The probability of another nuclear bomb being dropped

[ronburgundy]

But that's all Syed is doing, 'saying' shit. Not backing it up.
When my kids try to define a word using the same word, they get poor grades. Syed just proves he's trolling.

Nuclear bombs could fit the mold for your idea of terrorism.

Really? What is my idea of terrorism?
Syed calls the nation terrorist because we have nukes in the inventory. Having weapons is not part of my definition of terrorism.

It is not just an attack of one nation against the other nation's military.

Okay, that's what terrorism is NOT. Any chance of getting Syed to define what terrorism actually IS? I mean, without pointing fingers at every country he dislikes and calling them terrorists?

Curtis Lemay blazed the modern trail bringing modern warfare into the realm of terrorism by bombing civilian populations BEFORE the nuclear bombs.

Getting closer to something like a definition....

The real problem is believing in the efficacy of weapons of mass destruction and placing our fate in the hands of people who are capable of using them. It matters not the nation in which that happens. It only matters IF IT HAPPENS...and it HAS HAPPENED IN OUR COUNTRY.

So, possessing nuclear capability is terrorism, in your mind?
Okay.
You're scared shitless of nukes. How does that make it an act of terrorism, just having them?

So there is some merit to what Syed is saying.

Not the way he's babbling, no, there isn't.

I agree, his argument is, as per usual, incoherent rambling. However, it would seem that Hiroshima and Nagasaki would come close to fitting the most standard definitions of terrorism. It seems a reasonable enough argument that I assumed many historians have made it, and here is one. The author is a former US vet and a military historian.

He uses the definition of "any malicious actions against civilian populations with the intent of forcing them to make political choices in your favor." He points out that while Nagasaki did have a factories used to manufacture military equipment, there is evidence that the decision to bomb those places was made with the very conscious knowledge that the level of devastation including to civilians would strike such fear in the Japanese people that they would force their government to surrender. The military targets within those areas could have been bombed with non-nuclear bombs without devastation to civilians. Thus, the choice to use nuclear bombs was specifically to cause devastation far beyond eliminating the military targets in order to create terror in the people to force political change.
That's terrorism. Note that the author doesn't argue that we shouldn't have engaged in such terrorism, and he ends by rejecting the idea that such acts that technically meet the definition can be equated with modern terrorism. He also notes that such terrorist actions within the context of nations at war has been commonplace, and applies to the kind of non-nuclear carpet bombing used by German against London and the Allies against Dresden, which not coincidentally commonly referred to as "terror bombing" designed to weaken enemy morale rather than specifically target their military.

 

[bilby]

MAD breaks down as a doctrine when there exist targets that have neither the necessary weapons to retaliate, nor the backing of a sponsor with such weapons.

A small scale strike by the US with one (or a few) nukes as retaliation for a non-nuclear attack against the US (similar to 9-11) doesn't strike me as an unlikely scenario.

GWB wasn't crazy enough to nuke Baghdad after 9-11, but he was stupid enough to invade Iraq in order to retaliate against the Saudi responsible (despite the fact that that Saudi was in Afghanistan or Pakistan at the time).

Perhaps nuking Baghdad or Riyadh would have occurred had the US been self sufficient in oil at the time.

Perhaps it will happen next time.

Would the Russians or Chinese (or the French or British) launch a retaliatory strike in such circumstances? It seems unlikely.

'Mutually assured censure motions at the UN' doesn't strike me as much of a deterrent.

If the Russians nuked Kiev, would NATO really launch a full retaliatory response? What if it happened the day after a sarin attack on the Moscow underground suspected to have been launched by Ukrainian terrorists?

Such small scale and one sided use of nuclear weapons has precedent - indeed it's the only way they have been used in anger. Given sufficient provocation, and/or a sufficiently unstable or hotheaded leader, why would we not expect it to happen again?

 

[Keith&Co.]

Would the Russians or Chinese (or the French or British) launch a retaliatory strike in such circumstances? It seems unlikely.

I disagree.

Right now, we're all in agreement that we'll only use nukes to retaliate against the use of nukes. If no one goes first, the no one can go second. We're safe from everyone's nukes as long as everyone else is safe from our nukes. we all have this threshold of conventional-only up until the 'other guy' goes nuclear.

But if President Screwloose lowers the threshold, and starts throwing nukes around for non-nuclear-retaliation reasons, then everyone else is going to, in my opinion, lose their shit. They'll start to wonder if they'll be next. They'll have to, because we just rewrote the entire game. It won't take much for them to decide that they MUST take us out before we start in on them or their interests.

We are so paranoid about nuclear war, that before every test shot, we phone all the interested countries and tell them we're shooting a missile that's nuclear capable BUT not nuclear-tipped, about where/when we'll launch it, and where it's going to go.
If we were going to shoot Baghdad with a nuke, right now we'd call all the interested parties to tell them we're throwing a nuke, for the reason of X, but not at you, please don't shoot back at us. But if they said that they'd have to treat it as an incoming missile, we'd have to cancel. It would be insane not to stop, just on the chance that they're serious.

