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>You can’t win in a conflict under MAD against an opponent who has more at stake than you. That's purely a psychological trick, if you take this as true then i
by corimaith 2y ago
>You can’t win in a conflict under MAD against an opponent who has more at stake than you.
That's purely a psychological trick, if you take this as true then it would be rational for everyone to place madmen in the negotiating seat. A better example, if I had Trump say to China, if you don't open up your markets and drop your tariffs on us, we will nuke you. If I can guarantee as thought exercise that Trump will fire nukes if demands are not met (and that's not difficult to do in reality), do you think Xi Jingping will concede here?
- danenania 2y agoIt has to be believable. Even if it were true in your hypothetical, Xi would not believe that Trump or any other leader would sacrifice their life and the existence of the entire country over an issue that isn’t of existential importance, either to the leader or the country. That’s, again, the whole problem. You don’t have to view Putin as “mad” to see him taking a nuclear last stand over Ukraine. He is already invested and taking risk at an extreme level to the point that no one can doubt the importance to him and his willingness to make heavy sacrifices to win. There is no believable narrative where a US leader would be willing to gamble at an existential level over Ukraine.