"If any question why we died,
Tell them, because our fathers lied." - Kipling
For my part, I do not fear the onslaught so much as I tremble at its timing.
Long have I believed that weapons of great power are always employed sooner or later, always justified in someone's mind. The nuclear "option" _never_ really "off the table". And as proposed in the excellent article (thought experiment?), I have long suspected that life would go on, though in diminished numbers for the "victors".
What really chaps my ass is the very human (and genetically ancient) trait of hope and denial. It can sustain us when "hope" is a sucker's bet in Vegas yet in sustenance we somehow survive. And it can soothe us unto our sleeping destruction when that hope is the only the shield against consequence. Frustration and anger with the folks around us who insist we'll always live in poppy fields with unicorns and rainbows forever? Of course. I am human, flawed as the rest though perhaps in different ways.
Today, Preppers rise from their seats in the crowed theater and shout "FIRE". Yawn. Dismiss, Ridicule. It's that ancient, genetic human trait at work. And in an ironic way, validation of how we perceive the world now.
What I fear most is not the air bursts or radiation. No. My concerns are found that a rather large photovoltaic installation here on my property will not be complete in time (panel capacity with "Power Wall" to run well pump and refrigeration and exactly how might I protect the controllers from EMP?). My fear is not yet reaching understanding and capacity to expand gardening knowledge past pilot stages to full-blown sustenance and yearly hold-over/replant. My fear is that I will have to deal by myself with sheeple panic in the most extreme, while hoping family can exfiltrate and survive long enough to reach this place.
Give me one more year, just one more before the dam bursts. Just one more year...