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> For major militaries, there's no point in using them, which is why the "big" military powers have all signed up to the anti-chemical weapons and anti-biologic

> For major militaries, there's no point in using them, which is why the "big" military powers have all signed up to the anti-chemical weapons and anti-biological weapons treaties If chemical and biological weapons aren't useful, why does one need a treaty to ban them? Makes one wonder? Is there are treaty to ban feathers as weapons? The fact that there is an anti-biological weapons treaty is proof enough that countries are working on biological weapons, just like the anti-nuclear weapons treaty is proof that countries are working on nukes. The ability to think is a far greater tool than reading silly blogs. Take it from someone who has read too many silly blogs and watch too many silly youtube videos. Also, pretty much every treaty ( international and intranational ) has been broken. Some even say treaties are meant or created to be broken.

jcranmer 3y ago
Your attempts at "gotchas" here are unpersuasive. If the point of treaties is to be broken, why bother signing up to them in the first place? Perhaps more interestingly, why would a country sign up to some treaties banning weapons but not others, if its intent were to use all those weapons? Yes, countries can break treaties. But there is a real cost to doing so. The point of treaties (especially the anti-war treaties) is essentially to break a prisoner's dilemma: all parties can agree to do something that is mutually beneficial for everybody, but only when no one defects. The first arms control treaty was the Washington Naval Treaty, which was signed when most countries were literally unable to find the resources to keep up with the naval arms race and proposed by the one country that could. If you read the post I linked (I suspect you did not, as you are only reacting to my comments and not other material within the post), you'll see that there are many other lines of evidence we can use to ascertain the inutility of chemical weapons, not least of which is the lack of its use in conflicts after WWI, even in existential state conflicts like WWII or the Arab-Israel wars. > If chemical and biological weapons aren't useful, why does one need a treaty to ban them? The same reason why we have laws against murder. The existence of the treaty isn't to keep people from doing something useful (indeed, if you look at which treaties are acceded to, it's the treaties that keep people from doing something useful that don't get the signatories). Instead, it's to signal the unwillingness to use it and to pressure others not to consider its use. And if you know sufficiently few people are willing to use it, then you can avoid spending the money on countermeasures to chemical weapons.
- oilchange 3y ago
  > Your attempts at "gotchas" here are unpersuasive. It's not gotchas. It's just history and reasoning. Logic. It's persuasive to people who are willing to think. But no amount of reason will convince someone with an agenda. > If the point of treaties is to be broken, why bother signing up to them in the first place? As your buddy godelski pointed out, governments do things for optics, political grandstanding, etc. Why did germany and the soviet union sign the nonaggression treaty? Also to appease the naive masses who believe in fairy tales. So that naive people can say nobody is working on chemical or biological weapons since a treaty says so. See, this nonaggression treaty is proof germany and the soviet union will never attack each other. Genius logic. > The first arms control treaty was the Washington Naval Treaty, which was signed when most countries were literally unable to find the resources to keep up with the naval arms race and proposed by the one country that could. No. It was proposed by the one country that had isolationist political pressure against naval buildup due to our history and founding fathers warning against standing armies. It was proposed by the one country to kneecap british attempts to enforce navy limits. Also, the Washington Naval Treaty was a complete failure? It set the stage for japan to build more resentment which led to ww2. > not least of which is the lack of its use in conflicts after WWI, even in existential state conflicts like WWII or the Arab-Israel wars. Chemical weapons were used in iraq-iran war. In the syrian war just a few years ago. > The same reason why we have laws against murder. There are laws against murder because murder exists. People murder. So the treaty against chemical weapons must exist because chemical weapons exist? It would be great if chemical, biological, etc weapons are never used. But you'd have to be absolutely naive to think that every major nation isn't working on chemical or biological weapons. It's like all the naive people who claimed that government agencies stopped collecting our data after getting caught in the 70s. Of course they didn't stop collecting data. They increased the gathering of data. I live in a country where biological weapons wiped out a significant portion of the native population. Do you think such a country is working on biological weapons? If one major country is, then so is every major nation around the world. The real world isn't an utopian fairy tale. No matter how much one wishes it were. But it's a free country. Believe whatever you want.
  - George83728 3y ago
godelski 3y ago
> If chemical and biological weapons aren't useful, why does one need a treaty to ban them? Serious question, are you surprised governments do things that aren't useful? That they'll focus more on signaling than utility? That's literally 80% of politics: show. > The fact that there is an anti-biological weapons treaty is proof enough that countries are working on biological weapons, just like the anti-nuclear weapons treaty is proof that countries are working on nukes. Now that we got the above out of the way, maybe notice that China, Russia, and the US have all signed the Biological Weapons Convention[0] (outlaw bio weapons). All signed during the cold war. Then maybe notice that China, Russia, and the US have NOT signed the ban on the use of nuclear weapons[1]. > The ability to think is a far greater tool than reading silly blogs I agree. I mean just the dichotomy of [0] and [1] really tells a lot. You make a good point that governments are difficult to discuss because you can't take anything they do at face value so you have to dig in and think about their actions and what signals they are making. [0] https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/bwcsig https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/bwcsig [1] https://treaties.unoda.org/t/tpnw https://treaties.unoda.org/t/tpnw