If we don't call before we shoot, they'd likely shoot back exactly because their launch detection systems light up and they don't know what's going on.

IF we did call, and they said if we shoot, they'll retaliate, and we shoot anyway, they'll have to assume we're actually shooting at them, and the story was a cover, and they'll have to retaliate.

So the only way we could have a limited nuclear war is if EVERYONE agrees that nukes are the answer. WHich seems unlikely, since no matter where the bad guy is, they're going to be in someone's back yard.

 

[bilby]

Would the Russians or Chinese (or the French or British) launch a retaliatory strike in such circumstances? It seems unlikely.

I disagree.

Right now, we're all in agreement that we'll only use nukes to retaliate against the use of nukes. If no one goes first, the no one can go second. We're safe from everyone's nukes as long as everyone else is safe from our nukes. we all have this threshold of conventional-only up until the 'other guy' goes nuclear.

But if President Screwloose lowers the threshold, and starts throwing nukes around for non-nuclear-retaliation reasons, then everyone else is going to, in my opinion, lose their shit. They'll start to wonder if they'll be next. They'll have to, because we just rewrote the entire game. It won't take much for them to decide that they MUST take us out before we start in on them or their interests.

We are so paranoid about nuclear war, that before every test shot, we phone all the interested countries and tell them we're shooting a missile that's nuclear capable BUT not nuclear-tipped, about where/when we'll launch it, and where it's going to go.
If we were going to shoot Baghdad with a nuke, right now we'd call all the interested parties to tell them we're throwing a nuke, for the reason of X, but not at you, please don't shoot back at us. But if they said that they'd have to treat it as an incoming missile, we'd have to cancel. It would be insane not to stop, just on the chance that they're serious.

If we don't call before we shoot, they'd likely shoot back exactly because their launch detection systems light up and they don't know what's going on.

IF we did call, and they said if we shoot, they'll retaliate, and we shoot anyway, they'll have to assume we're actually shooting at them, and the story was a cover, and they'll have to retaliate.

So the only way we could have a limited nuclear war is if EVERYONE agrees that nukes are the answer. WHich seems unlikely, since no matter where the bad guy is, they're going to be in someone's back yard.

That works for ballistic missiles. But they are not the only, nor the best, option (not least for the reasons you just set out).

My understanding is the the Tomahawk is capable of carrying a variety of warheads, including nukes.

Lots of those were used by the US against targets in Iraq - there was footage from journalists watching them steer between buildings in Baghdad to reach specific Ba'ath Party and government targets.

And of course, as well as cruise missiles, there are other delivery systems (aircraft are an obvious one) that are in routine use for conventional weapons delivery, any of which could nuke a city (or a military target, or both) in such a way that it would be impossible for any of the nuclear powers to mistake them for an attack on themselves. A plane overflying an Iranian uranium enrichment plant is clearly not a nuclear attack on Russia or China. Even if it then drops an RNEP warhead on the facility's command bunker.

Had one of those Tomahawks in Baghdad carried a nuclear warhead, the first that the world would know about it would be the loud bang and subsequent mushroom cloud. Although likely the Baghdad based journalists would not have been in any condition to report the scoop of the century.

I find it hard to imagine that Russia or China would launch a massive nuclear retaliation as an immediate response. Particularly if the strike was clear retaliation against an attack on the US; and even more so if the Baghdad government was a clear front runner in the suspect list.

Of course, it would put the world in a far less stable situation; with the US having demonstrated their willingness to use nukes, the other nuclear powers would doubtless be more inclined towards a first strike in future conflicts or standoffs with the American military.

But I am unconvinced that such a response is now inevitable in the post Cold War environment - and I am also far from sure that Donald Trump is convinced of the inevitability of a nuclear response from anyone as the price of his first use against a non-nuclear armed enemy (or presumed enemy) state.

And ultimately it's only his opinion (no matter how misguided or mistaken) that counts.

 

[barbos]

Not to mention, he is assuming that nation states with high nuclear capabilities will not be controlled by mentally unstable demagogues who are so narcissistic they would risk the fate of humanity in response to a perceived personal insult.

Aw c'mon. All they have to do is keep their mouths shut, hands in their pockets (no GESTURES!!) stay the fuck away from Twitter, and we'll all be fine.

But what if some Al-Qaeda hacker hacks Putin's twitter and post from his twitter "Trump, you have small hands!"

 

[bilby]

Aw c'mon. All they have to do is keep their mouths shut, hands in their pockets (no GESTURES!!) stay the fuck away from Twitter, and we'll all be fine.

