Corebook states "the warheads never hit" and SWA says
then the missile disappeared." Typically if an ICBM warhead doesn't reach it's target location it doesn't activate. Either way, both are statistical freaks that happened before the Awakening.
Discarding the pre-Awakening nukes (and assuming the failed one in
Find Your Own Truth was post-Awakening) that means every nuke has worked, even those modified or affected by magic, save the
FYOT device. And one cannot discard the French's testing because in the testing it is shown that nukes still work, that's the whole point of the tests. SOTA: 2064's quote is "France still conducts regular underground testing, mostly offshore from French Guyana, as a show of bravado against Amazonia and Saeder-Krupp." (posted by Skywarp with no one posting to contradict him/her) Of course nothing is said about whether the tests show normal results, however for it to be used as "bravado" against other countries/corporations the main way (only way with out inviting people to partake in the experiments on site) to prove it would be seismographic detections by other countries with signatures equivalent to the French's claimed yields for each test. France says, "Everyone stay calm, we're doing an underground test of an X-megaton device at Y-time." Then Amazonia and Saeder-Krupp look at their seismographs after that time and say, "wow, look at that, that's indicative of an X-megaton device." Add to that, satellite info to watch for ground deformation at the sites...the current info in Shadowrun books would indicate that nukes work just fine.
Because the two most notable failed nukes were both launched, and that the Pakistan-India war lead to "three tactical nuclear devices exploded and thought the Himalayan valley contained much of the heat and shockwaves, the whole region is now irreparably irradiated and unsuitable for life" (SoA p. 66), where tactically generally means launched/delivered from smaller than ICBM delivery systems, it is a far higher probability that something in the delivery systems failed in the Lone Eagle and N. Korean attacks than the nuke itself. Then add to that that semi-ballistics transports still work, launching satellites still work, etc., a well-maintained MIRV on a well-maintained ICBM is just as deadly as it is today.
Then you have Ares, Saeder-Krupp, other Megas, and other nuclear-capable nations all holding on to stockpiles. If they didn't work they would be dismantling them for material use in other areas. But even if they work at 1/10th power (and only the magically modified nukes have shown any indication of reduced power) that's still quite a punch considering modern nukes are tens, hundreds of times as powerful as Little Boy and Fat Man.
Of course I may have missed something in the canon, or some of my assumptions are too narrow or broad, or my knowledge on nuclear weapons has grown a bit foggy, so I welcome comment/discussion on it
