10 ms·

The Heart of Deterrence (2012)

181 points by vezycash 11y ago

vezycash 11y ago
The last sentence is the best part of the article. "When I suggested this to friends in the Pentagon they said, 'My God, that’s terrible. Having to KILL someone would distort the President’s judgment. He might never push the button.'" From their response, killing through a button isn't killing.
- throwaway2048 11y ago
  "Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!"
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- chrisseaton 11y ago
  This argument makes absolutely no sense. Can you agree that sometimes it is morally just and legally permitted to use violence? Can you also imagine that someone may know that it is the right thing to order this violence, but be put off by physically having to hack someone up themselves? If so, do you now see the practical problem that the friends in the Pentagon were warning of? With the capsule in the person you are clouding the judgement of the president and making it harder for them to make a cool assessment of the right course of action, not adding some kind of clever moral check. Can't you see that? If you want to know more about this issue, read up on the 'trolley problem'. It's a more complex moral issue than your snarky comment implies.
  - jMyles 11y ago
    > Can you agree that sometimes it is morally just and legally permitted to use violence? Even if one can agree, which I think most of us can, this particular dilemma is specific to weapons of mass destruction, because their use inevitably (and intentionally) causes the death of many, many people who aren't the target but are in the wrong place at the wrong time. So, the thinking goes, it makes some sense to force the president to kill someone who isn't the target to ensure that it's a worthwhile sacrifice.
    - chrisseaton 11y ago
      My main objection is that the person telling the anecdote is making fun of the people in the pentagon, making it look like they didn't get his clever little moral trick, when in reality, like many things in life, it isn't quite that simple and maybe they had a good point.
  - vidarh 11y ago
    The problem is whether they "know that it is the right thing" vs. just do it because the negative repercussions are not felt strongly enough to deter him in circumstances when it is not the right thing. Perhaps the butcher knife and the capsule is too extreme, but on the other hand, perhaps just having to issue some codes is too easy. The situations where a nuclear counter-attack serves any moral purpose are limited enough that such thought experiment are worthwhile means or considering what level of deterrence should be in place.
    - GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
      Let's be honest - the President is not going to be pushing the button unless enemy missiles are already in the air. In that situation, we're all screwed, and a retaliatory launch is the appropriate action. Under that circumstance, the President should not be required to hack someone open in order to do the right thing.
      - Zigurd 11y ago
        > ...and a retaliatory launch is the appropriate action. Why? So that when a new intelligence emerges on this planet they'll know the value of deterrence?
        GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
        So you're Ok with, say, Putin deciding to launch his arsenal in a first strike and wiping out the US and allies with no retaliation?
        Zigurd 11y ago
        If he launches, deterrence failed and civilation is gone. What is the point of killing even more people?
      - danbruc 11y ago
        Why is it the right thing to do? A lot of people are already dead or about to die in the immediate future, why would you want to kill even more people, most of whom are not responsible for the attack? It's just pitiable revenge unless you specifically try to deter further attacks which may or may not be necessary and effectively achieved by the use of nuclear weapons.
- shrugger 11y ago
  Wow, that really is fascinating. I wonder what else people would be more willing to do by pushing a button rather than doing it themselves. I mean, it's not surprising that gov higher-ups would incinerate human beings with a button, dump toxic waste on people from a plane with a button, poison water supplies, launch tear-gas from choppers, etc. They should be forced to open their eyes and WATCH the effects of their buttons. Like Clockwork Orange or something.
  - dave2000 11y ago
    The problem with that is that just like with antibiotics you're left with the ones which they don't kill, you'll be left with those who would actually rather enjoy watching people getting killed.
    - shrugger 11y ago
      Yeah but if you are dying of a disease, surely it's wise to do SOMETHING, right? I mean, what's the solution to these types of problem where the adversary keeps getting better and better? I feel like Forever War touched on this too, where the Taurans just kept getting more and more advanced, and it was always an arm race to have the better technology and better weapons and better tactics, etc.
      - dave2000 11y ago
        The answer is to vote into power people who don't wish to dominate other countries.
  - wlievens 11y ago
    Basically you just incentivised the cruelest, nastiest sadists as the best candidates for high office. What could go wrong?
    - shrugger 11y ago
      Hmm, that was a shortcoming I did not foresee.
- rwc 11y ago
  It's amazing what people will do with a button if told to do so by an authority figure: http://www.simplypsychology.org/milgram.html http://www.simplypsychology.org/milgram.html
  - colejohnson66 11y ago
    But actually _hack someone up_? I'm sure if you dehumanized the "key carrier" like the Nazis did, you could probably get someone to do it. But if you've dehumanized someone enough you're willing to hack them up to follow an order, you wouldn't be working with them. The American military fighting in Vietnam dehumanized the Vietnam soldiers in order to justify killing them, but imagine if one of those American soldiers were told by his commanding officer that in order to kill more "Charlies", he'd have to kill his friend he's been fighting with since the beginning. Sure, you'll probably find someone crazy enough to do so, but a lot of people wouldn't do it. TLDR: It's different when it's someone you work with
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
- kazinator 11y ago
