3 ms·

Apologies indeed - the great thing about HN is that users take second seat to the content! But sometimes it backfires. On 2. - let's make it simpler then. The

by crdb 11y ago

Apologies indeed - the great thing about HN is that users take second seat to the content! But sometimes it backfires. On 2. - let's make it simpler then. The OP's (coldtea) premise is that it is not possible to say that one is better than the other ("it makes no sense to say"). The premise is incorrect because in my case, I can make the value judgment that one is better than the other, and further, it is probably safe to assume that most people also have their own ranking. In aggregate, people do make value judgments and do, therefore, make sense of "better". I agree that it can get a little lengthy discussing subjective value, and not armed with years of philosophy studies, I'm not very good at it either. On 4. - whilst several world powers such as the US, the USSR, France and Portugal have indeed fought proxy and covert wars to further the interests of a subset of their citizen, there has been no conflict of the scale and geography of World War II since World War II. Vietnam was localized in Vietnam, although it impacted US culture, precisely because Washington was afraid of starting a nuclear war. The only instances of WWII-level losses of lives were due to genocide, often from civil war. As an extreme example of the power of MAD fear, the Yom Kippur War was ended by US intervention (or at least the threat thereof) saving the Israelis at the last minute after Golda Meir made the bet that arming the nuclear weapons would be detected by the CIA and result in exactly such intervention. On 3., scientific knowledge available to the community is a very different thing to personal discovery of such knowledge. You do not need to know electronics, physics or applied mathematics to use a computer, and you do not need to know how to kill someone because there are people who specialize in this and keep the peace. But there is a difference in the type of knowledge that is the discovery and popularization of random forests, and knowing the feeling of taking someone's life. Getting better at killing CAN have positive effects. The refined Blitzkrieg with modern equipment waged by the US in the first Gulf War, the product of decades of research on killing and invading, resulted in a very short war with almost no casualties on the offensive side (292 - all figures from Wikipedia), and relatively few on the defending side (20-35,000) and civilians (5,000) compared to what a more even war would have cost (for example, the Iran-Iraq war cost around 100,000 lives for each of these groups). I see this as a net positive. Generally, financing an extreme imbalance of power results in global lasting relative peace, cf Pax Romana, Pax Britannia, Pax Americana.

