5 ms·

There won't ever be an "all out war" of nuclear states with each other. Only via proxies.

chmod775 2mo ago
Of course there can be - likely with a gentleman's understanding that neither would use them, and each side careful to not back the other into a corner where they'd have nothing left to lose. It's just going to be your typical meatgrinder and attrition warfare.
- FpUser 2mo ago
  >"gentleman's understanding that neither would use them, and each side careful to not back the other into a corner where they'd have nothing left to lose." So we'll just grind each other into a halt? And what is the end state? What a BS.
  - tcp_handshaker 2mo ago
    In case you did not notice, that is exactly what happened between China and India. Disputes at the border are frequent and they fight with sticks: https://youtu.be/T1-Gi_l-024 https://youtu.be/T1-Gi_l-024
  - toyg 2mo ago
    That's what's happening in Ukraine right now, I don't understand why you think it's BS. The point is reaching a situation where one of the parties is ok with going "alright, enough". Not all wars are WWII-level fight-to-the-death conflicts, a lot of them just end with both sides agreeing a new status quo.
- dualvariable 2mo ago
  Yeah, arguably the war in Ukraine is teaching everyone who is listening that nobody is willing to be the first to use nukes and destroy the planet, which means that nuclear powers can actually fight wars--which is incredibly dangerous, of course.
  - mullingitover 2mo ago
    My takeaway is that Russia, China's vassal, wanted to use nukes and China told them they can't[1]. I don't believe Russia really cares about the rest of the planet. At the same time, China doesn't care if Russia gets a bloody nose on Putin's little vanity project and realizes a nuclear war is bad for their mercantile economy. [1] https://www.politico.eu/article/volodymyr-zelenskyy-china-urged-vladimir-putin-not-use-nuclear-weapons-in-ukraine/ https://www.politico.eu/article/volodymyr-zelenskyy-china-ur...
    - toyg 2mo ago
      This coming from the leader of the other country in a war... I mean, I do find it credible that Xi might have told Putin to think very hard before doing something extremely stupid, but from there to stating that Russia is "China's vassal" and will do whatever they're told by a party who has long been a direct competitor (China and Russia have been solid "frenemies" for a long time, pushing very different views of what "real socialism" looks like)... It's a big jump.
      - mullingitover 2mo ago
        The Soviet Union's relationship with China was more of a peer rivalry situation. The Russian relationship with China is nowhere near parity. Russia would fold tomorrow if China withdrew their backing and went along with the US/EU sanctions. So Russia is only able to prosecute their war with China's permission. When your foreign policy is decided by another power, that's the textbook definition of a vassal.
        toyg 2mo ago
        It's not a binary choice between material support and sanctions, there are plenty of intermediate states. I think you are being hyperbolic again. And I disagree that USSR and PRC were just "rival peers". Rival peers would be UK/US (at least until Suez), or UK/FR until the 90s. USSR and PRC actively fought each other and almost started a nuclear war; that's way beyond "peer rivalry", that's actual direct competition.
- SmirkingRevenge 2mo ago
  I think the biggest risk of war between nuclear powers is from mistakes and accidents that might trigger nuclear escalation/MAD. Systems can malfunction. War can spiral out of control, fast. We had some very close calls in the cold war.
junofan 2mo ago
You could fight conventionally over logistics chokepoints. China’s not going to lob nukes just because their oil’s dried up.
- analognoise 2mo ago
  China imports food and has stressed or extremely stressed fresh water reserves. You take out the method they keep alive hundreds of millions of citizens, you think they won’t launch a nuke? Although for all the strategic thinking we’ve seen out of the “department of war” (that offers gender affirming testosterone shots and then runs out of missiles), I wouldn’t be shocked if you worked at the Pentagon, hahahaha.
  - FuriouslyAdrift 2mo ago
    China is already sending their fishing fleets to just off the EEZ of South American and is rapidly depleting their stock. https://latinamericanpost.com/americas/environment-en/a-silent-crisis-as-chinas-fishing-fleets-threaten-latin-americas-marine-ecosystems/ https://latinamericanpost.com/americas/environment-en/a-sile...
    - maxglute 2mo ago
      This interesting way of saying PRC distant fishing fleet fishing in international waters. Geopolitical drama aside, DWF is like 3% of PRC fishing catch, much of it just luxury consumption or resold globally. Reality is PRC more or less absolute caloric self sufficient on staples, chicken/fish. They import a lot of soy for animal feed but shit hits fan, people eat less pork/beef.
- maxglute 2mo ago
  [dead]
bombcar 2mo ago
They called World War I “the Great War” because they couldn’t conceive of a sequel. Never say never.
Tadpole9181 2mo ago
Until there is. We have thus far been supremely lucky that irrational actors have not acquired a nuclear bomb. But the reality is that throughout history most leaders have been irrational. My country (America) is behaving increasingly irrationally. I've been hearing fringe conservatives calling for nuking the middle east since the early 2000s, but the rot has spread and became deeply religious. Now I hear talk of the end times from the most powerful people in the country, actively building bunkers. Groups of Republicans openly talking about the US being allowed to take whatever we want from anyone we want through war (Venezuela, Iran, Greenland, Canada). Almost all of our leadership has been replaced in every branch of government. SCOTUS is clearly compromised and bought. The legislative may as well be dead. Almost all executive agencies have been purged, what remains have had their heads swapped with sycophants. Something like half of the military generals have been turned over. The DoD was renamed to the DoW with cheers, as an alcoholic prison guard was put in charge and has started touting hypermacho religious warrior catchphrases and openly advocating for war crimes. The other day we testimony from judges before legislature who refused to say if Presidents can run for three terms or that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. Under oath, just simply refused. And that's before getting into how the President of the United States started a war to distract from his involvement in the highest profile sex trafficking ring in human history, and has continued to use his position to perform insider trading on oil prices repeatedly for weeks. If you said any of this would be happening in 2005, I would have laughed at how "that would never happen in the US". And now it's just... reality. Like Russia. And it seems to have no end in sight. So what actually happens if Trump gets so deranged he hits the red button? And if not him, who will the loonies pick tomorrow - someone who actually believes in "the cause", who doesn't understand it's a grift? And what are the external long term consequences of Trump's actions in countries like Iran and Venezuela and Ukraine? The US is not to be trusted anymore, every country has a clear signal to build their own nuclear arsenal ASAP. We have a river of blood behind us, so are we just expecting to get lucky that no one in Iran, for instance, who gets to a position of power leverages an irrational hate for the US and just... Does it in a religious or hate-driven Armageddon?
- tharmas 2mo ago
  >We have thus far been supremely lucky that irrational actors have not acquired a nuclear bomb. Cough, cough. Who is currently in the White House?