  Killing via button is killing many of them "them". Hacking the innocent's chest is killing one of "us". Part of the dilemma in this thought experiment is basically about weighing the worth of the lives of unknown numbers of "them", against one of "us". The President must distinguish "them" or "us", otherwise he has no business leading the country in a war. He must treat the killing of one of "us" with a different judgment. The other part of this is remote controlled killing versus visceral engagement. Suppose that pushing the button is the right thing to do for the country, but the President has a personal aversion against the bloody engagement form of killing. As President, he's supposed to push, but a personal, psychological reason is preventing him from doing it as a man.
  - ekianjo 11y ago
    > Killing via button is killing many of them "them". Hacking the innocent's chest is killing one of "us". Pressing the button means killing of lot of "us" in the end too, because there's no such thing as one-way nuclear exchanges nowadays, with subs ready to fire from anywhere in the world.
    - Retric 11y ago
      Also, fallout is not restricted by borders. For example US and USSR where within 60 miles of each other at there closest borders during the Cold War. India and Pakistan share a border.
    - newjersey 11y ago
      Which is why we have proxy wars where we "protect" or "liberate" peoples who are not super power themselves and do not have second strike capability.
  - fweespee_ch 11y ago
    Honestly, large scale nuclear weapon deployment is going to kill alot of "us" so symbolically killing one of us is a better representation of reality. There is never going to be a one-sided nuclear exchange when a substantial number of powerful, ideologically opposed countries have access to ICBMs.
- venomsnake 11y ago
  There is huge difference though. He has to kill one of the citizens of his own country. Better example would have been lets say a convicted war criminal. He still has to do the killing, but not a person that is one of his own.
  - jdavis703 11y ago
    Launching a nuclear strike against another nuclear-armed country will cause your own citizens to die though.
    - GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
      Yeah, but no President has ever launched a pre-emptive nuclear attack (saving WWII). And the likelihood of any President doing so has decreased over time. The only time the button would be pressed is if enemy missiles are in the air.
    - venomsnake 11y ago
      It may not have to be nuclear armed adversary. And it will cause a high probability of your own citizens dying. Not certainty.
      - vidarh 11y ago
        It is exactly this line of thinking that makes it worthwhile creating extra barriers to make it harder to launch a strike to force the person responsible to be very sure.
- throwaway2048 11y ago
  Remember this when people like raiyner and tptacek tell us that drones don't change warfare.
  - jMyles 11y ago
    I was thinking the same thing about the same two commenters, even though I do definitely enjoy their contributions.
  - GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
    They don't change it any more than smart bombs and missiles already had. They just widen that change somewhat.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    Tonight the music seems so loud --- I wish that we could lose this crowd! Maybe it's better this way: we'd hurt each other with the things we'd want to say. We could have been so good together! We could have lived this dance forever! But now? Who's gonna dance with me? Please stay!
    - throwaway2048 11y ago
      Nothing careless about my reply, opinions like yours kill people. Really.
    - tptacek 11y ago
      You think telling me I can kill people with my mind powers is going to make me write fewer HN comments? YOU DON'T KNOW ME AT ALL.
- peatmoss 11y ago
  (Perhaps) misattributed to Stalin: "The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic."
- GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
  Our nuclear opponents need to think we'd be perfectly willing to push the button in order for the balance to work correctly. This destabilizes the situation, which is NOT a good thing.
- dorfsmay 11y ago
  I cannot find any link right now, but I remember reading about the Milgram's experiment, or one of it replication, and one of the test was with and without glass, what looked like a more direct connection between the button and the victim or via a machine, etc... and that one of the conclusion was that the more indirect connection, the more distance, the more elements between the person pressing the button and the victim, and the more likely the person was going to push the button. By the way, have you ever wonder which type of meat you would eat if you had to kill the animals yourself?
kstenerud 11y ago
That's a bit of a silly thought experiment. If faced with a symmetric foe that has launched a nuclear holocaust upon my country, it would be absolutely essential to retaliate in kind so as to ensure that they could not mount a second assault and kill even more people. If I were president, I would not hesitate.
- ekianjo 11y ago
  > If faced with a symmetric foe that has launched a nuclear holocaust upon my country, it would be absolutely essential to retaliate in kind so as to ensure that they could not mount a second assault and kill even more people. If I were president, I would not hesitate. OK, and it's the end of the world as we know it. Like, Game Over, the survivors are back to the Stone Age and the civilization can start from scratch with 99% less people. Sounds like a sound decision you'd make.
  - jerf 11y ago
    This is well-trodden ground, though perhaps long enough ago that younger people have never heard it. A lot of stuff that sounds really sweet and nice and moral turns into nightmares if you play it out in the real world. Advertising to the world that you won't strike back even if you are wiped out is, over the long term, an invitation to be wiped out. Of course if you want to signal your morality to certain types by valuing your own people at zero that may sound better than striking back, but you're still in the end advocating for millions of deaths, whether you meant to or not. If nothing else, allow me to appeal to your own naked self-interest in pointing out you'd be one of them. It is ironic, but by taking a strong "We will strike back" stance, you decrease the chances of ever having to strike. On the flip side, some of the well-trod ground is now out of date, too. Arguments about how maybe we could try non-proliferation instead become irrelevant as nuclear weapons become relatively speaking easier and easier to acquire due to advancing and dispersing technological sophistication. Anyhow, upshot, if you're serious about thinking through the issues this turns out to be a really challenging stage to get up and morally preen at people on. It's very easy to end up advocating a strategy that kills billions of people while preening. It may be unpleasant to you, but you do in fact have to think. Hard. With neither rose-tinted glasses nor excessive cynicism. The easy answers don't work. The sweet answers don't work.
