Read the news today, crapped my pants a little.

[barbos]

Well, according to expert named Keith&Co, russians subs are not the problem. I mean when I mentioned subs he called me an idiot.
But according to article russian generals don't feel that ICBM subs are enough of a deterrent for american generals.

Then the problem isn't how the US deploys it's nukes, the problem is that the Russian military has a bunch of idiots who've been promoted to generals. No amount of planning can fix stupid.

I don't follow. Why are you saying they are idiots? Even if they are, how are they more idiots than american ones?
Assuming the article is correct, american engineers just turned russian land based anything into useless junk as far as nuclear war with US concerned. And you call russian generals idiots, this does not compute.
I call american generals idiots because it increased chances of US being accidentally nuked. In fact this is what article says too.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Will you ever take a hold of yourself and start actually discussing the topic and not the person you don't like?

Bwahahahaha! That's hilarious.

I tried that.
Post 5.

You ignored it and preferred to tell lies about what I said in other posts. Well, either you're lying about it, or you didn't comprehend it. Either way, you won't discuss what I thought the topic was.

 

[RavenSky]

Staff Warning

/mod

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Then the problem isn't how the US deploys it's nukes, the problem is that the Russian military has a bunch of idiots who've been promoted to generals. No amount of planning can fix stupid.

I don't follow. Why are you saying they are idiots?

They're idiots if they think that the elimination of all their land-based nuclear weapons in a first strike by the US would reduce their ability to perform a retaliatory nuclear strike against the US to such an extent that the corresponding loss of life on the US side would be small enough to be considered acceptable collateral damage.

Even if they are, how are they more idiots than american ones?

I would never make a statement which implied that Americans are not idiots.

Assuming the article is correct, american engineers just turned russian land based anything into useless junk as far as nucler war with US concerned. And you call russian generals idiots, this does not compute.

OK, let's say that you're right and an American first strike is 100% successful in turning the entire land-based Russian nuclear arsenal into useless junk. In what way does this impair the ability of the Russian military to reduce most American cities into radioactive ash in response? A quick google search shows that Russia has at least one to two hundred nuclear weapons deployed on submarines. How does firing those instead of firing the land-based ones not totally destroy America?

Since it doesn't compute for you, I assume that you mean that only having the submarine based weapons to rely upon eliminates the concept of mutually assured destruction and makes a first strike by America a valid military option that gives them a chance of actually winning a nuclear war with Russia as opposed to getting wiped out along with Russia. If that was what you meant, step me through how that happens because I don't see the logical progression of that thought process. If you meant something else, give some more details about how it doesn't compute for you.

 

[barbos]

I don't follow. Why are you saying they are idiots?

They're idiots if they think that the elimination of all their land-based nuclear weapons in a first strike by the US would reduce their ability to perform a retaliatory nuclear strike against the US to such an extent that the corresponding loss of life on the US side would be small enough to be considered acceptable collateral damage.

Then why do americans bother with first strike capabilities if they can't imagine considering it? Try explaining it to russian idiot general.

Even if they are, how are they more idiots than american ones?

I would never make a statement which implied that Americans are not idiots.

I will hold you to that.

Assuming the article is correct, american engineers just turned russian land based anything into useless junk as far as nucler war with US concerned. And you call russian generals idiots, this does not compute.

OK, let's say that you're right and an American first strike is 100% successful in turning the entire land-based Russian nuclear arsenal into useless junk. In what way does this impair the ability of the Russian military to reduce most American cities into radioactive ash in response? A quick google search shows that Russia has at least one to two hundred nuclear weapons deployed on submarines. How does firing those instead of firing the land-based ones not totally destroy America?

Russia has 11 subs I read in the article. And 3 are usually in maintenance, So 7-8 subs with nukes and we don't really know how likely they are to survive if US decides to strike first. maybe as Keith&Co says they are all easily followed by US subs.
And article says russians are worried about american missile defense even though article says they should not be. Either way, subs is the only option left and this alone should make russians worried.

Since it doesn't compute for you, I assume that you mean that only having the submarine based weapons to rely upon eliminates the concept of mutually assured destruction and makes a first strike by America a valid military option that gives them a chance of actually winning a nuclear war with Russia as opposed to getting wiped out along with Russia. If that was what you meant, step me through how that happens because I don't see the logical progression of that thought process. If you meant something else, give some more details about how it doesn't compute for you.