Of course there can be - likely with a gentleman's understanding that neither would use them, and each side careful to not back the other into a corner where they'd have nothing left to lose. It's just going to be your typical meatgrinder and attrition warfare.

FpUser 2mo ago
>"gentleman's understanding that neither would use them, and each side careful to not back the other into a corner where they'd have nothing left to lose." So we'll just grind each other into a halt? And what is the end state? What a BS.
- tcp_handshaker 2mo ago
  In case you did not notice, that is exactly what happened between China and India. Disputes at the border are frequent and they fight with sticks: https://youtu.be/T1-Gi_l-024 https://youtu.be/T1-Gi_l-024
- toyg 2mo ago
  That's what's happening in Ukraine right now, I don't understand why you think it's BS. The point is reaching a situation where one of the parties is ok with going "alright, enough". Not all wars are WWII-level fight-to-the-death conflicts, a lot of them just end with both sides agreeing a new status quo.
dualvariable 2mo ago
Yeah, arguably the war in Ukraine is teaching everyone who is listening that nobody is willing to be the first to use nukes and destroy the planet, which means that nuclear powers can actually fight wars--which is incredibly dangerous, of course.
- mullingitover 2mo ago
  My takeaway is that Russia, China's vassal, wanted to use nukes and China told them they can't[1]. I don't believe Russia really cares about the rest of the planet. At the same time, China doesn't care if Russia gets a bloody nose on Putin's little vanity project and realizes a nuclear war is bad for their mercantile economy. [1] https://www.politico.eu/article/volodymyr-zelenskyy-china-urged-vladimir-putin-not-use-nuclear-weapons-in-ukraine/ https://www.politico.eu/article/volodymyr-zelenskyy-china-ur...
  - toyg 2mo ago
    This coming from the leader of the other country in a war... I mean, I do find it credible that Xi might have told Putin to think very hard before doing something extremely stupid, but from there to stating that Russia is "China's vassal" and will do whatever they're told by a party who has long been a direct competitor (China and Russia have been solid "frenemies" for a long time, pushing very different views of what "real socialism" looks like)... It's a big jump.
    - mullingitover 2mo ago
      The Soviet Union's relationship with China was more of a peer rivalry situation. The Russian relationship with China is nowhere near parity. Russia would fold tomorrow if China withdrew their backing and went along with the US/EU sanctions. So Russia is only able to prosecute their war with China's permission. When your foreign policy is decided by another power, that's the textbook definition of a vassal.
      - toyg 2mo ago
        It's not a binary choice between material support and sanctions, there are plenty of intermediate states. I think you are being hyperbolic again. And I disagree that USSR and PRC were just "rival peers". Rival peers would be UK/US (at least until Suez), or UK/FR until the 90s. USSR and PRC actively fought each other and almost started a nuclear war; that's way beyond "peer rivalry", that's actual direct competition.
SmirkingRevenge 2mo ago
I think the biggest risk of war between nuclear powers is from mistakes and accidents that might trigger nuclear escalation/MAD. Systems can malfunction. War can spiral out of control, fast. We had some very close calls in the cold war.