Alex3917 11y ago
I like this idea in theory, but in practice if I see Dick Cheney coming at me with a butcher's knife I'm getting the hell out of there.
- malloreon 11y ago
  Cheney never comes at you with a butcher's knife. He prefers to become your friend over many years, have great experiences together, then shoot you in the face and make you apologize for your role in the incident.
  - avar 11y ago
    Is there any actual proof that that's what happened aside from lame conspiracy theories?
    - hga 11y ago
      Errr, that is exactly what happened, and an apology was due. While it's primarily the responsibility of an upland bird hunter (anyone shooting, of course, but in this sort of hunting you move around a lot and flush out birds unexpectedly) to keep track of everyone and not shoot when any of them are down range, everyone in the hunting party also has a responsibility to follow previously agreed upon protocols to make this easier and less error prone. The guy who got shot screwed that up big time.
      - avar 11y ago
        I mean the implied accusation that Chaney was at fault but due to some coercion got the guy to say that it was his bad, which is usually what the subtext is when this gets trotted out.
        Avshalom 11y ago
        That's because that subtext is fucking hilarious. It's the actualization of every punchline about Real Power ever.
toomanythings2 11y ago
Presuming the USA is the only country with nuclear weapons? Does everyone promise to do this and have them nowhere else?
tiredwired 11y ago
They should have a twin backup and test the process every month.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 11y ago
Not a big deal. Air Force One actually has operating rooms on board. Just have a cardiothoracic surgeon with the President whose job it would be to retrieve the launch codes.
- evan_ 11y ago
  Doctors take an oath to do no harm, so that's another wrinkle...
  - casion 11y ago
    Breaking an oath isn't very problematic at all. If you really wanted to be clever about it, have a non-medically trained person begin the operation... and then the surgeon would have to step in to save the patient.
- dingaling 11y ago
  But what if the carrier of the codes was... the man entrusted with the launch authority? To save the country, he'd have to sacrifice himself. Should any of his direct reports consider killing him to access the codes, that'd be capital-offence treason ( " levying War against them" ).
cronjobber 11y ago
Observe the sneaky trick this story tries to play: The president is supposed to kill one of his own before he's allowed to retaliate against the enemy. As a thought experiment, let's implant the launch code into, say, a captured enemy spy. Is it still the same story?
- adam12 11y ago
  It's not a trick. Innocent people will die from the nuclear bomb.
- Mtinie 11y ago
  Probably not. The piece that I found particularly interesting about the proposal is the that the person with the implanted codes is a volunteer. Not only would you need to have a President take hands-on ownership of taking a life (the first of many if the launch proceeds), but you have a martyr who is first to die for a cause that they feel most strongly for.
  - tlunter 11y ago
    So far, since the top of the comments, you're the only one that acknowledged the volunteer has thoughts too. I think everyone is just looking at the moral part of this and not how the interaction between the volunteer and president would be when he's hesitant but the volunteer still believes it's the right decision. It does call into question what kind of volunteer this is. Someone who's ready to die for the country from the get go wouldn't work out very well.
- JamilD 11y ago
  What is the moral distinction between one of their innocent people and one of our innocent people?
- deckar01 11y ago
  It's a weakened form that should still cause more hesitation than pressing a button. Stronger forms: - Pieces of the code in multiple people. - Inside a loved one. - In the arm or leg of the president.
warmblood 11y ago
I am almost cynical enough to believe that a modern neoliberal president surrounded by hawkish advisors could be convinced quite easily to personally kill the keeper and retrieve the launch codes. I believe that the hawkish "at any cost" mindset of modern American politics distorts human empathy so much that it's completely within the realm of belief for me for this to occur. More likely, I think, that those holding prestigious enough office can find ways to get around very high procedural barriers like this one by assigning the task to a secret service agent or other on-hand staff of a martial trade. Personally I think we've seen plenty of evidence that those in high office might personally carry out and enable heinous acts of individual violence if the stakes are made to appear grave enough to them.
- Avshalom 11y ago
  All I know is that if I did get drunk enough to volunteer I'd spend the rest of my life running away from the president anytime there was a hint of a foreign relations dust up.
  - Nutmog 11y ago
    You wouldn't just be running away from the president. You'd be running away from a whole country full of hysterical people afraid of an imminent communist invasion and blaming it on you.
- Zigurd 11y ago
  There would be a legal memorandum about how it's not murder, written by a relatively, in bureaucratic terms, sharp legal mind, subsequently rewarded by a sinecure at a public university.
imaginenore 11y ago
1) A psychopath / sociopath willing to kill millions is not going to care about one more. 2) Politicians / leaders are orders of magnitude more likely to be psychopaths.
hardlianotion 11y ago
It's all very telling, but the notion that you would sacrifice one more, presumably innocent life for no good reason at all is itself immoral. I assume that is part of the moral of the tale. The story only makes sense in signalling that you think that nuclear weapons are pointless.
- epistasis 11y ago