ZenoArrow 11y ago
Let's remind ourselves of the countries that have nuclear weapons, and the date they obtained them... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_nuclear_weapons_development https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_nuclear_weapons_... US - 1945 Russia - 1949 UK - 1952 France - 1960 China - 1967 Isreal - Unknown, but appear to have them in the 1970's India - 1974 South Africa - 1979 to 1991 Pakistan - 1998 North Korea - 2006 Have any of the countries above avoided conflict since WW2? Perhaps France, China and South Africa, though it could be argued they've been involved in conflicts in other ways. The US, Russia, UK, Isreal, India, Pakistan and North Korea have all been involved with wars against other countries since WW2 ended even after they got nuclear weapons. Why do you suspect this is? As for the Yom Kippur War, it's not one I'm overly familiar with, but it is relevant so thanks for mentioning it. However, the impression I get from reading this account was that the arming of the missiles was a cry for help in order to get the backing of the US. What would the Isrealis have stood to gain if they'd really set them off? http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/06/opinion/the-last-nuclear-moment.html http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/06/opinion/the-last-nuclear-m...
- crdb 11y ago
  It's not about being involved in regional, relatively minor conflict, but about avoiding annihilation. I did not say we have had no war, I said we have had no global wars of the scale seen fairly frequently until WWII. For Israel, the idea was to convey the message of a desperate strike before succumbing (since the neighbouring countries were pretty clear about their intentions); if the message was not convincing, it wouldn't have had the effect it had. Meir took a risk that paid off handsomely. MAD is the only message as no nation today would get away with the aggressive use of a nuke, it is the option for desperate people and discourages total war which makes governments desperate. The Yom Kippur war is generally fascinating to read about and I really recommend digging, if you are interested in modern history and the Middle East. Europe was under threat of the Red Army to such an extent that entire regions were mined with nukes on 3 day fuses (in some famous cases, with live chicken inside to keep the electronics warm) to take out the invading force once it had settled. Russia's foreign policy was of systematic undermining of Western civilisation in any way possible (through both fostering enemies in proxy wars, and Active Measures, which is a fascinating topic in itself on which much has been written by Gen. Kalugin and others - just look up famous KGB defectors). Israel, Pakistan and North Korea obtained weapons to defend themselves against overwhelming regional threats by increasing the cost of invasion substantially; Pakistan also wanted to follow India's lead (famously "If India builds the bomb, we will eat grass and leaves for a thousand years, even go hungry, but we will get one of our own." - Bhutto in... 1965 - luckily, India's foreign policy did not end up in an invasion of Pakistan, as the mountain of bodies from Partition may have led observers to think would happen). The UK and France both were involved only in decolonization wars (Algeria, Indochina, Kenya, Malaya, Ireland... and modern French interventions are related to Francafrique) except for the Falklands, a territory too small to warrant exercising the nuclear option or even scale to the mainland, especially when the attacker was not nuclear; and Rhodesia, where British forces were deployed just long enough to allow Mugabe's forces to take the countryside safe from the RLI and Selous Scouts and therefore the election (the blame might also lie with the Scouts' miscalculation about British unwillingness to let Mugabe win, weakening Nkomo strategically). Talking of Rhodesia, you have to understand the mindset of pre-1991 South Africa - every European colony in Africa was falling, one after the other, and South Africa felt the vice tighten as hostile borders closed in. The great thing about exporting commodities is that no matter the blocade the stuff still gets through, so you can get away with a lot. There were tankers in Iraq and Syria during their respective wars... (from what I hear, it's actually harder to move the money than the oil). The other reason for closeness with the US was the Cuban artillery and fighters in South West Africa and other places where the South Africans were fighting. French and British nukes were aimed at Russia, with which they never fought. China's wars are and were defensive or internal, with the exception of Korea (and even the intervention in Indochina - the Maquis Chocolat reported beheading some officers from a Chinese division that moved early on - was the result of an internal conflict, pushing a Southern general out of the way to make way for a Northerner to take up the space, although I don't have the details at hand, see e.g. [1] if you can read French or follow Jean Sassi's trail); especially after the split from the Soviet, Mao needed his own capability to really scare off any new friends of the KMT. The point stands: nuclear weapons appear to have staved off any further truly global conflict with dozens of millions of deaths. Local conflict will always happen when the odds are in favour. Si vis pacem, para bellum - only an overwhelming imbalance of force is dissuasive enough to avoid conflict and enjoy a relatively free and safe global environment. Look at [2] - between 2004 and 2007 around 50,000 to 200,000 people a year died from armed conflict. Compare this to WWII which killed 48 million, with an estimated further 2 million saved by the two nuclear attacks on Japan causing it to surrender early. Or take the "purge" of the PKI in Indonesia (1965?) where estimates of the civilian death toll number between half and a full million. TL;DR: We live in a period of unprecedented peace, even if it doesn't look like it looking at TV. Most Western countries even abolished national service... Nuclear weapons and MAD are a very likely contributing factor. [1] http://www.amazon.fr/Commandos-choc-Indochine-h%C3%A9ros-oubli%C3%A9s/dp/2246008662/ http://www.amazon.fr/Commandos-choc-Indochine-h%C3%A9ros-oub... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_conflict_deaths https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_conflict_deaths

by crdb 11y ago

ZenoArrow 11y ago

Let's remind ourselves of the countries that have nuclear weapons, and the date they obtained them... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_nuclear_weapons_development https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_nuclear_weapons_... US - 1945 Russia - 1949 UK - 1952 France - 1960 China - 1967 Isreal - Unknown, but appear to have them in the 1970's India - 1974 South Africa - 1979 to 1991 Pakistan - 1998 North Korea - 2006 Have any of the countries above avoided conflict since WW2? Perhaps France, China and South Africa, though it could be argued they've been involved in conflicts in other ways. The US, Russia, UK, Isreal, India, Pakistan and North Korea have all been involved with wars against other countries since WW2 ended even after they got nuclear weapons. Why do you suspect this is? As for the Yom Kippur War, it's not one I'm overly familiar with, but it is relevant so thanks for mentioning it. However, the impression I get from reading this account was that the arming of the missiles was a cry for help in order to get the backing of the US. What would the Isrealis have stood to gain if they'd really set them off? http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/06/opinion/the-last-nuclear-moment.html http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/06/opinion/the-last-nuclear-m...

