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I got into a debate with a friend over the recent agreement to reduce the number of deployable nuclear warheads below 1,700 each within seven years of the treaty coming into force. That's down from 2,200 under the START treaty. That's not counting the thousands of warheads that in storage and can be brought back into service.
My friend argued that now is a bad time to be reducing the number of Nukes we have, saying the N. Koreans and Iranians are ramping up production now. I argued Iran and N. Korea would only be able to produce nukes in the single digits, we would still have hundreds of times more then both them. 1700 is way to high of a number IMHO, the World could be destroyed many times over, adding more wouldn't make anyone safe. Having thousands of nukes didn't prevent N. Korea from going ahead with their nuclear program.
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But it is true that past a certain point, there are diminishing returns and real dangers associated with an over-sized nuclear arsenal.
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quote:Economic interdependence is a much less risky method of M.A.D. than nukes.
Economic interdependence does not by any means negate the sorts of concerns that MAD attempts to address. That is, economic co-dependence is not proof against war. Look at WWII.
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True, but conventional warfare as practiced in WWII usually leaves more of a conquered country's production available to a conquerer than a nuclear strike (especially the kind of nuclear strike brought about by a modern nuclear warhead, which are largely much in excess of the payload of a Hiroshima or Nagasaki.)
I do think that the arsenals we currently maintain are a holdover from the Cold War. We could probably reduce safely; it wouldn't take 2,200 warheads to blanket any of our most likely future enemies, even assuming a fair number of failures and interceptions.
I like to think that no one would be crazy enough to bring about a nuclear exchange... And then I look at Kim Jong Il.
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Tresopax: would you like a list of times heavily economically dependent countries have gone to war? It would take me a little while, but I'm sure you could look some up yourself pretty quickly.
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With the power of our best conventional bombs, combined with easy air superiority, we could kill off a huge portion of North Korea's population without leaving it a radioactive wasteland for the next 10,000+ years.
Unless there's some desire for the symbolism of an eye-for-an-eye response, I don't see how North Korea factors into the equation.
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quote:1700 is way to high of a number IMHO, the World could be destroyed many times over, adding more wouldn't make anyone safe. Having thousands of nukes didn't prevent N. Korea from going ahead with their nuclear program.
Really? How many nukes does it take to destroy the world?
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Xavier: nukes have much greater penetration, and NK is very dug-in. Tactical nukes (which don't leave nearly as much radiation behind) could very well play a part in any conflict with NK (taking out all their likely nuclear launch sites as quickly as possible) in a way that wouldn't be feasible with conventional weaponry.
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quote:Tresopax: would you like a list of times heavily economically dependent countries have gone to war? It would take me a little while, but I'm sure you could look some up yourself pretty quickly.
The level of economic interdependence that exists today has only existed for a few decades - arguably since the end of the Cold War. No two major world powers have been directly at war during that period. We were considerably closer to global war during the Cold War era of nuclear M.A.D.
That's not to say such a war isn't possible. It's always possible if someone's crazy enough or passionate enough about something - but that's just as true for nuclear weapons.
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The level of world-wide economic dependence is relatively new, though there was a similar huge increase in trade interdependency a bit before world war one, but there have been numerous pairs of countries with huge economic interdependencies throughout history, including plenty that have gone to war.
I agree that economic co-development has the potential to greatly increase peace, but that is not the same as economic interdependence. Additionally, we have ample evidence that even given heavy economic interdependence it is entirely possible for a country to have an economic collapse, and if the country is in economic collapse, that is fertile ground for the nationalistic and war-like sentiments that can lead to major wars.
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quote:Really? How many nukes does it take to destroy the world?
About 1,000 megatons to start a civilization-ending nuclear winter, according to the best idealized models.
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When the earth's core stops spinning and the asteroids show up, we're gonna be really happy we have all those nukes.
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We don't need them so much to kill people as we do for keeping hobos from sleeping in the empty silos.
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The original reason for our over abundance of nuclear weapons was the MAD Doctrine. This was a realization between us and the Soviet Union that if either one of us would attack the other, there was enough nukes that would survive so that we would be able to destroy the attacker. That is a very dangerous game to play.
There are just a few reasons to keep our stockpile, or even add to it.
1) MAD is still active. While the Soviet Union is gone, there are still many in Russia that see us as a danger to their power. If they could wipe us out without threat of retaliation, it would be in their self interest to do so. While there is a small chance of this scenario happening, it is still a chance.
2) MAD China. Interdependence will keep US/China relations mutually happy for a while. Yet if hard-liners, military nationalists, or a complete economic breakdown does occur, we have MAD to fall back on to keep China from wiping out their biggest rival.
3) Other Nuclear Threats. Name the nuclear threats that face the US where some nuclear retaliation might be necessary? North Korea, Iran, Pakistan. Maybe some odd scenario with France, India or Israel? Yet nuclear missiles are not shields. Making more won't stop the nuts in North Korea from using the ones they have.
4) The Appearance of Strength. While a nuclear weapon won't stop Kim from launching an attack on South Korea, Japan, or even Hawaii, the appearance of a strong, retaliatory US that will destroy him would stop him. So the number of missiles we need is the number that the leader of North Korea believes would be needed to wipe him and his family off the face of the earth. While this may logically be only a few, in his odd mental view, it may be quite many.
5) Revenge. Not a pretty word, ever. Yet if some fool in Iran managed to nuke Tel Aviv, and for some reason Israel was incapable of delivering a retaliatory strike, there would be all kinds of political demands that the US should turn all of Iran into a nuclear waste site. If Jerusalem was destroyed, or Bethlehem, then Christians as well as Jews would be demanding it.
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The militarization that facilitated all the wars in the first fifty years of the nineteen hundreds should not be allowed to happen again. We have enough to end the world, a couple times over, N. Korea would be stupid to use a nuke on anyone when we can vaporize the entire country.
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