  > no good reason There's a good reason: to make real the human suffering that can be caused in a quick, momentary decision. Previous forms of warfare took longer amounts of time to cause immense destruction. Read the story of Ronald Reagan's response to watching the movie The Day After [1] and you will realize that such representations of the suffering can have a great impact. > The story only makes sense in signalling that you think that nuclear weapons are pointless. Absolutely not. You can think that nuclear weapons are important, and still take seriously their immense destructive capacity. Throughout human history human leaders have caused great suffering at little cost to themselves. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_After#Effects_on_policymakers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_After#Effects_on_polic...
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shockstate 11y ago
nice
tacon 11y ago
I can't remember where, but recently I read about a similar proposal that would have required the US and Soviet power structure to designate a relatively close family member that would take up residence in the other capital. It wouldn't have been as dramatic as hacking a complete stranger, but it tied into the strong genetic drives to protect one's family.
- hga 11y ago
  Taking long term hostages to try to insure the good behavior of others is an ancient tradition.
- throwaway11212 11y ago
  Perhaps you've read this article before? It's right there.
  - hga 11y ago
    The article was recently changed, probably after tacon wrote his comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11556250 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11556250
archgoon 11y ago
The entire calculus of having nuclear weapons in the first place rests on the assumption that no one will use them because to use them invites a retaliatory strike. Reducing the likelihood of a retaliatory strike, under this model, increases the likelihood of nuclear weapons being used. Now of course, this model may be wrong (pre-emptive strike on non-nuclear state with no nuclear allies); but I'm somewhat disturbed that the Pentagon employees don't seem to understand this. Maybe they do, and the author only gave the initial reaction rather than their full counterargument.
- hga 11y ago
  This was all in the context of "Warmonger Reagan" becoming president. Assuming bad will on the part of the author is perhaps not required, but it was a safe bet back then.
  - vidarh 11y ago
    And Reagan presided over two years of increase in tensions and hostility vs. the Soviet Union worse than any others since Kennedy, to the point where there's indications that the Soviet Union were concerned that Able Archer 83 was preparation for a real attack and considered a first strike. It was first faced with the reality of the level of Soviet fear of an US attack that appears to have set him on a new course. In '81, worrying about Reagans antagonistic foreign policy was quite rational.
    - hga 11y ago
      Worse than any since Kennedy, but to a purpose: the end of the Soviet Union, which he actually achieved. Kennedy blundered into his crises by projecting weakness, and being worse than weak in the Bay of Pigs invasion, Reagan at least was making a calculated gamble that paid off, when few thought the inevitable end of the Soviet Union could be a fraction as peaceful as it was. And I noticed no "new course" on his part, your claim elsewhere in this discussion that it made "him determined to sit down with the Soviet leadership" is not supported by my memory. He was certainly willing to "sit down with" them, he just wasn't willing to surrender even more to them. The accession of Gorbachev to was almost certainly a more significant factor (then again, maybe Gorbachev's hand was strengthed by Able Archer 83 et. al.), and note for example the much hyped "failure" at Reykjavík following the earlier one in Geneva.
tremendo 11y ago
So far no one seems to be discussing the "volunteer". S/He can fight back. Use the butcher's knife against the president. Maybe even be in the right, or not. The moment this person "volunteers" to carry the codes inside, it becomes suicide, even if it never happens, they have to be ready to be hacked to death, and not try to avoid it when the moment comes, and this I believe is next to impossible, and effectively compromises the president's ability to carry out whatever actions deemed necessary. It's a nice thought experiment, but not more than that.
- archgoon 11y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11555640 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11555640 Alex3917: I like this idea in theory, but in practice if I see Dick Cheney coming at me with a butcher's knife I'm getting the hell out of there.
jlg23 11y ago
Interesting idea, but it fails to take user stupidity into account. "00000000"[1] in a capsule in a volunteer's body does not really protect anything. [1] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/12/launch-code-for-us-nukes-was-00000000-for-20-years/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/12/launch-code-for-u...
dang 11y ago
Url changed from http://boingboing.net/2015/12/11/proposal-keep-the-nuclear-lau.html http://boingboing.net/2015/12/11/proposal-keep-the-nuclear-l..., which points to this.
osmala 11y ago
I'm from country without nuclear weapons and even I think that idea is really bad. Here's why, either Russia or China could launch a first strike if they believed USA wouldn't retaliate. Or simpler they would use conventional means more aggressively and if that escalated to conflict with USA then they would simply make first strike. Key point is neither country should ever think USA would definitely NOT use nuclear retaliation on nuclear first strike. In a sense by making a major nuclear weapons power less likely to do use its own weapons increase overall chance of nuclear war. And finally this system also gives additional urgency for aggressive actions for opposing great powers, by forcing them to act and finish all their aggressive plans during term of a president they perceive in capable of ultimate action.
force_reboot 11y ago
What a ridiculous and insulting proposal. People in the military agree to serve the country within certain bounds defined by tradition, they are not simply meat that can be used for any purpose. How about use any politician who has every voted for the use of US military overseas. Or even better, a volunteer from their families. Or any professor who has advocated for such, or their families. Because I think that this would cover a lot of people who smugly accuse others of being drive by an "us vs them" mentality.