crdb 11y ago
It's not about being involved in regional, relatively minor conflict, but about avoiding annihilation. I did not say we have had no war, I said we have had no global wars of the scale seen fairly frequently until WWII. For Israel, the idea was to convey the message of a desperate strike before succumbing (since the neighbouring countries were pretty clear about their intentions); if the message was not convincing, it wouldn't have had the effect it had. Meir took a risk that paid off handsomely. MAD is the only message as no nation today would get away with the aggressive use of a nuke, it is the option for desperate people and discourages total war which makes governments desperate. The Yom Kippur war is generally fascinating to read about and I really recommend digging, if you are interested in modern history and the Middle East. Europe was under threat of the Red Army to such an extent that entire regions were mined with nukes on 3 day fuses (in some famous cases, with live chicken inside to keep the electronics warm) to take out the invading force once it had settled. Russia's foreign policy was of systematic undermining of Western civilisation in any way possible (through both fostering enemies in proxy wars, and Active Measures, which is a fascinating topic in itself on which much has been written by Gen. Kalugin and others - just look up famous KGB defectors). Israel, Pakistan and North Korea obtained weapons to defend themselves against overwhelming regional threats by increasing the cost of invasion substantially; Pakistan also wanted to follow India's lead (famously "If India builds the bomb, we will eat grass and leaves for a thousand years, even go hungry, but we will get one of our own." - Bhutto in... 1965 - luckily, India's foreign policy did not end up in an invasion of Pakistan, as the mountain of bodies from Partition may have led observers to think would happen). The UK and France both were involved only in decolonization wars (Algeria, Indochina, Kenya, Malaya, Ireland... and modern French interventions are related to Francafrique) except for the Falklands, a territory too small to warrant exercising the nuclear option or even scale to the mainland, especially when the attacker was not nuclear; and Rhodesia, where British forces were deployed just long enough to allow Mugabe's forces to take the countryside safe from the RLI and Selous Scouts and therefore the election (the blame might also lie with the Scouts' miscalculation about British unwillingness to let Mugabe win, weakening Nkomo strategically). Talking of Rhodesia, you have to understand the mindset of pre-1991 South Africa - every European colony in Africa was falling, one after the other, and South Africa felt the vice tighten as hostile borders closed in. The great thing about exporting commodities is that no matter the blocade the stuff still gets through, so you can get away with a lot. There were tankers in Iraq and Syria during their respective wars... (from what I hear, it's actually harder to move the money than the oil). The other reason for closeness with the US was the Cuban artillery and fighters in South West Africa and other places where the South Africans were fighting. French and British nukes were aimed at Russia, with which they never fought. China's wars are and were defensive or internal, with the exception of Korea (and even the intervention in Indochina - the Maquis Chocolat reported beheading some officers from a Chinese division that moved early on - was the result of an internal conflict, pushing a Southern general out of the way to make way for a Northerner to take up the space, although I don't have the details at hand, see e.g. [1] if you can read French or follow Jean Sassi's trail); especially after the split from the Soviet, Mao needed his own capability to really scare off any new friends of the KMT. The point stands: nuclear weapons appear to have staved off any further truly global conflict with dozens of millions of deaths. Local conflict will always happen when the odds are in favour. Si vis pacem, para bellum - only an overwhelming imbalance of force is dissuasive enough to avoid conflict and enjoy a relatively free and safe global environment. Look at [2] - between 2004 and 2007 around 50,000 to 200,000 people a year died from armed conflict. Compare this to WWII which killed 48 million, with an estimated further 2 million saved by the two nuclear attacks on Japan causing it to surrender early. Or take the "purge" of the PKI in Indonesia (1965?) where estimates of the civilian death toll number between half and a full million. TL;DR: We live in a period of unprecedented peace, even if it doesn't look like it looking at TV. Most Western countries even abolished national service... Nuclear weapons and MAD are a very likely contributing factor. [1] http://www.amazon.fr/Commandos-choc-Indochine-h%C3%A9ros-oubli%C3%A9s/dp/2246008662/ http://www.amazon.fr/Commandos-choc-Indochine-h%C3%A9ros-oub... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_conflict_deaths https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_conflict_deaths