Land based nukes were guaranteed to partially survive surprise attack, nuclear subs may not have such guarantee. Even though in theory subs are good idea but there is still uncertainty.
Now land nukes pretty much guaranteed to be destroyed, hence there is no guarantee anything will survive.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

OK, let's say that you're right and an American first strike is 100% successful in turning the entire land-based Russian nuclear arsenal into useless junk. In what way does this impair the ability of the Russian military to reduce most American cities into radioactive ash in response? A quick google search shows that Russia has at least one to two hundred nuclear weapons deployed on submarines. How does firing those instead of firing the land-based ones not totally destroy America?

Russia has 11 subs I read in the article. And 3 are usually in maintenance, So 7-8 subs with nukes and we don't really know how likely they are to survive if US decides to strike first. maybe as Keith&Co says they are all easily followed by US subs.
And article says russians are worried about american missile defense even though article says they should not be. Either way, subs is the only option left and this alone should make russians worried.

Yes, and IIRC, each one of these subs can carry 16-20 nuclear weapons. So, assuming that there is no buildup to the American first strike and the Russians are caught completely off guard and don't have enough forewarning about the potential for an attack to deploy the subs in maintenance, you have at least 100 nuclear weapons deployed at sea.

From the strategic point of view of the Americans, I don't see a difference in "The Russians have over 1000 nuclear weapons to fire back at us in response to a first strike" and "The Russians have 100 nuclear weapons to fire back at us in response to a first strike". Why would having the latter be the case affect their planning in a way which would be different than the former?

Since it doesn't compute for you, I assume that you mean that only having the submarine based weapons to rely upon eliminates the concept of mutually assured destruction and makes a first strike by America a valid military option that gives them a chance of actually winning a nuclear war with Russia as opposed to getting wiped out along with Russia. If that was what you meant, step me through how that happens because I don't see the logical progression of that thought process. If you meant something else, give some more details about how it doesn't compute for you.

Land based nukes were guaranteed to partially survive surprise attack, nuclear subs may not have such guarantee. Even though in theory subs are good idea but there is still uncertainty.
Now land nukes pretty much guaranteed to be destroyed, hence there is no guarantee anything will survive.

Well, nothing is a guarantee, especially in war. Military planning doesn't have to do with guarantees but with potentials. Russia will have the potential for at least 100 nuclear weapons not affected by a first strike against their land-based nuclear assets. This means that the ability to destroy the land-based arsenals doesn't alter MAD calculations. The Americans have nothing to gain in terms of the damage done to them by a retaliatory strike by destroying the land-based arsenals which they would not have done to them by not destroying those arsenals, meaning that these weapons don't affect their calculations about whether or not to make a first strike.

 

[barbos]

Why do americans bother with first strike capabilities?

 

[Keith&Co.]

maybe as Keith&Co says they are all easily followed by US subs.

No, I never said that, either.

Not much point to a discussion if you're going to be taking the parts of both sides.

- - - Updated - - -

Why do americans bother with first strike capabilities?

To be scary.
Hopefully scary enough to prevent the threat of nuclear war.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

barbos seems to think nuclear war is turn based.

Russian Military Person A: Shit! The Americans just launched nukes from their submarines at us!
Russian Military Person B: Should we fire out missiles before the nukes get to our silos?
Russian Military Person A: No, that wouldn't be fair.

- - - Updated - - -

Why do americans bother with first strike capabilities?

Because we want to take over that icy shithole of a nation.

 

[barbos]

Why do americans bother with first strike capabilities?

To be scary.
Hopefully scary enough to prevent the threat of nuclear war.

Scary ones usually get shot at the slightest suspicion. just ask blacks in US.

 

[barbos]

barbos seems to think nuclear war is turn based.

Russian Military Person A: Shit! The Americans just launched nukes from their submarines at us!
Russian Military Person B: Should we fire out missiles before the nukes get to our silos?
Russian Military Person A: No, that wouldn't be fair.

Another dude who did not read the article but has an opinion about it and thinks americans are complete idiots.

 

[Keith&Co.]

From the strategic point of view of the Americans, I don't see a difference in "The Russians have over 1000 nuclear weapons to fire back at us in response to a first strike" and "The Russians have 100 nuclear weapons to fire back at us in response to a first strike". .

Yeah, the whole point of the MAD game is that you pick the path that leads to NO nukes coming at you.
There's a great number of resources dedicated to trying to find their silos and mobile platforms and subs. But it's not perfect.