junofan 2mo ago

You could fight conventionally over logistics chokepoints. China’s not going to lob nukes just because their oil’s dried up.

analognoise 2mo ago
China imports food and has stressed or extremely stressed fresh water reserves. You take out the method they keep alive hundreds of millions of citizens, you think they won’t launch a nuke? Although for all the strategic thinking we’ve seen out of the “department of war” (that offers gender affirming testosterone shots and then runs out of missiles), I wouldn’t be shocked if you worked at the Pentagon, hahahaha.
- FuriouslyAdrift 2mo ago
  China is already sending their fishing fleets to just off the EEZ of South American and is rapidly depleting their stock. https://latinamericanpost.com/americas/environment-en/a-silent-crisis-as-chinas-fishing-fleets-threaten-latin-americas-marine-ecosystems/ https://latinamericanpost.com/americas/environment-en/a-sile...
  - maxglute 2mo ago
    This interesting way of saying PRC distant fishing fleet fishing in international waters. Geopolitical drama aside, DWF is like 3% of PRC fishing catch, much of it just luxury consumption or resold globally. Reality is PRC more or less absolute caloric self sufficient on staples, chicken/fish. They import a lot of soy for animal feed but shit hits fan, people eat less pork/beef.
maxglute 2mo ago
[dead]

bombcar 2mo ago

They called World War I “the Great War” because they couldn’t conceive of a sequel. Never say never.

Tadpole9181 2mo ago

Until there is. We have thus far been supremely lucky that irrational actors have not acquired a nuclear bomb. But the reality is that throughout history most leaders have been irrational. My country (America) is behaving increasingly irrationally. I've been hearing fringe conservatives calling for nuking the middle east since the early 2000s, but the rot has spread and became deeply religious. Now I hear talk of the end times from the most powerful people in the country, actively building bunkers. Groups of Republicans openly talking about the US being allowed to take whatever we want from anyone we want through war (Venezuela, Iran, Greenland, Canada). Almost all of our leadership has been replaced in every branch of government. SCOTUS is clearly compromised and bought. The legislative may as well be dead. Almost all executive agencies have been purged, what remains have had their heads swapped with sycophants. Something like half of the military generals have been turned over. The DoD was renamed to the DoW with cheers, as an alcoholic prison guard was put in charge and has started touting hypermacho religious warrior catchphrases and openly advocating for war crimes. The other day we testimony from judges before legislature who refused to say if Presidents can run for three terms or that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. Under oath, just simply refused. And that's before getting into how the President of the United States started a war to distract from his involvement in the highest profile sex trafficking ring in human history, and has continued to use his position to perform insider trading on oil prices repeatedly for weeks. If you said any of this would be happening in 2005, I would have laughed at how "that would never happen in the US". And now it's just... reality. Like Russia. And it seems to have no end in sight. So what actually happens if Trump gets so deranged he hits the red button? And if not him, who will the loonies pick tomorrow - someone who actually believes in "the cause", who doesn't understand it's a grift? And what are the external long term consequences of Trump's actions in countries like Iran and Venezuela and Ukraine? The US is not to be trusted anymore, every country has a clear signal to build their own nuclear arsenal ASAP. We have a river of blood behind us, so are we just expecting to get lucky that no one in Iran, for instance, who gets to a position of power leverages an irrational hate for the US and just... Does it in a religious or hate-driven Armageddon?

tharmas 2mo ago
>We have thus far been supremely lucky that irrational actors have not acquired a nuclear bomb. Cough, cough. Who is currently in the White House?