181 points by vezycash 11y ago

The last sentence is the best part of the article. "When I suggested this to friends in the Pentagon they said, 'My God, that’s terrible. Having to KILL someone would distort the President’s judgment. He might never push the button.'" From their response, killing through a button isn't killing.

throwaway2048 11y ago
"Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!"
deleted 11y ago
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chrisseaton 11y ago
This argument makes absolutely no sense. Can you agree that sometimes it is morally just and legally permitted to use violence? Can you also imagine that someone may know that it is the right thing to order this violence, but be put off by physically having to hack someone up themselves? If so, do you now see the practical problem that the friends in the Pentagon were warning of? With the capsule in the person you are clouding the judgement of the president and making it harder for them to make a cool assessment of the right course of action, not adding some kind of clever moral check. Can't you see that? If you want to know more about this issue, read up on the 'trolley problem'. It's a more complex moral issue than your snarky comment implies.
- jMyles 11y ago
  > Can you agree that sometimes it is morally just and legally permitted to use violence? Even if one can agree, which I think most of us can, this particular dilemma is specific to weapons of mass destruction, because their use inevitably (and intentionally) causes the death of many, many people who aren't the target but are in the wrong place at the wrong time. So, the thinking goes, it makes some sense to force the president to kill someone who isn't the target to ensure that it's a worthwhile sacrifice.
  - chrisseaton 11y ago
    My main objection is that the person telling the anecdote is making fun of the people in the pentagon, making it look like they didn't get his clever little moral trick, when in reality, like many things in life, it isn't quite that simple and maybe they had a good point.
- vidarh 11y ago
  The problem is whether they "know that it is the right thing" vs. just do it because the negative repercussions are not felt strongly enough to deter him in circumstances when it is not the right thing. Perhaps the butcher knife and the capsule is too extreme, but on the other hand, perhaps just having to issue some codes is too easy. The situations where a nuclear counter-attack serves any moral purpose are limited enough that such thought experiment are worthwhile means or considering what level of deterrence should be in place.
  - GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
    Let's be honest - the President is not going to be pushing the button unless enemy missiles are already in the air. In that situation, we're all screwed, and a retaliatory launch is the appropriate action. Under that circumstance, the President should not be required to hack someone open in order to do the right thing.
    - Zigurd 11y ago
      > ...and a retaliatory launch is the appropriate action. Why? So that when a new intelligence emerges on this planet they'll know the value of deterrence?
      - GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
        So you're Ok with, say, Putin deciding to launch his arsenal in a first strike and wiping out the US and allies with no retaliation?
        Zigurd 11y ago
        If he launches, deterrence failed and civilation is gone. What is the point of killing even more people?
    - danbruc 11y ago
      Why is it the right thing to do? A lot of people are already dead or about to die in the immediate future, why would you want to kill even more people, most of whom are not responsible for the attack? It's just pitiable revenge unless you specifically try to deter further attacks which may or may not be necessary and effectively achieved by the use of nuclear weapons.
shrugger 11y ago
Wow, that really is fascinating. I wonder what else people would be more willing to do by pushing a button rather than doing it themselves. I mean, it's not surprising that gov higher-ups would incinerate human beings with a button, dump toxic waste on people from a plane with a button, poison water supplies, launch tear-gas from choppers, etc. They should be forced to open their eyes and WATCH the effects of their buttons. Like Clockwork Orange or something.
- dave2000 11y ago
  The problem with that is that just like with antibiotics you're left with the ones which they don't kill, you'll be left with those who would actually rather enjoy watching people getting killed.
  - shrugger 11y ago
    Yeah but if you are dying of a disease, surely it's wise to do SOMETHING, right? I mean, what's the solution to these types of problem where the adversary keeps getting better and better? I feel like Forever War touched on this too, where the Taurans just kept getting more and more advanced, and it was always an arm race to have the better technology and better weapons and better tactics, etc.
    - dave2000 11y ago
      The answer is to vote into power people who don't wish to dominate other countries.
- wlievens 11y ago
  Basically you just incentivised the cruelest, nastiest sadists as the best candidates for high office. What could go wrong?
  - shrugger 11y ago
    Hmm, that was a shortcoming I did not foresee.
rwc 11y ago
It's amazing what people will do with a button if told to do so by an authority figure: http://www.simplypsychology.org/milgram.html http://www.simplypsychology.org/milgram.html
- colejohnson66 11y ago
  But actually _hack someone up_? I'm sure if you dehumanized the "key carrier" like the Nazis did, you could probably get someone to do it. But if you've dehumanized someone enough you're willing to hack them up to follow an order, you wouldn't be working with them. The American military fighting in Vietnam dehumanized the Vietnam soldiers in order to justify killing them, but imagine if one of those American soldiers were told by his commanding officer that in order to kill more "Charlies", he'd have to kill his friend he's been fighting with since the beginning. Sure, you'll probably find someone crazy enough to do so, but a lot of people wouldn't do it. TLDR: It's different when it's someone you work with
  - deleted 11y ago
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kazinator 11y ago
Killing via button is killing many of them "them". Hacking the innocent's chest is killing one of "us". Part of the dilemma in this thought experiment is basically about weighing the worth of the lives of unknown numbers of "them", against one of "us". The President must distinguish "them" or "us", otherwise he has no business leading the country in a war. He must treat the killing of one of "us" with a different judgment. The other part of this is remote controlled killing versus visceral engagement. Suppose that pushing the button is the right thing to do for the country, but the President has a personal aversion against the bloody engagement form of killing. As President, he's supposed to push, but a personal, psychological reason is preventing him from doing it as a man.
- ekianjo 11y ago
  > Killing via button is killing many of them "them". Hacking the innocent's chest is killing one of "us". Pressing the button means killing of lot of "us" in the end too, because there's no such thing as one-way nuclear exchanges nowadays, with subs ready to fire from anywhere in the world.
  - Retric 11y ago
    Also, fallout is not restricted by borders. For example US and USSR where within 60 miles of each other at there closest borders during the Cold War. India and Pakistan share a border.
  - newjersey 11y ago
    Which is why we have proxy wars where we "protect" or "liberate" peoples who are not super power themselves and do not have second strike capability.
- fweespee_ch 11y ago
  Honestly, large scale nuclear weapon deployment is going to kill alot of "us" so symbolically killing one of us is a better representation of reality. There is never going to be a one-sided nuclear exchange when a substantial number of powerful, ideologically opposed countries have access to ICBMs.
venomsnake 11y ago
There is huge difference though. He has to kill one of the citizens of his own country. Better example would have been lets say a convicted war criminal. He still has to do the killing, but not a person that is one of his own.
- jdavis703 11y ago
  Launching a nuclear strike against another nuclear-armed country will cause your own citizens to die though.
  - GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
    Yeah, but no President has ever launched a pre-emptive nuclear attack (saving WWII). And the likelihood of any President doing so has decreased over time. The only time the button would be pressed is if enemy missiles are in the air.
  - venomsnake 11y ago
    It may not have to be nuclear armed adversary. And it will cause a high probability of your own citizens dying. Not certainty.
    - vidarh 11y ago
      It is exactly this line of thinking that makes it worthwhile creating extra barriers to make it harder to launch a strike to force the person responsible to be very sure.
throwaway2048 11y ago
Remember this when people like raiyner and tptacek tell us that drones don't change warfare.
- jMyles 11y ago
  I was thinking the same thing about the same two commenters, even though I do definitely enjoy their contributions.
- GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
  They don't change it any more than smart bombs and missiles already had. They just widen that change somewhat.
- tptacek 11y ago
  Tonight the music seems so loud --- I wish that we could lose this crowd! Maybe it's better this way: we'd hurt each other with the things we'd want to say. We could have been so good together! We could have lived this dance forever! But now? Who's gonna dance with me? Please stay!
  - throwaway2048 11y ago
    Nothing careless about my reply, opinions like yours kill people. Really.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    You think telling me I can kill people with my mind powers is going to make me write fewer HN comments? YOU DON'T KNOW ME AT ALL.
peatmoss 11y ago
(Perhaps) misattributed to Stalin: "The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic."
GunboatDiplomat 11y ago
Our nuclear opponents need to think we'd be perfectly willing to push the button in order for the balance to work correctly. This destabilizes the situation, which is NOT a good thing.
dorfsmay 11y ago
I cannot find any link right now, but I remember reading about the Milgram's experiment, or one of it replication, and one of the test was with and without glass, what looked like a more direct connection between the button and the victim or via a machine, etc... and that one of the conclusion was that the more indirect connection, the more distance, the more elements between the person pressing the button and the victim, and the more likely the person was going to push the button. By the way, have you ever wonder which type of meat you would eat if you had to kill the animals yourself?

