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US Revamping Its Nuclear Arsenal
FreedomFirstThenPeac writes: As a former Cold Warrior (both launch officer side and staff analytical mathematician side), I now appreciate the bitterness I saw in former WW2 warriors when they would see a Japanese car. According to the NY Times, a new assembly plant in Kansas is "part of a nationwide wave of atomic revitalization that includes plans for a new generation of weapon carriers. This expansion comes under a president who campaigned for 'a nuclear-free world' and made disarmament a main goal of American defense policy." Mind you, Mutual Assured Destruction is a dangerous path, and one we managed to negotiate only because we were lucky (and we were) and because we were careful (and we were).
As a strategy, it only works with rational people (e.g., world powers with lots to lose) who might have irrational expectations that they will win in the long run. (The rapid fall of imperialist Russia was helpful — I have seen blackboard talks on this as a mathematical result in game theory. This speed minimized the time we spent in the high-risk regions while transiting from MAD to where we were in the 1990s). The Times article says, "The original idea was that modest rebuilding of the nation’s crumbling nuclear complex would speed arms refurbishment, raising confidence in the arsenal’s reliability and paving the way for new treaties that would significantly cut the number of warheads. Instead, because of political deals and geopolitical crises, the Obama administration is engaging in extensive atomic rebuilding while getting only modest arms reductions in return."
As a strategy, it only works with rational people (e.g., world powers with lots to lose) who might have irrational expectations that they will win in the long run. (The rapid fall of imperialist Russia was helpful — I have seen blackboard talks on this as a mathematical result in game theory. This speed minimized the time we spent in the high-risk regions while transiting from MAD to where we were in the 1990s). The Times article says, "The original idea was that modest rebuilding of the nation’s crumbling nuclear complex would speed arms refurbishment, raising confidence in the arsenal’s reliability and paving the way for new treaties that would significantly cut the number of warheads. Instead, because of political deals and geopolitical crises, the Obama administration is engaging in extensive atomic rebuilding while getting only modest arms reductions in return."
For fifteen years, our launch codes were a string of zeros. Only poorly placed Dippy Bird and we would have all died.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
-- This sig is only a test. If this were a real sig it would say something witty. --
Back during Cold War I, one of the big TV networks made a movie about nuclear war (and aftermath) called The Day After. Every sane and rational person should watch it every 5 or 10 years to remind themselves of the horrific nature of nuclear war. Ironically, the film is set between Kansas City and Lawrence, KS. The film hopefully cools the excitement about nukes. Probably best not to show the film to radical jihadists as it would likely have the opposite effect.
So, you identify yourself as personally involved in both the tactical, and theoretical side of an issue that spans generations now, and then you extend that back to WW2. Skip forward to current-day Kansas, link in the politics of the current president, quoting (hopefully accurate) political campaign rhetoric (with an undercurrent of disdain).
Now, throw in the logical statement "Mind you, Mutual Assured Destruction is a dangerous path" ... really, it's a dangerous path?
Then, jump to the strategic level where we assume you are correct that it only works with rational people (and let's also assume you are assuming that American people (voters) and politicians are rational too).
now throw in some blackboard theory from the 90's.... and viola!
Obama's policies don't get enough peace in return....
I imagine there's maybe 1, or 2 people in the world who can navigate sanely though that argument chain.... certainly not me. So. This is one of those.... blah blah blah posts that says more about submitters to slashdot than American policy.
.. if only.
*Sigh* A former cold warrior you may be, but all you do is give proof to what I've long said - a worm's eye view doesn't make you an expert. Or even knowledgeable. (And yeah, the view of a launch control officer is pretty low level). Having been an SSBN weapons tech (and FTB to be precise), I'm quite aware of just how little can be seen from the operating level.
America's nuclear strategy isn't MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction), and hasn't been for a couple of decades now. The strategy we're working towards now is Minimal Deterrence - the smallest number of weapons needed for deterrence.
"It seems to me the use of strategies like this assume that the people involved are relatively rational.
In our current world this doesn't seem to be that good an assumption."
Nor in the past world. Read "The Guns of August" by Barbara Tuchman.
My first thought was "What were they thinking?" My next thought was "There was no thought involved." 17 million dead by the end, and not a nuke in sight. They didn't even discover the neutron until 1932.
MAD prevented WWIII. I don't care whether the people who build them or the people who authorize their construction are corrupt, or worship a giant statue of a sexually aroused Beelzebub, the fact is that we are kept largely secure from would be Napoleons, Hitlers and Stalins by the mere fact that these weapons exist.
Hitler would have pushed the button just before he pulled the trigger.
MAD only works when all the owners of knukes are reasonably sane.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
MAD prevented WWIII
WWIII is the war on terror.
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
Political cronyism, sure... Most American rockets weren't built in Alabama because that is where all of the rocket scientists were born, rather because of who chaired which committee, just like the Johnson space center isn't named after Goddard. If the government is going to spend money, politicians are going to represent their electorate
Since you already went there, what is on the other side of the aisle if Obama was to unilaterally allow our nuclear arsenal age out of usefulness while Russia enters into an aggressive posture, China continues with their Long March series of missile, India/Pakistan/Korea expand their arsenals, etc...
I'll tell you what, The GOP would be livid about American impotence in the face of threats, leading to a long slide into a second-rate has been... rant fume, etc...
And they would be right to some degree, with their red faces and spittle flecked chins, and even Obama seems rational enough to realize that you are not going to negotiate with Putin, etc, from a position of weakness
Russia recently stopped all shipments of processed Uranium from Russia to America for fuel processing, a move that indicates they have no intention of reducing their arsenal. Why would we reduce our arsenal in that situation?