Minute-by-minute timeline of what would happen in first moments of nuclear bomb
After Donald Trump's recent threats against Iran, people across the world have been left concerned about the possibility of another atomic bomb being dropped.
The US president launched an ominous warning against the Middle Eastern country earlier this week as negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz continued, with the war now in its sixth week.
"A whole civilisation will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will," the president wrote on Truth Social.
"However, now that we have complete and total regime change, where different, smarter, and less radicalised minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, who knows? We will find out tonight," he added.
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Although they have thankfully now reached a two-week ceasefire after Iran agreed to re-open the crucial waterway, the comments made by both Trump and his vice president JD Vance suggest that the US are willing to use the nuclear weapons in their arsenal should they believe that the situation demands them.
Albert Einstein once said: "Mankind invented the atomic bomb, but no mouse would ever construct a mousetrap". That perhaps sums up how most people feel about the threat of nuclear war, given the catastrophic consequences that would likely occur.
That's certainly a belief shared by American journalist Annie Jacobsen, who published her book 'Nuclear War: A Scenario' in 2024, in which she theorises that it could take just 72 minutes for a first nuclear missile strike to develop into a global thermonuclear war.
Last year, she appeared on 'The Diary of a CEO' podcast to discuss exactly what would happen in the minutes after a nuclear strike was first launched.
She said: "There is a very fast process where the trajectory of the ballistic missile is being determined and we're talking in the first minutes of the sequence because everyone is getting ready to tell the president. Because what they're going to tell the president is 'sir, you need to chose a counter-attack'. That is called 'get the blue clock running'.
"Everyone is working on figuring out the trajectory of the ballistic missile, [which] cannot be redirected or recalled. Ultimately, the defence department will wait for second confirmation of that missile from a ground radar system. We have them around the world. It has to be able to see and confirm that missile is definitely coming this way. That happens at around eight or nine minutes.
"The president learns around three minutes and they're waiting for the second confirmation."
Jacobsen then explains that the teams in America will have a big decision to make, and that involves the military wanting to keep the president around to make an executive decision on what a response might look like, whereas the secret service will be keen to get him away from the White House, if it has been targeted by the missile.
That will likely see the president board the 'doomsday plane' before taking to the skies to keep him safe from the attack, while the rest of us are forced to deal with the destruction.
There have only been two atomic bombs dropped in history, both by the US in response to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor towards the end of World War Two.
The horrific destruction of Nagasaki and Hiroshima should hopefully serve as enough deterrent to convince world leaders that there is never an excuse to use these weapons but
Topics: Donald Trump, Iran, US News
James Moorhouse