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According to MAD principles a "safe" deterrent is less effective. Because your adversary must always think you are capable of delivering a retaliation. A perfe

by 7952 7y ago

According to MAD principles a "safe" deterrent is less effective. Because your adversary must always think you are capable of delivering a retaliation. A perfectly safe system, may prevent that retaliation and invalidate the detterent effect. This issue applies to all technology and human systems connected with nuclear weapons. The outcome of nuclear war is so horrific that no technoogy would ever be good enough. The solution is to eliminate them entirely and stop creating such insane choices.

icebraining 7y ago
> The solution is to eliminate them entirely Sure, how do you propose to do that?
kranner 7y ago
> The solution is to eliminate them entirely and stop creating such insane choices. That solution entails magically ensuring that no one else has such weapons or will develop them. If we had a way of doing that, we wouldn't even need armies protecting borders. You'd still need minimal border security to ensure individual intruders don't make it through, but why maintain a hugely expensive army if you could ensure that nobody else could create an army to invade you (or anyone else?)
- 7952 7y ago
  Yeah, there isn't really a solution. Personally I don't see long term national security as possible with nukes either. Sooner or later a situation will exist where a bad actor is in power. Or they are just launched by accident. And large countries are not guaranteed to be politically stable. These large nations can and do disintegrate. I think the risk of obliteration without nukes is less bad. I would rather see my country destroyed in a first strike or invaded by a foreign power. I think that would be less bad than a nuclear war. The funny things is that the USA could easily be defended from conventional attack. And a small sub based detterant would be good enough. And there is a risk in stoking paranoia in your enemy by having large stockpiles. The vast majority of nations have far less conventional defence than the US and still don't want nukes.
anigbrowl 7y ago
I mean wasn't that the point of having nuclear submarines, since they can't easily be located but can deliver enough of a retaliation to bring your victory party to an abrupt end (separately from realizing that the fallout from nuking your enemies is now drifting towards your country anyway thanks to the weather).

by 7952 7y ago

icebraining 7y ago

> The solution is to eliminate them entirely Sure, how do you propose to do that?

kranner 7y ago

> The solution is to eliminate them entirely and stop creating such insane choices. That solution entails magically ensuring that no one else has such weapons or will develop them. If we had a way of doing that, we wouldn't even need armies protecting borders. You'd still need minimal border security to ensure individual intruders don't make it through, but why maintain a hugely expensive army if you could ensure that nobody else could create an army to invade you (or anyone else?)

7952 7y ago
Yeah, there isn't really a solution. Personally I don't see long term national security as possible with nukes either. Sooner or later a situation will exist where a bad actor is in power. Or they are just launched by accident. And large countries are not guaranteed to be politically stable. These large nations can and do disintegrate. I think the risk of obliteration without nukes is less bad. I would rather see my country destroyed in a first strike or invaded by a foreign power. I think that would be less bad than a nuclear war. The funny things is that the USA could easily be defended from conventional attack. And a small sub based detterant would be good enough. And there is a risk in stoking paranoia in your enemy by having large stockpiles. The vast majority of nations have far less conventional defence than the US and still don't want nukes.

anigbrowl 7y ago

I mean wasn't that the point of having nuclear submarines, since they can't easily be located but can deliver enough of a retaliation to bring your victory party to an abrupt end (separately from realizing that the fallout from nuking your enemies is now drifting towards your country anyway thanks to the weather).