But what if some Al-Qaeda hacker hacks Putin's twitter and post from his twitter "Trump, you have small hands!"

The Cuban missile crisis it ain't.

But I'm not sure that it is any less terrifying.

Time to dig a shelter and stock it with five years supply of tinned beans.

 

[arkirk]

But that's all Syed is doing, 'saying' shit. Not backing it up.
When my kids try to define a word using the same word, they get poor grades. Syed just proves he's trolling.

Nuclear bombs could fit the mold for your idea of terrorism.

Really? What is my idea of terrorism?
Syed calls the nation terrorist because we have nukes in the inventory. Having weapons is not part of my definition of terrorism.

It is not just an attack of one nation against the other nation's military.

Okay, that's what terrorism is NOT. Any chance of getting Syed to define what terrorism actually IS? I mean, without pointing fingers at every country he dislikes and calling them terrorists?

Curtis Lemay blazed the modern trail bringing modern warfare into the realm of terrorism by bombing civilian populations BEFORE the nuclear bombs.

Getting closer to something like a definition....

The real problem is believing in the efficacy of weapons of mass destruction and placing our fate in the hands of people who are capable of using them. It matters not the nation in which that happens. It only matters IF IT HAPPENS...and it HAS HAPPENED IN OUR COUNTRY.

So, possessing nuclear capability is terrorism, in your mind?
Okay.
You're scared shitless of nukes. How does that make it an act of terrorism, just having them?

So there is some merit to what Syed is saying.

Not the way he's babbling, no, there isn't.

Let us look at the start of WWII for a moment. What is being missed is that the war against Japan in its earliest phases. The U.S. was already deeply involved in an attempt to dominate the sea in the Pacific. You do not build a fleet of battleships and station them right in the middle of the pacific because you are anticipating PEACE. There was a huge buildup of naval firepower in Pearl Harbor of battlelships cruisers and destroyers massed there for SOME REASON that clearly was not PEACE. There was an economic tug of war for ALL THE COMMERCE IN THE WESTERN PACIFIC AND THE U.S. was waging an unfair contest with the Japanese. I am not saying the Japanese were right, but I am saying they had reason to FEAR THE U.S.

That story sounds a lot like the conditions we are facing today with Trump blabbing his willingness to engage in a nuclear weapons race with countries all of which are militarily weaker than his own. He is sounding more and more like America's Netanyahu. There is no honor in crushing others just because you are stronger. That is what is wrong with all the chauvanistic leaders...Trump, Putin, Abe, Netanyahu, etc. The United Nations does it pathetic best to deal with all these renegade beasts...and it falls short of a serious attack on the problem, but the United Nations at its worst is not as mean spirited as any of the renegade chauvanist leaders in the world. It is a more sound basis on which to do the business of staying alive and intact on this globe. What Syed said was true that we are the only country that has ever used nuclear weapons. We kept building them and making them more deadly after we used them the first time. Truman had a program called Operation Blowfurnace, which was the accelerated building of nuclear weapons to target the 2500 largest population masses in the old Soviet Union...even though only a small fraction of those weapons would trigger nuclear winter. They got built by us more than four times over. To have a nuclear weapons arsenal is to be an threat to life on the planet. Syed has a right to feel betrayed by our and other leaderships who insist on nuclear weapons races. Trump is not the only juvenile delinquent to lay claim to the power of the U.S. presidency. We have had many very mean spirited leaders, and we are not alone in this regard.

You may think Syed's concerns are shit, but they are not shit. Watching these spoiled maniacal leaders play chess with our lives is enough to raise fear in the hardiest of souls. Without being one sided about it, probably every country Syed dislikes is a promoter of terrorism. We really need to understand that modern warfare is an attack on civilian populations for political reasons. Hmmmm.That is the classical definition of terrorism A nuclear weapon is definitely a weapon of terror. Quit playing he said, she said, on these international disputes. It is just childish tribalism.

 

[skepticalbip]

But that's all Syed is doing, 'saying' shit. Not backing it up.
When my kids try to define a word using the same word, they get poor grades. Syed just proves he's trolling. Really? What is my idea of terrorism?
Syed calls the nation terrorist because we have nukes in the inventory. Having weapons is not part of my definition of terrorism.

It is not just an attack of one nation against the other nation's military.

Okay, that's what terrorism is NOT. Any chance of getting Syed to define what terrorism actually IS? I mean, without pointing fingers at every country he dislikes and calling them terrorists?

Curtis Lemay blazed the modern trail bringing modern warfare into the realm of terrorism by bombing civilian populations BEFORE the nuclear bombs.

Getting closer to something like a definition....

The real problem is believing in the efficacy of weapons of mass destruction and placing our fate in the hands of people who are capable of using them. It matters not the nation in which that happens. It only matters IF IT HAPPENS...and it HAS HAPPENED IN OUR COUNTRY.