kstenerud 11y ago

That's a bit of a silly thought experiment. If faced with a symmetric foe that has launched a nuclear holocaust upon my country, it would be absolutely essential to retaliate in kind so as to ensure that they could not mount a second assault and kill even more people. If I were president, I would not hesitate.

ekianjo 11y ago
> If faced with a symmetric foe that has launched a nuclear holocaust upon my country, it would be absolutely essential to retaliate in kind so as to ensure that they could not mount a second assault and kill even more people. If I were president, I would not hesitate. OK, and it's the end of the world as we know it. Like, Game Over, the survivors are back to the Stone Age and the civilization can start from scratch with 99% less people. Sounds like a sound decision you'd make.
- jerf 11y ago
  This is well-trodden ground, though perhaps long enough ago that younger people have never heard it. A lot of stuff that sounds really sweet and nice and moral turns into nightmares if you play it out in the real world. Advertising to the world that you won't strike back even if you are wiped out is, over the long term, an invitation to be wiped out. Of course if you want to signal your morality to certain types by valuing your own people at zero that may sound better than striking back, but you're still in the end advocating for millions of deaths, whether you meant to or not. If nothing else, allow me to appeal to your own naked self-interest in pointing out you'd be one of them. It is ironic, but by taking a strong "We will strike back" stance, you decrease the chances of ever having to strike. On the flip side, some of the well-trod ground is now out of date, too. Arguments about how maybe we could try non-proliferation instead become irrelevant as nuclear weapons become relatively speaking easier and easier to acquire due to advancing and dispersing technological sophistication. Anyhow, upshot, if you're serious about thinking through the issues this turns out to be a really challenging stage to get up and morally preen at people on. It's very easy to end up advocating a strategy that kills billions of people while preening. It may be unpleasant to you, but you do in fact have to think. Hard. With neither rose-tinted glasses nor excessive cynicism. The easy answers don't work. The sweet answers don't work.

