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Well that's irony right? If Iraq had actually had credible WMDs they would never have been invaded. Not like these lessons have been lost on North Korea or Ira

by zxcmx 6y ago

Well that's irony right? If Iraq had actually had credible WMDs they would never have been invaded. Not like these lessons have been lost on North Korea or Iran. There's the things the international community says about nukes on one hand, and there's how they actually treat you when you don't have them on the other. The realpolitik view is that you don't have actual sovereignty without nukes. In my opinion this is why the U.K. for example (which, let's be honest, doesn't really have any practical use for the damn things and wastes a lot of money on them) is nuclear armed.

082349872349872 6y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permanent_members_of_the_United_Nations_Security_Council https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permanent_members_of_the_Unite... Realpolitik says Airstrip One gets a better deal from Oceania with that veto; otherwise it could only hope to get treated as well as, say, Japan. (aren't you all impeding the free market by preferring unchlorinated chicken?)
cryptonector 6y ago
Non-sequitur. I did not and do not deny that nukes buy you immunity from conventional attacks -- they clearly do. I said that too many countries having them will lead to their being used with plausible deniability. Got an answer to that?
- zxcmx 6y ago
  Agree we're talking past each other a bit. Sorry. I agree with you that proliferation is bad, but I'd like to elaborate. Summarising as I see it: OP's point was that WMDs (of all kinds) are an equalizer between nations. Your response was that nuclear proliferation creates instability. You also I think unfairly characterised OP's position as being pro-nuclear proliferation. You assumed OP was talking about nukes but I believe they were making a broader point. My response to you was that nuclear anti-proliferation efforts create a kind of hegemony where dominant nations get cemented in power forever. For the record, I'm also anti-nuclear-proliferation, but I wanted to point out that from the point of view of anyone not under the protective nuclear umbrella of a dominant nation there's a heavy element of hypocrisy involved. Circling back around to drones, I can see why the U.S. might want to restrict them or classify them as WMDs. I think the following is where OP was coming from: They have the potential to undermine conventional power and effectively turn war into a competition of mass cheap manufacturing capability. It's not at all clear in 2020 that the U.S. (in particular) would be able to dominate in such a situation. They're super hard to regulate in the sense that a nation aligned to a major manufacturing power could acquire or stockpile them in massive quantities with little oversight. It would create a possibly surprising shift in power where the U.S. might not be able to project conventional force into areas where they would normally expect to be able to do that. They're also tricky in terms of message management (big part of warfare) because when used defensively, a nuclear response to them is not politically credible. So you can't use the big stick. This doesn't create nuclear instability but it does create "instability" in the sense that it has the potential to shift the balance of power for the existing nuclear and conventional hegemony. Which I think was the crux of the OP's original point.
  - cryptonector 6y ago
    > Your response was that nuclear proliferation creates instability. You also I think unfairly characterised OP's position as being pro-nuclear proliferation. You assumed OP was talking about nukes but I believe they were making a broader point. My question to OP had been whether they are pro-proliferation. You're free to take the question as "characterizing their position as pro-proliferation" all you want, but I think it's a fair question.

by zxcmx 6y ago

082349872349872 6y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permanent_members_of_the_United_Nations_Security_Council https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permanent_members_of_the_Unite... Realpolitik says Airstrip One gets a better deal from Oceania with that veto; otherwise it could only hope to get treated as well as, say, Japan. (aren't you all impeding the free market by preferring unchlorinated chicken?)

cryptonector 6y ago

Non-sequitur. I did not and do not deny that nukes buy you immunity from conventional attacks -- they clearly do. I said that too many countries having them will lead to their being used with plausible deniability. Got an answer to that?

zxcmx 6y ago
Agree we're talking past each other a bit. Sorry. I agree with you that proliferation is bad, but I'd like to elaborate. Summarising as I see it: OP's point was that WMDs (of all kinds) are an equalizer between nations. Your response was that nuclear proliferation creates instability. You also I think unfairly characterised OP's position as being pro-nuclear proliferation. You assumed OP was talking about nukes but I believe they were making a broader point. My response to you was that nuclear anti-proliferation efforts create a kind of hegemony where dominant nations get cemented in power forever. For the record, I'm also anti-nuclear-proliferation, but I wanted to point out that from the point of view of anyone not under the protective nuclear umbrella of a dominant nation there's a heavy element of hypocrisy involved. Circling back around to drones, I can see why the U.S. might want to restrict them or classify them as WMDs. I think the following is where OP was coming from: They have the potential to undermine conventional power and effectively turn war into a competition of mass cheap manufacturing capability. It's not at all clear in 2020 that the U.S. (in particular) would be able to dominate in such a situation. They're super hard to regulate in the sense that a nation aligned to a major manufacturing power could acquire or stockpile them in massive quantities with little oversight. It would create a possibly surprising shift in power where the U.S. might not be able to project conventional force into areas where they would normally expect to be able to do that. They're also tricky in terms of message management (big part of warfare) because when used defensively, a nuclear response to them is not politically credible. So you can't use the big stick. This doesn't create nuclear instability but it does create "instability" in the sense that it has the potential to shift the balance of power for the existing nuclear and conventional hegemony. Which I think was the crux of the OP's original point.
- cryptonector 6y ago
  > Your response was that nuclear proliferation creates instability. You also I think unfairly characterised OP's position as being pro-nuclear proliferation. You assumed OP was talking about nukes but I believe they were making a broader point. My question to OP had been whether they are pro-proliferation. You're free to take the question as "characterizing their position as pro-proliferation" all you want, but I think it's a fair question.