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Very interesting idea. It certainly jives with the British tradition of Letter's of Last Resort (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letters_of_last_resort https://en

Very interesting idea. It certainly jives with the British tradition of Letter's of Last Resort (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letters_of_last_resort https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letters_of_last_resort ; "This American Life" also did an interesting piece on these letters: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/399/contents-unknown https://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/399/... ). Essentially, the Brits have nuclear subs positioned around the world ready to launch. If, for some reason, the UK gets wiped out and one of these subs becomes disconnected from the chain of command, then a letter locked in the Captain's safe contains instructions on what to do: launch, or don't launch. One would think the very existence of these letters, and the non-zero probability that they would say "don't launch", reduces the effectiveness of the UK's nuclear deterrent under a MAD strategy, but as you point out it is actually the non-zero probability that one of these subs becomes accidentally disconnected and the letter in their safe says "launch" that makes their deterrent work in the first place. Essentially, in game theory terms you're turning a prisoner's dilemma into a Nash equilibrium, which while it sounds straight-forward enough in theory is not always so simple to achieve in practice.

michaelt 10y ago
Well, the UK is a bit of a special case - the main time a threat to launch is unconvincing is if (a) you're trying to change the status quo or (b) you're protecting an ally and it wouldn't really hurt you to cut them loose. If Britain claims they'll launch if London is attacked, that's pretty believable on its own. If Britain (say) claims they'll launch if Russia invades the Crimean Peninsula, that's kind of hard to believe. As Britain's cold war allies were also America's cold war allies, Britain didn't really /need/ to scare the soviets with the chance of a random launch as America pretty much had that taken care of. And as Britain is an island, they didn't have the 'soldiers crossed the border by accident' problem either.
- sgt101 10y ago
  Britain and France (and other small countries in Europe) faced a strategic issue in that "The Soviets" could escalate a nuclear war to a tactical /medium range missile level, avoid the use of strategic missiles and pulverise western europe. In the meantime the US would probably use tactical weapons to kill many soviet troops and smash up eastern europe and bits of places like Ukraine, but to strike at Moscow from Germany would have been a strategic escalation and Soviet strategists might have argued that the US wouldn't have made it. On the other hand a British PM faced with 100 or more H-bomb detonations + fall out from the 500 or more that the conflict in Europe would have required (probably closer to 800 given that the red army plan called for 450 +) probably would have. And it would have been difficult for a strategist to argue that they wouldn't, much less "The French" who were all drunk all the time as any good Soviet well knew.

michaelt 10y ago

Well, the UK is a bit of a special case - the main time a threat to launch is unconvincing is if (a) you're trying to change the status quo or (b) you're protecting an ally and it wouldn't really hurt you to cut them loose. If Britain claims they'll launch if London is attacked, that's pretty believable on its own. If Britain (say) claims they'll launch if Russia invades the Crimean Peninsula, that's kind of hard to believe. As Britain's cold war allies were also America's cold war allies, Britain didn't really /need/ to scare the soviets with the chance of a random launch as America pretty much had that taken care of. And as Britain is an island, they didn't have the 'soldiers crossed the border by accident' problem either.

sgt101 10y ago
Britain and France (and other small countries in Europe) faced a strategic issue in that "The Soviets" could escalate a nuclear war to a tactical /medium range missile level, avoid the use of strategic missiles and pulverise western europe. In the meantime the US would probably use tactical weapons to kill many soviet troops and smash up eastern europe and bits of places like Ukraine, but to strike at Moscow from Germany would have been a strategic escalation and Soviet strategists might have argued that the US wouldn't have made it. On the other hand a British PM faced with 100 or more H-bomb detonations + fall out from the 500 or more that the conflict in Europe would have required (probably closer to 800 given that the red army plan called for 450 +) probably would have. And it would have been difficult for a strategist to argue that they wouldn't, much less "The French" who were all drunk all the time as any good Soviet well knew.