6 ms·

France has nukes though. So I think you still have the MAD issue. Maybe France doesn't have enough of a stockpile to destroy all humanity 8x over, but not sure

France has nukes though. So I think you still have the MAD issue. Maybe France doesn't have enough of a stockpile to destroy all humanity 8x over, but not sure how much that changes the game theory.

catchclose8919 5y ago
They wouldn't have to share them with an EU army, they could leave them for "national use" only and avoid any possibility of escalation. Now the EU Army being a non-nuclear entity would make anyone using nuclear army against them "the villain" and onward one could easily justify using "all means" (there's stuff there I'd say even nastier than nuclear...) against them, so a "moral" deterrent could work fine in practice (since everyone knows you're technologically capable of developing the really nasty stuff if anything motivates you to...).
- nradov 5y ago
  Moral deterrents have never worked for long. Which "stuff" is even nastier than nuclear? Chemical weapons aren't very effective against modern militaries. Biological weapons are nearly as dangerous to the user as to the target.
- sofixa 5y ago
  > They wouldn't have to share them with an EU army, they could leave them for "national use" only and avoid any possibility of escalation That's not true, Macron explicitly stated he's open sharing the responsibility and power of French nuclear power with the EU.
  - catchclose8919 5y ago
    > the responsibility and power probably it's more like sharing "the COST of maintaining and upgrading it" :)) ...EU Army funds would probably be better spend on tech for urban/guerrila warfare + next gen UAVs, eg. stuff you'd actually end up using in a real war! Heck Russia would probably have the military capability to actually win this war cleanly and quickly of they didn't have to invest billions in their strategic weapons that will (hopefully) never be used. If the current world leaders are competent, they are probably only pretending to properly maintain and upgrade strategic WMDs while covertly diverting the funds to other secret operations... If WMDs are actually used, we've all lost anyways, so it probably only makes sense to keep a huuuuuge stash of the cheapest + most destructive and suffering-maximizing stuff around (I imagine some hellish bio thing) for pure revenge end-game.
Zababa 5y ago
> Maybe France doesn't have enough of a stockpile to destroy all humanity 8x over, but not sure how much that changes the game theory. I think we currently have 2 submarines with 150 nukes each around the world. Probably not enough to end humanity, but enough to ensure mutual destruction.
- TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
  I did not know submarines could carry 150 weapons. Wow, that is a lot.
  - waffleiron 5y ago
    Modern ballistic missiles have multiple independent warheads. For example the French M51 has "6 to 10" independently targetable warheads. The submarine carries "only" 16 of these missiles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targetable_reentry_vehicle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targeta...
- waffleiron 5y ago
  Yup, deterrence theory is quite interesting and every country has different strategies. One doesn't need hundreds of nukes to deter an enemy from nuking them. For example is a large difference between massive retaliation [1] which the US uses to deter North Korea, and minimal deterrence [2] used by China (during the cold war), or Pakistan currently. Secondly it's not just the amount of nukes that influences deterrence, it's how one says they will use them. For example China has pledged "no first use" from the moment they got their first nuclear weapons, whereas the Russia and the US both adopted official policies stating the right of first use. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_retaliation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_retaliation [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence

France has nukes though. So I think you still have the MAD issue. Maybe France doesn't have enough of a stockpile to destroy all humanity 8x over, but not sure how much that changes the game theory.

catchclose8919 5y ago

They wouldn't have to share them with an EU army, they could leave them for "national use" only and avoid any possibility of escalation. Now the EU Army being a non-nuclear entity would make anyone using nuclear army against them "the villain" and onward one could easily justify using "all means" (there's stuff there I'd say even nastier than nuclear...) against them, so a "moral" deterrent could work fine in practice (since everyone knows you're technologically capable of developing the really nasty stuff if anything motivates you to...).

nradov 5y ago
Moral deterrents have never worked for long. Which "stuff" is even nastier than nuclear? Chemical weapons aren't very effective against modern militaries. Biological weapons are nearly as dangerous to the user as to the target.
sofixa 5y ago
> They wouldn't have to share them with an EU army, they could leave them for "national use" only and avoid any possibility of escalation That's not true, Macron explicitly stated he's open sharing the responsibility and power of French nuclear power with the EU.
- catchclose8919 5y ago
  > the responsibility and power probably it's more like sharing "the COST of maintaining and upgrading it" :)) ...EU Army funds would probably be better spend on tech for urban/guerrila warfare + next gen UAVs, eg. stuff you'd actually end up using in a real war! Heck Russia would probably have the military capability to actually win this war cleanly and quickly of they didn't have to invest billions in their strategic weapons that will (hopefully) never be used. If the current world leaders are competent, they are probably only pretending to properly maintain and upgrade strategic WMDs while covertly diverting the funds to other secret operations... If WMDs are actually used, we've all lost anyways, so it probably only makes sense to keep a huuuuuge stash of the cheapest + most destructive and suffering-maximizing stuff around (I imagine some hellish bio thing) for pure revenge end-game.

Zababa 5y ago

> Maybe France doesn't have enough of a stockpile to destroy all humanity 8x over, but not sure how much that changes the game theory. I think we currently have 2 submarines with 150 nukes each around the world. Probably not enough to end humanity, but enough to ensure mutual destruction.

TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
I did not know submarines could carry 150 weapons. Wow, that is a lot.
- waffleiron 5y ago
  Modern ballistic missiles have multiple independent warheads. For example the French M51 has "6 to 10" independently targetable warheads. The submarine carries "only" 16 of these missiles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targetable_reentry_vehicle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_independently_targeta...
waffleiron 5y ago
Yup, deterrence theory is quite interesting and every country has different strategies. One doesn't need hundreds of nukes to deter an enemy from nuking them. For example is a large difference between massive retaliation [1] which the US uses to deter North Korea, and minimal deterrence [2] used by China (during the cold war), or Pakistan currently. Secondly it's not just the amount of nukes that influences deterrence, it's how one says they will use them. For example China has pledged "no first use" from the moment they got their first nuclear weapons, whereas the Russia and the US both adopted official policies stating the right of first use. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_retaliation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_retaliation [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence