The purpose of the existence of our nukes is the destruction of threats to our lives.
It is actually meant to deter a nuclear attack from the Russia or China. US military posture has never been about using our nukes as offensive weapons.
It is actually meant to deter a nuclear attack from the Russia or China. US military posture has never been about using our nukes as offensive weapons.
Nobody is proposing using nukes as an offensive weapon, only as a defensive weapon. Historically, the original nuclear threat was Russia, but when China developed the bomb and the possibility of delivery, it was added to the list of âreasons to have the bombâ. As a historical statement about the original purpose, itâs simply wrong to say that the bomb âis meantâ to deter attack from Russia and China â it was only Russia. Things change, and now we have to add Iran and North Korea to the list.
The purpose of the existence of Iranâs government is the destruction of America.
The purpose of the existence of our nukes is the destruction of threats to our lives.
Iran threatens our lives.
Your hyperbole aside, are you saying that
- there will be no net negative consequences of nuking Tehran
- that there might be net negative consequences of nuking Tehran, but since this is Hellooooo!!! an emergency! we have to concern ourselves with the short-term
- that there might be negative consequences, but you have determined(âŚ) that the potential negatives donât outweigh the potential positives
- Negatives? In our moment of triumph? I think you overestimate their capacity!
Destroying a ⌠stronghold would demoralize the fighters and motivate non-jihadis to pressure jihadis to cut out the crap.
If a country pursuing nuclear arms sees a like-minded nation destroyed by nuclear fire, their fear of American belligerence will prevent them from seeing their plans to conclusion. Does that answer your question?
I dunno. Let me try to apply this. If (as a hypothetical) America was ever atttacked, Americans would be demoralized from fighting for what they believe in and people who didnât see the need for action, instead of joining the cause, would pressure the war hawks to be nonaggressive?
And (as a hypothetical) itâs preposterous to think that seeing a non-nuclear nation like, say, Japan get nuked would do anything but deter a non-nuclear nation from seeking nukes out of fear?
What is perfectly clear is that using cold war strategies on countries that are attempting to acquire nuclear weapons is not efficacious.
What you mean by cold war strategies beyond âattack as a last resort, as attacking just might be disasterous for us as well as the enemyâ?
Hellooooo!!! We donât have time to wait for a ârevolutionâ! We have to defend ourselves. Tehran is the Fatherland of terrorism, 19 of the 21 highjackers were Saudia Arabians. The purpose of the existence of Iranâs government is the destruction of America.
We are certainly not faced with the mutually exclusive choice between either military action or philosophical assault. We can do both if they are each deemed necessary and moral. In numerous situations we have no rational choice other than to crush those who dedicate themselves to our destruction. However, islamic extremism, like many other virulent philosophies, will not go away by military assault alone. What I have proposed would be a necessary supplement to whatever action is taken.
Nobody is proposing using nukes as an offensive weapon, only as a defensive weapon.
The problem is that it is being used tactically in an offensive, rather than defensive, manner. You can argue that in the long-term strategic view, the use is defensive, but determining defensive/offensive in that view is very difficult.
For example on that basis Germanyâs invasion of France and Belgium in WWI was defensive, the Spanish-American War was defensive for the US, etc.
If we are talking international law, pre-emptive attacks are almost always considered aggressive, not defensive. Personally I think this draws the line incorrectly, but the idea that the line of definition must be drawn somewhere is necessary. Otherwise ANY military action can be judged defensive based only on the purported justifications of that nation.
The confusion on this forum might arise because of the fact that a nationâs derivative right of self-defense governs all military actions, but that doesnât mean all the military actions they take are âdefensiveâ militarily. They might be offensive, IE âThe best defense is a good offense.â
I dunno. Let me try to apply this. If (as a hypothetical) America was ever atttacked, Americans would be demoralized from fighting for what they believe in and people who didnât see the need for action, instead of joining the cause, would pressure the war hawks to be nonaggressive?
America is a different case. One American nuclear sub could probably take out any coalition of nations that threatened the US, even if all of the continental US was destroyed. But Iâll try to work within the analogy.
Americans would be pissed. But if Chicago, Washington, New York and Los Angeles went up in smoke, how capable of fighting would America be in the long term? The deterence comes in when you consider how Mexico and Canada would react, âWe saw what happened to the US, and we donât want to go down that road.â
And (as a hypothetical) itâs preposterous to think that seeing a non-nuclear nation like, say, Japan get nuked would do anything but deter a non-nuclear nation from seeking nukes out of fear?
Japan is a different animal, it is a United States protectorate. If Japan got nuked by North Korea, Iâm sure South Korea would want to get their hands on the bomb right away. But without US backing, they would probably fold in the face DPRK pressure. Iran has nobody who will back them up in the face of a US assault.
If people actually believe that they will meet ruin if they threaten the US, then they will stop threatening the US. America has been sending a different message since the end of the war in the Pacific. Begining with the Korean war, the US has failed to crush the enemies that defy it. The pattern continues to this day.
What you mean by cold war strategies beyond âattack as a last resort, as attacking just might be disasterous for us as well as the enemyâ?
Right⌠But, in the case when a country does not have a nuclear threat, attacking them certainly would not be desasterous. Disaster starts being a possibility when they get a deployable nuclear capability. Sanctions and incentives allow them to attain that capability. So, in Iranâs case, it should never get to the point where war is a last resort. We should hit them before the situation becomes that dire.
The problem is that it is being used tactically in an offensive, rather than defensive, manner. You can argue that in the long-term strategic view, the use is defensive, but determining defensive/offensive in that view is very difficult.
Defensive actions do not have to wait for a first strike. BTW weâre not talking about international law, which is really just another statement of World Community opinion. If we had a world government subject to a global constitutution and a real international police force to enforce laws, there might be some point in talking about international law, but there isnât so letâs not.
The fundamental question that has to be answered first is whether Iran, or any other country, is a threat to the US. By threat I mean âthreat of forceâ â not an economic threat. Threats should not be tolerated. If a country threatens us, that threat must be answered. Ideally a verbal answer would suffice, but strong words butter no parsnips â there needs to be a clear understanding that failure to heed the strong words will lead to absolute devastation. Conventional bombs can do a lot of damage, but something on the order of the 1961 58 megaton Russian device would be unmistakable. But this should only be done as part of a policy, not because in this case we feel the scales of justice need to be balanced.
If people actually believe that they will meet ruin if they threaten the US, then they will stop threatening the US. America has been sending a different message since the end of the war in the Pacific.
Yes, if the US had a true and widely recognized willingness to ruin its enemies, it is unlikely that it would ever face the need to actually do so.
As things stand, it is more likely that the next nuke attack will come against the US rather than from the US. Hopefully, it will not be too powerful a weapon.
Defensive actions do not have to wait for a first strike. BTW weâre not talking about international law, which is really just another statement of World Community opinion. If we had a world government subject to a global constitutution and a real international police force to enforce laws, there might be some point in talking about international law, but there isnât so letâs not.
I agree as to the utility of international law on the use of force, as I said when I brought it up. My point was just that if there is a meaningful defensive/offensive distinction there must be some sort of definition or policy rationale to make said distinction. You canât simply rely on putative justifications, because any nation can say it is acting defensively, but that doesnât seem to mean it necessarily is acting so.
The fundamental question that has to be answered first is whether Iran, or any other country, is a threat to the US. By threat I mean âthreat of forceâ â not an economic threat.
This is the problem however, because there seems no clear-cut way to draw the line anywhere. For instance, both you and I reject the international law definition of âdefensiveâ as largely restricting to responding to actual (IE enemy troops crossing the border) uses of force. But you canât say that any military response to a percieved threat is defensive either, otherwise almost all military actions will be justified as âdefensive.â
For instance, the US gathers intel that there are three terrorists plotting against the US in an apartment in Berlin. There clearly is a threat, although not a very large one. Is a US nuclear strike on Berlin a defensive military action?
Or in another example, it would be reasonable for the US to say (as a corollary to the Bush doctrine) that all non-democratic countries are threats to the US. Would the use of force against all non-democratic nations be defensive?
Or what about a âthreat of a threat?â IE, we know there is no imminent threat, but there is a threat of a threat developing in the future.
If threats are the only standard it also seems that any military action in furtherance of US security (threat removal) is defensive regardless of who is the target or if the threat is unintentional. For example, a country which is not a threat to us and which has necessary US strategic airbases on its soil decides it no longer wants the bases there. Is US military action deposing this government and installing a pro-US one which will allow the bases a defensive action?