Alex3917 11y ago

I like this idea in theory, but in practice if I see Dick Cheney coming at me with a butcher's knife I'm getting the hell out of there.

malloreon 11y ago
Cheney never comes at you with a butcher's knife. He prefers to become your friend over many years, have great experiences together, then shoot you in the face and make you apologize for your role in the incident.
- avar 11y ago
  Is there any actual proof that that's what happened aside from lame conspiracy theories?
  - hga 11y ago
    Errr, that is exactly what happened, and an apology was due. While it's primarily the responsibility of an upland bird hunter (anyone shooting, of course, but in this sort of hunting you move around a lot and flush out birds unexpectedly) to keep track of everyone and not shoot when any of them are down range, everyone in the hunting party also has a responsibility to follow previously agreed upon protocols to make this easier and less error prone. The guy who got shot screwed that up big time.
    - avar 11y ago
      I mean the implied accusation that Chaney was at fault but due to some coercion got the guy to say that it was his bad, which is usually what the subtext is when this gets trotted out.
      - Avshalom 11y ago
        That's because that subtext is fucking hilarious. It's the actualization of every punchline about Real Power ever.

toomanythings2 11y ago

Presuming the USA is the only country with nuclear weapons? Does everyone promise to do this and have them nowhere else?

tiredwired 11y ago

They should have a twin backup and test the process every month.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 11y ago

Not a big deal. Air Force One actually has operating rooms on board. Just have a cardiothoracic surgeon with the President whose job it would be to retrieve the launch codes.

evan_ 11y ago
Doctors take an oath to do no harm, so that's another wrinkle...
- casion 11y ago
  Breaking an oath isn't very problematic at all. If you really wanted to be clever about it, have a non-medically trained person begin the operation... and then the surgeon would have to step in to save the patient.
dingaling 11y ago
But what if the carrier of the codes was... the man entrusted with the launch authority? To save the country, he'd have to sacrifice himself. Should any of his direct reports consider killing him to access the codes, that'd be capital-offence treason ( " levying War against them" ).

cronjobber 11y ago

Observe the sneaky trick this story tries to play: The president is supposed to kill one of his own before he's allowed to retaliate against the enemy. As a thought experiment, let's implant the launch code into, say, a captured enemy spy. Is it still the same story?

adam12 11y ago
It's not a trick. Innocent people will die from the nuclear bomb.
Mtinie 11y ago
Probably not. The piece that I found particularly interesting about the proposal is the that the person with the implanted codes is a volunteer. Not only would you need to have a President take hands-on ownership of taking a life (the first of many if the launch proceeds), but you have a martyr who is first to die for a cause that they feel most strongly for.
- tlunter 11y ago
  So far, since the top of the comments, you're the only one that acknowledged the volunteer has thoughts too. I think everyone is just looking at the moral part of this and not how the interaction between the volunteer and president would be when he's hesitant but the volunteer still believes it's the right decision. It does call into question what kind of volunteer this is. Someone who's ready to die for the country from the get go wouldn't work out very well.
JamilD 11y ago
What is the moral distinction between one of their innocent people and one of our innocent people?
deckar01 11y ago
It's a weakened form that should still cause more hesitation than pressing a button. Stronger forms: - Pieces of the code in multiple people. - Inside a loved one. - In the arm or leg of the president.

warmblood 11y ago

I am almost cynical enough to believe that a modern neoliberal president surrounded by hawkish advisors could be convinced quite easily to personally kill the keeper and retrieve the launch codes. I believe that the hawkish "at any cost" mindset of modern American politics distorts human empathy so much that it's completely within the realm of belief for me for this to occur. More likely, I think, that those holding prestigious enough office can find ways to get around very high procedural barriers like this one by assigning the task to a secret service agent or other on-hand staff of a martial trade. Personally I think we've seen plenty of evidence that those in high office might personally carry out and enable heinous acts of individual violence if the stakes are made to appear grave enough to them.

Avshalom 11y ago
All I know is that if I did get drunk enough to volunteer I'd spend the rest of my life running away from the president anytime there was a hint of a foreign relations dust up.
- Nutmog 11y ago
  You wouldn't just be running away from the president. You'd be running away from a whole country full of hysterical people afraid of an imminent communist invasion and blaming it on you.
Zigurd 11y ago
There would be a legal memorandum about how it's not murder, written by a relatively, in bureaucratic terms, sharp legal mind, subsequently rewarded by a sinecure at a public university.

imaginenore 11y ago

1) A psychopath / sociopath willing to kill millions is not going to care about one more. 2) Politicians / leaders are orders of magnitude more likely to be psychopaths.

hardlianotion 11y ago

It's all very telling, but the notion that you would sacrifice one more, presumably innocent life for no good reason at all is itself immoral. I assume that is part of the moral of the tale. The story only makes sense in signalling that you think that nuclear weapons are pointless.

epistasis 11y ago
> no good reason There's a good reason: to make real the human suffering that can be caused in a quick, momentary decision. Previous forms of warfare took longer amounts of time to cause immense destruction. Read the story of Ronald Reagan's response to watching the movie The Day After [1] and you will realize that such representations of the suffering can have a great impact. > The story only makes sense in signalling that you think that nuclear weapons are pointless. Absolutely not. You can think that nuclear weapons are important, and still take seriously their immense destructive capacity. Throughout human history human leaders have caused great suffering at little cost to themselves. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_After#Effects_on_policymakers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_After#Effects_on_polic...

