The hospital stuff was the least of our concerns.[3] The history of this actually gets better. Nixon was sloshed half the time and then rolled that fact into t

The hospital stuff was the least of our concerns.[3] The history of this actually gets better. Nixon was sloshed half the time and then rolled that fact into the furtherance of his nuclear brinksmanship[2] pioneering: "If the president had his way," Kissinger growled to aides more than once, "there would be a nuclear war each week!" This may not have been an idle jest. The CIA's top Vietnam specialist, George Carver, reportedly said that in 1969, when the North Koreans shot down a US spy plane, "Nixon became incensed and ordered a tactical nuclear strike... The Joint Chiefs were alerted and asked to recommend targets, but Kissinger got on the phone to them. They agreed not to do anything until Nixon sobered up in the morning." [1] No big deal. "The allegation of flirting with nuclear weaponry is not an isolated one. Nixon had been open to the use of tactical nuclear weapons in Vietnam as early as 1954 and as president-elect in 1968 had talked of striking "a blow that would both end the war and win it". A Kissinger aide who moved over to the White House, David Young, told a colleague "of the time he was on the phone [listening] when Nixon and Kissinger were talking. Nixon was drunk, and he said, 'Henry, we've got to nuke them.'"[1] Now we know where a certain warmonger gets their habit of threatening the use of tactical nukes. I think the best system is probably some type of consensus system between military command elements. We have a fleet of EC-4 "Nightwatch" aircraft for this purpose, as a backup. It makes more sense to have your nuclear war decision makers comfortably aloft with the job being their primary vocation, as opposed to some dude waking up groggy at 3am being told they have 15 minutes to live while probably also being evacuated at the same time. Mandrake, do you recall what Clemenzo once said about war? Mandrake: No. I don't think I do sir, no. Ripper: He said war was to important to be left to the Generals. When he said that, fifty years ago, he might have been right. But today, war is too important to be left to politicians. They have neither the time, the training, nor the inclination for strategic thought. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/weekend/story/0,3605,362947,00.html https://www.theguardian.com/weekend/story/0,3605,362947,00.h... [1] https://www.theguardian.com/weekend/story/0,3605,362958,00.html https://www.theguardian.com/weekend/story/0,3605,362958,00.h... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madman_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madman_theory [3] https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/09/23/the-real-gen-milley-story-is-the-presidents-sole-authority-to-launch-nukes/ https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/09/23/the-real-gen-mi...