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Who Should Manage the Nuclear Weapons Complex, Civilians Or Military?
Lasrick writes "For the first time since 1946, Congress is seriously debating whether the U.S. nuclear weapons complex should be under civilian or military control. That the article is in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists is significant, as it was many of the scientists who founded BAS who argued for civilian control in the wake of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They believed that atomic energy was too destructive, and the military too secretive, which would possibly thwart scientific discovery and erect a major obstacle to international control and cooperation. The article talks about how management has changed over the decades and explains the discussion that needs to happen before Congress acts."
Who do you trust less: the military, or a whatever corporation would be set up to run it? Personally, I'd take the one where people of whatever level of management can be held accountable by court-martial.
Isn't the military supposed to be under civilian control already? Have they gone rogue and I just haven't heard of it until now?
The military is under civilian control, but the military are better at controlling their own weapons than some private corporation, IMHO.
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
Major Jack D Ripper : Mandrake, do you recall what Clemenceau once said about war?
Captain Lionel Mandrake : No, I don't think I do, sir, no.
Major Jack D Ripper : He said war was too important to be left to the generals. When he said that, 50 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.
Noone. It should be destroyed in the fires of Mt. Doom.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
I agree. I think we should base all our decisions on 50-year old fictional movies.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Nah, just diffuse them. Don't ever launch them, outlaw that shit. Use 'em for powering space stuff or energy plants, never weapons. We've got other better more precision weapons. Think about Nuclear Retaliation... really? Even if fired on, or as a last ditch effort to win some war, wouldn't it be better not to launch a nuke? I mean, imagine you're now going to die... Soooo... what? You whip an Uzi out from under your death-bead pillow to take a few others down with you? FUCK THE LIVING! I'M DYING ANYWAY. I can't find much difference between this type of thinking and the mentality of those suicide bombers, or climate change denialists.
100% of the wars the US initiated have been initiated by a civilian government.
The current structure is that the military is a tool used by politicians to exert pressure on foreign nations. Having a military layer between the civilians and the big red button seems better than no layer at all.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Doesn't the military do that anyway?
Better put all in the hands of the military yes ? Those same fuck ass holes that wanted to start world war 3 during the Cuban missile crisis ?
And your basis for this opinion is... what? Something other than movies, I hope?
Those same fucktards warmongers that wanted to invade Cuba ?
If you mean the Bay of Pigs, you do know that that was a CIA operation, and that the CIA is a civilian agency, not a military one, right? If you mean the JCS recommendation during the missile crisis, that was their assessment of what it would take to remove the Soviet missiles. When Kennedy asked for their opinions, should they have lied to him and not given him honest analysis about what they thought it would take to ensure no missiles remained in Cuba?
I trust the government much more than I trust even one military.
Then you know very little about how decisions are made, especially the high-level kind that you're referring to. Military personnel are often more cautious than their civilian bosses, because they have a better grasp of the actual capabilities and risks involved. When the generals urge a stronger response than what the civilians are suggesting (as in the Cuban Missile Crisis), it's usually because the civilians have an inflated perception of what the military can do -- in that case, the JCS recommended an invasion because airstrikes alone couldn't ensure the destruction of the missile sites. Do the thing properly, or don't attempt it at all. Go read pretty much any memoir by a US president, vice-president, or secretary of defense (regardless of party) who had a serious military crisis on their watch, and you'll see this when they discuss the decision-making process. Bob Woodward's The Commanders is also insightful on this. It's not quite the same dynamic as PHB vs. techie, but there are strong similarities at times.
Further, military personnel have a range of ideologies, just like civilians do. John Kerry, George McGovern, Jeremiah Wright, and Charles Rangel hardly match the caricature you're painting.
"The Greens lynched a hacker in Chicago. Last month, but I think the body's still hanging from the old Water Tower."
I'm sorry but I'll listen to a general before some political reptile, politicians are the least trustworthy members of society.
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
I was based in San Diego, and once lived up near the San Onofre plant (had a good friend who worked there). I would have no worries having my family live right nearby in San Onofre (the neighboring community, for those not familiar with the area). First, the plant has a containment facility designed to handle a direct impact by an airliner or a worst-case meltdown, and also designed for SoCal earthquakes. Second, while I have MANY issues with the horrendous civilian oversight of nuclear activity in the US, my main complaint is that they are far too stringent on things that do not matter and not strict enough to make me happy on some things that do. Having said that, however, the record is that the civilian overseers in the US are sufficiently cautious that no American plant has ever killed anybody. Even three Mile Island where the operators completely screwed-up harmed precisely zero people. Unlike Chernobyl, we mandate adequate containment.
You are correct that the US Navy has an amazing track record with nuclear power. I used to have a buddy who was an engineering officer on a boomer, and he and his associates were sterling. I never cease to be amazed that the US Navy can take a bunch of 18 year-old kids from high school and 22 year old college kids and teach them to be competent, disciplined, and exacting ..... and then put them in charge of nuclear reactors, jet aircraft, nuclear weapons, etc and have such results.
I have long thought that no nuclear plant in the US should be civilian ... working in these plants ought to be a second career we offer to the best members of our nuclear navy when they choose to retire and want a stable family life at a fixed street address. Such people could not only be trusted to be fully-competent and willing to sacrifice to protect their fellow citizens, but also would be competent to defend the facility should that need ever arise.