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

shockstate 11y ago

nice

tacon 11y ago

I can't remember where, but recently I read about a similar proposal that would have required the US and Soviet power structure to designate a relatively close family member that would take up residence in the other capital. It wouldn't have been as dramatic as hacking a complete stranger, but it tied into the strong genetic drives to protect one's family.

hga 11y ago
Taking long term hostages to try to insure the good behavior of others is an ancient tradition.
throwaway11212 11y ago
Perhaps you've read this article before? It's right there.
- hga 11y ago
  The article was recently changed, probably after tacon wrote his comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11556250 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11556250

archgoon 11y ago

The entire calculus of having nuclear weapons in the first place rests on the assumption that no one will use them because to use them invites a retaliatory strike. Reducing the likelihood of a retaliatory strike, under this model, increases the likelihood of nuclear weapons being used. Now of course, this model may be wrong (pre-emptive strike on non-nuclear state with no nuclear allies); but I'm somewhat disturbed that the Pentagon employees don't seem to understand this. Maybe they do, and the author only gave the initial reaction rather than their full counterargument.

hga 11y ago
This was all in the context of "Warmonger Reagan" becoming president. Assuming bad will on the part of the author is perhaps not required, but it was a safe bet back then.
- vidarh 11y ago
  And Reagan presided over two years of increase in tensions and hostility vs. the Soviet Union worse than any others since Kennedy, to the point where there's indications that the Soviet Union were concerned that Able Archer 83 was preparation for a real attack and considered a first strike. It was first faced with the reality of the level of Soviet fear of an US attack that appears to have set him on a new course. In '81, worrying about Reagans antagonistic foreign policy was quite rational.
  - hga 11y ago
    Worse than any since Kennedy, but to a purpose: the end of the Soviet Union, which he actually achieved. Kennedy blundered into his crises by projecting weakness, and being worse than weak in the Bay of Pigs invasion, Reagan at least was making a calculated gamble that paid off, when few thought the inevitable end of the Soviet Union could be a fraction as peaceful as it was. And I noticed no "new course" on his part, your claim elsewhere in this discussion that it made "him determined to sit down with the Soviet leadership" is not supported by my memory. He was certainly willing to "sit down with" them, he just wasn't willing to surrender even more to them. The accession of Gorbachev to was almost certainly a more significant factor (then again, maybe Gorbachev's hand was strengthed by Able Archer 83 et. al.), and note for example the much hyped "failure" at Reykjavík following the earlier one in Geneva.

tremendo 11y ago

So far no one seems to be discussing the "volunteer". S/He can fight back. Use the butcher's knife against the president. Maybe even be in the right, or not. The moment this person "volunteers" to carry the codes inside, it becomes suicide, even if it never happens, they have to be ready to be hacked to death, and not try to avoid it when the moment comes, and this I believe is next to impossible, and effectively compromises the president's ability to carry out whatever actions deemed necessary. It's a nice thought experiment, but not more than that.

archgoon 11y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11555640 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11555640 Alex3917: I like this idea in theory, but in practice if I see Dick Cheney coming at me with a butcher's knife I'm getting the hell out of there.

jlg23 11y ago

Interesting idea, but it fails to take user stupidity into account. "00000000"[1] in a capsule in a volunteer's body does not really protect anything. [1] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/12/launch-code-for-us-nukes-was-00000000-for-20-years/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/12/launch-code-for-u...

dang 11y ago

Url changed from http://boingboing.net/2015/12/11/proposal-keep-the-nuclear-lau.html http://boingboing.net/2015/12/11/proposal-keep-the-nuclear-l..., which points to this.

osmala 11y ago

I'm from country without nuclear weapons and even I think that idea is really bad. Here's why, either Russia or China could launch a first strike if they believed USA wouldn't retaliate. Or simpler they would use conventional means more aggressively and if that escalated to conflict with USA then they would simply make first strike. Key point is neither country should ever think USA would definitely NOT use nuclear retaliation on nuclear first strike. In a sense by making a major nuclear weapons power less likely to do use its own weapons increase overall chance of nuclear war. And finally this system also gives additional urgency for aggressive actions for opposing great powers, by forcing them to act and finish all their aggressive plans during term of a president they perceive in capable of ultimate action.

force_reboot 11y ago

What a ridiculous and insulting proposal. People in the military agree to serve the country within certain bounds defined by tradition, they are not simply meat that can be used for any purpose. How about use any politician who has every voted for the use of US military overseas. Or even better, a volunteer from their families. Or any professor who has advocated for such, or their families. Because I think that this would cover a lot of people who smugly accuse others of being drive by an "us vs them" mentality.