But you canât say that any military response to a percieved threat is defensive either, otherwise almost all military actions will be justified as âdefensive.â
For instance, the US gathers intel that there are three terrorists plotting against the US in an apartment in Berlin. There clearly is a threat, although not a very large one. Is a US nuclear strike on Berlin a defensive military action?
This is a brave new world that weâre living in, given terrorism as the new international threat to rights. It clearly poses a real conceptual problem for looking at national defense in the way we were used to during the first two world wars. But this is not an insurmountable conceptual problem.
Apart from nutcases like Baby Kim who might just be crazy enough to try nation-on-nation military action against the US or South Korea, or possibly Red China against Taiwan (but Iâm doubtful that could ever happen), the threat of the modern world is rogue nations which tolerate and facilitate attacks against us. So itâs not just the existence of 3 rogue Germans plotting to blow us up, itâs the fact that the governments of Iran, Talibanistan, Libya (apparently reformed) and Syria have been entirely unlike the Germans. The Germans are actively combatting terrorism, investigating terrorist cells and arresting people when they can. That is not what is happening everywhere, so you are getting only perfunctory efforts to stop terrorist activities within their national borders.
The principle is very simple then. If your government has a policy of facilitating terrorism, they are responsible â whether or not it is an officially declared policy. If you are fallible and do not manage to stop terrorism 100% of the time, you are not a terrorist-enabler. Obliterate the terrorist-enablers, just as you would obliterate the nation that dresses its citizens up in uniforms and marches them over your borders.
Of course there is always the old excuse âbut where can you draw the line between an honest but imperfect effort to combat terrorism, and a terrorist-sympathizing stateâ, which leads to the slippery-slope conclusion that we should not fight terrorism. Look at the evidence.
Um, shouldnât we also nuke Riyadh then? I mean, whatâs another nuke between friends?
Ok
This is a brave new world that weâre living in, given terrorism as the new international threat to rights. It clearly poses a real conceptual problem for looking at national defense in the way we were used to during the first two world wars. But this is not an insurmountable conceptual problem.
What I was trying to get at was not that I see terrorism as something we canât formulate some sort of defensive policy against (interestingly your framework mirrors several elements of international law) but rather that it seems wrong to characterize any action in that regard as âdefensive.â I think that if allowed to go back in time and freed from any proportionality requirement, almost any military action can be characterized as âdefensive.â
For example, you could argue that Hitlerâs invasion of Poland was defensive in nature by either tying the âthreatâ to the British and French military buildup, or to the Versailles Treaty, or to the anticipated hostility with Russia, etc. I am not talking about the moral justification of a war, remember, just how military action is characterized as either âoffensiveâ or âdefensive.â
There is the possibility that Objectivism simply defines all military action taken by âfreeâ states as defensive and all military action taken by âslaveâ states as offensive. But this seems problematic from both linguistic and foreign policy points of view, and I donât think it is the best resolution.
If people actually believe that they will meet ruin if they threaten the US, then they will stop threatening the US.
But the problem with such statements are the assumptions that
- âthreaten the USâ has a clear (to other nations) and objective meaning
- people believe that they will not meet ruin if they donât threaten the US
The fundamental question that has to be answered first is whether Iran, or any other country, is a threat to the US.
Sounds good. What qualifies as âthreatening the USâ?
The US gathers intel that there are three terrorists plotting against the US in an apartment in Berlin. There clearly is a threat, although not a very large one. Is a US nuclear strike on Berlin a defensive military action?
The threat of the modern world is rogue nations which tolerate and facilitate attacks against us.
If your government has a policy of facilitating terrorism, they are responsible.
Are you disagreeing with Vladimir that the exampled terrorists are a threat?
Sounds good. What qualifies as âthreatening the USâ?
Are you asking for an exhaustive list, or a general characterization? I assume you know what âthreatâ means; then threatening the US is making a threat against the US (in part or in whole). For example, but not limited to, threatening to fly a plane into a building, threatening to drop a nuclear bomb on the US, threatening to blow up buildings, people, livestock, cars⌠threatening to release neurotoxins, or biological agents, threatening to EMP the nation into the stone age, threatening to destroy the power grid, or power generating facilities, or blow up petroleum or natural gas pipelines, threatening to destroy our food supply, or our capacity to produce food⌠I really hope that you donât seriously think that this level of specificity is necessary. All of this is covered under the rubric âinitiation of forceâ. Iâm saying, donât do it and donât even think of doing it, or we will burn you to a cinder. Although I know that that would violate current US policy.
