3 ms·
I don’t see the MAD principle changing in light of these new weapons. The major players will still rely on it, but to ensure they can hold ip their end of the “
by yardstick 7y ago
I don’t see the MAD principle changing in light of these new weapons. The major players will still rely on it, but to ensure they can hold ip their end of the “deal” I expect we’ll see a lot more submarine based IBCMs. Compensating for any early knockout of ground missiles like minutemen etc.
- drevil-v2 7y agoExactly my thoughts. To fully neuter MAD you would need to be 100% sure and then some that you got everything that the enemy had. Even a single missile getting through would be mean multiple warheads get deployed. That's too high a price to pay. And I am fairly certain that the decision to launch would not be obeyed without resistance.
- m_mueller 7y agoI guess that would change when underwater drones can be mass produced to such a degree that they could detect and hunt down all nuclear subs within strike distance almost instantly. It's unclear to me whether that's even realistic based on raw materials required.
- chipsa 7y agoMAD isn't a principle. It's an effect. The actual principle is Assured Destruction. It's just that everyone else also follows the same principle: we want to be sure of being able to destroy our enemies. We might also see airborne alerts resume (bombers flying around with nukes ready to avoid being caught on the ground)
- supermanfan 7y agoI have studied the Cold War and SDI ("Star Wars".) Russian and US leaders thought that MAD was idiotic - that defending your country against your adversaries was of the highest importance, not retaliating after your capital was in ashes. That was the motivation for the Moscow ABM ring (still exists) and SDI (the ABM part worked, the lasers didn't.) MAD is for policy wonks and technocrats, and is not what leaders rely on.