So, possessing nuclear capability is terrorism, in your mind?
Okay.
You're scared shitless of nukes. How does that make it an act of terrorism, just having them?

So there is some merit to what Syed is saying.

Not the way he's babbling, no, there isn't.

Let us look at the start of WWII for a moment. What is being missed is that the war against Japan in its earliest phases. The U.S. was already deeply involved in an attempt to dominate the sea in the Pacific. You do not build a fleet of battleships and station them right in the middle of the pacific because you are anticipating PEACE. There was a huge buildup of naval firepower in Pearl Harbor of battlelships cruisers and destroyers massed there for SOME REASON that clearly was not PEACE. There was an economic tug of war for ALL THE COMMERCE IN THE WESTERN PACIFIC AND THE U.S. was waging an unfair contest with the Japanese. I am not saying the Japanese were right, but I am saying they had reason to FEAR THE U.S.

... snip...

You seem to have missed the actual beginnings of WWII. It started long before the US involved troops. In the Pacific, the Japanese had invaded China, Korea, Indochina, etc. long before they attacked the US in Hawaii. The naval buildup was to protect our interest in the Pacific like the Philippines, Hawaii, and even New Caledonia and Australia, etc. from the Japanese expansion.

Yes there was an economic tug of war before Pearl Harbor. For instance the US stopped selling our scrap metal to Japan when they became militarily aggressive toward the other nations in the region. Just as the US stopped selling a lot of goods to Germany years before we got into the war.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You seem to have missed the actual beginnings of WWII. It started long before the US involved troops. In the Pacific, the Japanese had invaded China, Korea, Indochina, etc. long before they attacked the US in Hawaii. The naval buildup was to protect our interest in the Pacific like the Philippines, Hawaii, and even New Caledonia and Australia, etc. from the Japanese expansion.

Yes there was an economic tug of war before Pearl Harbor. For instance the US stopped selling our scrap metal to Japan when they became militarily aggressive toward the other nations in the region. Just as the US stopped selling a lot of goods to Germany years before we got into the war.

What's this nonsense?

Reality: If something bad happened America did it or caused it.

Any "facts" contrary to this are disinformation.

Besides, the fact that my wife was not aware of the Japanese invasion of China prior to American involvement obviously proves it didn't happen. (Never mind the fact that she wasn't alive at the time.)

 

[Malintent]

Post reported to the US Department of Homeland Security.

Surprised no one commented on this yet. I deeply hope this was a joke, and if it is, it is not a joke that should be made here without making it clear it is a joke. Sadly, the internet is rife with fascists that would in fact report such a post hoping to cause real harm to a person's life merely for expressing their political views.

Not sure what the punch line is... Syed accused the US of being Terrorists by dropping a nuke on Japan... how that has anything to do with a threat of any kind is beyond me. I think sdelsolray was confused by syed's (fake) broken English maybe.

 

[ronburgundy]

Surprised no one commented on this yet. I deeply hope this was a joke, and if it is, it is not a joke that should be made here without making it clear it is a joke. Sadly, the internet is rife with fascists that would in fact report such a post hoping to cause real harm to a person's life merely for expressing their political views.

Not sure what the punch line is... Syed accused the US of being Terrorists by dropping a nuke on Japan... how that has anything to do with a threat of any kind is beyond me. I think sdelsolray was confused by syed's (fake) broken English maybe.

Yeah, the fact that it made no sense as a joke has me concern it was sincere.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Someone pretending to be an old muslim man is critical of white, Christain America.
Someone else pretends that the mere act of criticism is sufficient for deploying Homeland Security.
It seems to me that the butt of the joke is Homeland Security and a general trend to believe the worst of anything remotely muslim.
That was a campaign promise, wasn't it?

 

[Malintent]

Not sure what the punch line is... Syed accused the US of being Terrorists by dropping a nuke on Japan... how that has anything to do with a threat of any kind is beyond me. I think sdelsolray was confused by syed's (fake) broken English maybe.

Yeah, the fact that it made no sense as a joke has me concern it was sincere.

but what I was trying to say was that, given 100% total sincerity, what is the threat? He did not say TO drop bombs on anybody. He said that Americans are Terrorists for HAVING DROPPED a nuke on Japan.

I think it is an interesting point to make. What, during wartime, is appropriate or not? dies simply having the technology to granularly discriminate between soldier and civilian necessitate use of that level of care? what happens when the players in war become less defined... what happens when "war" becomes less defined?
Durring WWII, carpet bombing civilian infrastructure was normal.. it was not terroristic, even if the goal was to strike fear into the hearts of civilians, create hardship and death, so those people lobby their government to surrender (or otherwise comply)... like the Japanese did. This surrender saved how many months or years of war and further death? Did the dropping of the bomb SAVE lives, in the long run?

All good questions for debate, IMO.