Are you disagreeing with Vladimir that the exampled terrorists are a threat?
No, that such activity does not constitute a reason to bomb Germany. I take it you did not understand the point about deliberately facilitating terrorism vs. not managing to succeed at stopping terrorism. Do you have a clear idea what part of the distinction eludes you, so that I might try explaining in further detail? This is a really important concept, and since entire nations seem not to get it, I guess it must be strangely difficult to get ahold of.
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the assumptions thatâŚ
- people believe that they will not meet ruin if they donât threaten the US
Are you implying that this is an invalid assumption? i.e., that the U.S. has a history of ruining nations that do not threaten it?
But the problem with such statements are the assumptions that
- âthreaten the USâ has a clear (to other nations) and objective meaning
- people believe that they will not meet ruin if they donât threaten the US
I think people will start to get a clue when the bombing starts. We certainly should try to help them understand why it is happening, but their understanding is of little consequence.
Iran is not a real threat to the USA, at this time.
The majority of Iranâs people do not like their government. There is hope there. Nuke those people, the survivors will side with their government. So will the rest of the world quite frankly.
We know they sponsor terrorism in Iraq. That calls for an appropriate response, not a nuking. Why no one is taking it, I canât guess. Maybe they are and we dontâ know about it. Maybe America is just waiting for Iran to make a mistake? No idea.
Iâm guessing in the next few years the American government will decide that they have no real strategic interest in the middle east and will pull out. The USA doesnât depend that much on middle east oil. Other nations (for example, China) do however. Why arenât they footing some of the bill in the middle east? The next administrtaion will probably decide to slowly get out of âprotectingâ the region. For better or worse.
Dropping a nuke on Iran is silly irrational talk. No matter how much I would like to see it - and Iâm not too sure I would want to see it either. The majority of those killed and injured would be normal people, not death loving fanatics. There just isnât a good reason to nuke right now.
No, that such activity does not constitute a reason to bomb Germany. I take it you did not understand the point about deliberately facilitating terrorism vs. not managing to succeed at stopping terrorism. Do you have a clear idea what part of the distinction eludes you, so that I might try explaining in further detail? This is a really important concept, and since entire nations seem not to get it, I guess it must be strangely difficult to get ahold of.
I am confused on your rationale then. From what I first understood it was; âIf there is a threat to the US, any military action we use in response to that threat is âdefensiveâ (and is I assume thus moral) regardless of the proportionality or civilian casualties.â
If so, then it would be perfectly consistant and moral to nuke Berlin in my example. You seem to be implying that doing so would be bad in a practical, diplomatic sense, and I agree. There will certainly be cases where we have the moral right to retaliate yet we either do not retaliate or else retaliate with a less-destructive means for various policy considerations. This is different from saying we shouldnât nuke Berlin for a moral reason, however, or that nuking Berlin would not be âdefensiveâ military action.
What I am trying to understand is how your moral schematic for the use of force is limited in any meaningful moral way.
What I am trying to understand is how your moral schematic for the use of force is limited in any meaningful moral way.
The proper course of action is for the German government to control terrorism within its borders, and it does do so, even if it is not omniscient. The Iranian of Talibanian governments are entirely unlike the German government, in this respect. Germanyâs rare failure to be perfect is no proof that they are using terrorism as a means of covertly destroying the US. Tell me what part of that you donât understand.
I say we owe it to the victims of 9/11. We should have done it five years ago!
Five reason, go ahead. :nuke:
Brandon
I can only think of one at the moment: Because doing so would upset the power play of the world bankers.
It took a while to slowly realize why America was on a self-destructive path. I first thought it was ignorance, but now I am coming to realize it may be by intent. The failure to close the borders, the constant wars that have no visible results, the sham of a justice system⌠itâs all for the profit of a few, rich, powerful and very influential bankers. This is their game, and our military, its pawns. We are itâs cattle, to be harvested and rendered for their benefit. Itâs becoming very clear to me now. There is no reason to nuke Iran, because itâs not in the plans.