jcranmer 3y ago

Your attempts at "gotchas" here are unpersuasive. If the point of treaties is to be broken, why bother signing up to them in the first place? Perhaps more interestingly, why would a country sign up to some treaties banning weapons but not others, if its intent were to use all those weapons? Yes, countries can break treaties. But there is a real cost to doing so. The point of treaties (especially the anti-war treaties) is essentially to break a prisoner's dilemma: all parties can agree to do something that is mutually beneficial for everybody, but only when no one defects. The first arms control treaty was the Washington Naval Treaty, which was signed when most countries were literally unable to find the resources to keep up with the naval arms race and proposed by the one country that could. If you read the post I linked (I suspect you did not, as you are only reacting to my comments and not other material within the post), you'll see that there are many other lines of evidence we can use to ascertain the inutility of chemical weapons, not least of which is the lack of its use in conflicts after WWI, even in existential state conflicts like WWII or the Arab-Israel wars. > If chemical and biological weapons aren't useful, why does one need a treaty to ban them? The same reason why we have laws against murder. The existence of the treaty isn't to keep people from doing something useful (indeed, if you look at which treaties are acceded to, it's the treaties that keep people from doing something useful that don't get the signatories). Instead, it's to signal the unwillingness to use it and to pressure others not to consider its use. And if you know sufficiently few people are willing to use it, then you can avoid spending the money on countermeasures to chemical weapons.

oilchange 3y ago
> Your attempts at "gotchas" here are unpersuasive. It's not gotchas. It's just history and reasoning. Logic. It's persuasive to people who are willing to think. But no amount of reason will convince someone with an agenda. > If the point of treaties is to be broken, why bother signing up to them in the first place? As your buddy godelski pointed out, governments do things for optics, political grandstanding, etc. Why did germany and the soviet union sign the nonaggression treaty? Also to appease the naive masses who believe in fairy tales. So that naive people can say nobody is working on chemical or biological weapons since a treaty says so. See, this nonaggression treaty is proof germany and the soviet union will never attack each other. Genius logic. > The first arms control treaty was the Washington Naval Treaty, which was signed when most countries were literally unable to find the resources to keep up with the naval arms race and proposed by the one country that could. No. It was proposed by the one country that had isolationist political pressure against naval buildup due to our history and founding fathers warning against standing armies. It was proposed by the one country to kneecap british attempts to enforce navy limits. Also, the Washington Naval Treaty was a complete failure? It set the stage for japan to build more resentment which led to ww2. > not least of which is the lack of its use in conflicts after WWI, even in existential state conflicts like WWII or the Arab-Israel wars. Chemical weapons were used in iraq-iran war. In the syrian war just a few years ago. > The same reason why we have laws against murder. There are laws against murder because murder exists. People murder. So the treaty against chemical weapons must exist because chemical weapons exist? It would be great if chemical, biological, etc weapons are never used. But you'd have to be absolutely naive to think that every major nation isn't working on chemical or biological weapons. It's like all the naive people who claimed that government agencies stopped collecting our data after getting caught in the 70s. Of course they didn't stop collecting data. They increased the gathering of data. I live in a country where biological weapons wiped out a significant portion of the native population. Do you think such a country is working on biological weapons? If one major country is, then so is every major nation around the world. The real world isn't an utopian fairy tale. No matter how much one wishes it were. But it's a free country. Believe whatever you want.
- George83728 3y ago

godelski 3y ago

> If chemical and biological weapons aren't useful, why does one need a treaty to ban them? Serious question, are you surprised governments do things that aren't useful? That they'll focus more on signaling than utility? That's literally 80% of politics: show. > The fact that there is an anti-biological weapons treaty is proof enough that countries are working on biological weapons, just like the anti-nuclear weapons treaty is proof that countries are working on nukes. Now that we got the above out of the way, maybe notice that China, Russia, and the US have all signed the Biological Weapons Convention[0] (outlaw bio weapons). All signed during the cold war. Then maybe notice that China, Russia, and the US have NOT signed the ban on the use of nuclear weapons[1]. > The ability to think is a far greater tool than reading silly blogs I agree. I mean just the dichotomy of [0] and [1] really tells a lot. You make a good point that governments are difficult to discuss because you can't take anything they do at face value so you have to dig in and think about their actions and what signals they are making. [0] https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/bwcsig https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/bwcsig [1] https://treaties.unoda.org/t/tpnw https://treaties.unoda.org/t/tpnw