We can have pretty high confidence we'll know if they start the war, that we'll see their launches no matter where they start from, but it's a completely different story to be able to say with any confidence that 'we can take them.' Because that won't involve taking down 'enough' of their assets to leave a response that's survivable, it has to be all.

And while our weapons are very reliable, they're not quite at 110% reliable. And anything less than 100% does leave a potential response with is just intolerable.

 

[Keith&Co.]

To be scary.
Hopefully scary enough to prevent the threat of nuclear war.

Scary ones usually get shot at the slightest suspicion. just ask blacks in US.

If that were at all an applicable analogy, Russia would have nuked us the day before Reagan took office. That man had a scary view of the Evil Empire and didn't understand the triad. He thought we could recall the missiles launched from the subs if Russia backed down and we changed our mind...

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Why do americans bother with first strike capabilities?

Going first limits the damage of the retaliatory strike. If the Russians launch 100 nukes instead of 1000, they have to choose targets instead of not bothering to choose targets. Idaho might be OK in this scenario and the surviving Americans wouldn't need to worry about potato shortages on top of everything else.

If the Americans feel that Russia is about to launch and they need to make a choice between the two nightmare scenarios of "Our country is about to be destroyed and the survivors won't have enough potatoes to eat" and "Our country is about to be destroyed, but we can probably save the potato industry", then obviously it's in their interest to choose the latter. It's the least bad of two terrible situations and they have the potential to save something.

It does not, however, give them enough of an advantage to factor into planning that a first strike is a viable military option since better first strike capabilities does not mean that MAD no longer applies, it just means that the D is slightly smaller.

 

[barbos]

Scary ones usually get shot at the slightest suspicion. just ask blacks in US.

If that were at all an applicable analogy, Russia would have nuked us the day before Reagan took office. That man had a scary view of the Evil Empire and didn't understand the triad. He thought we could recall the missiles launched from the subs if Russia backed down and we changed our mind...

He was not scary at all.

 

[Keith&Co.]

If that were at all an applicable analogy, Russia would have nuked us the day before Reagan took office. That man had a scary view of the Evil Empire and didn't understand the triad. He thought we could recall the missiles launched from the subs if Russia backed down and we changed our mind...

He was not scary at all.

Right... when he announced that he'd signed legislation that outlawed Russia and the missiles were already in the air, no one lost their shit on that.

he scared me and I worked for him.

 

[Terrell]

I'm not entirely sure that retaliation by the Russians matters in terms of damage to the United States or Western civilization. If such a strike were to occur, even without retaliation, would the global consequences simply to the environment destroy civilization even in nations where no nuclear weapons hit?

 

[barbos]

Why do americans bother with first strike capabilities?

Going first limits the damage of the retaliatory strike. If the Russians launch 100 nukes instead of 1000, they have to choose targets instead of not bothering to choose targets. Idaho might be OK in this scenario and the surviving Americans wouldn't need to worry about potato shortages on top of everything else.

If the Americans feel that Russia is about to launch and they need to make a choice between the two nightmare scenarios of "Our country is about to be destroyed and the survivors won't have enough potatoes to eat" and "Our country is about to be destroyed, but we can probably save the potato industry", then obviously it's in their interest to choose the latter. It's the least bad of two terrible situations and they have the potential to save something.
It does not, however, give them enough of an advantage to factor into planning that a first strike is a viable military option since better first strike capabilities does not mean that MAD no longer applies, it just means that the D is slightly smaller.

If the Americans feel? Well this alone should make russians feel compelled to strike first and you to crap your pants.
I am sorry but I don't feel you have adequate excuse for development first strike capabilities.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Idaho might be OK in this scenario and the surviving Americans wouldn't need to worry about potato shortages on top of everything else.

Yeah, but there's a really good chance that we've got at least three missiles aimed at Moscow, Idaho. so we'll take care of Idaho FOR them...

 

[barbos]

I'm not entirely sure that retaliation by the Russians matters in terms of damage to the United States or Western civilization. If such a strike were to occur, even without retaliation, would the global consequences simply to the environment destroy civilization even in nations where no nuclear weapons hit?

I think consensus now is that it's not a big deal environment wise.

- - - Updated - - -

He was not scary at all.

Right... when he announced that he'd signed legislation that outlawed Russia and the missiles were already in the air, no one lost their shit on that.

he scared me and I worked for him.

As far as MAD concerned he was not scary. USSR was going to nuke US back no matter what.