What you have done here is a logical fallacy called a strawman.
Getting nuked out of existance <> being overthrown like Saddam was.
Maybe so, but not around here. You know, fighting ignorance and all that.
I disagree that a police officer using justified deadly force in the course of doing his job is just a “technicality” different from murder. It’s not the same thing at all.
Try Dr. Strangelove.
I think you’ve been whooshed. 
Isn’t the scale quite a bit different here? Human rights violations are one thing, and nuclear attacks are another. Even if the UN as a whole can’t agree on a course of action, don’t you think the more powerful members will be reacting quite strongly in the wake of such an event?
What the reactions will be is still quite a sticky wicket.
Surely the risk of the terrorists targeting the other powers is even more reason they would want to keep their nuclear deterrents?
Think about it from the other side’s view for a moment. Say Moscow got hit rather than Boston, and the Russians, holding up a photo of the crater, said to the US, “Look, you people didn’t lose a major city. The US and everyone except Russia must destroy all their weapons except two… or else we’ll nuke you.”
What do you think the US would do? Who would claim to have right on their side?
Now the sensible thing to do would be to work together in friendship with the other powers (and the UN) to ensure all nukes are stored securely, and old Cold War stockpiles are greatly reduced on all sides. Then they could work together on the terrorist threat.
I understand your scepticism, but things like the Iraq war were complicated because everyone had different selfish interests, and thus couldn’t agree on the way forward. I believe it would be in everyone’s interests to come down on nuke users very hard, however.
For some. It doesn’t seem to me that Pakistan, India, England, France, and a few others actually keep their nuclear bombs around out of a sense of deterrance. For them, it seems a matter of status quo.
Besides, what do you do when places like Iraq claim they want the bomb as a deterrent? How can you deny them the same capabilities as everyone else?
And then we could all join hands and sing, “I’d like to teach the world to sing” and “We are the world.”
C’mon, you know it wouldn’t be that easy. Unless someone steps up and really takes charge, any joint efforts will quickly dissolve into endless futile discussions hindered by self-interest.
But, part of your point is good. Perhaps it would be prudent to let Russia and China in on the pact to police the world. We’ll take the Americas, China, you take Asia and the Middle East, and Russia, you take Europe and Africa. Superfriends Go!
Well, you’d certainly hope so. But, recall that Bush told the world that Saddam had WMD (rightly or wrongly). And we had just suffered the worst terrorist attack ever. The world, via the UN, just shrugged their collective shoulders.
What makes you think that the nuking of a major city will trigger a much different reaction?
I do not think the primary danger is nation states using nukes, but terrorists using nukes.
The real question, and the interesting one, is how willing we or others will be to assign responsibility to the nation-states that support terrorists who nuke us.
There would also be the problem of determining who nuked us. I don’t know for sure, but I imagine that nukes do a pretty thorough job of destroying evidence along with everything else. If no one claimed responsibility for the attack, as seems likely given the probable response, then we’d need a very good intelligence net to figure out who did it, and all the evidence indicates that we have a piss-poor intelligence net.
If we did somehow find out what terrorist group nuked us, though, would it be enough to destroy just the terrorists? Syria and elements of the Saudi government have long supported al-qaeda, as do many Pakistanis. Are the terrorists alone responsible or would the people who gave them money and logistical support responsible too? if we just killed the terrorists wouldn’t there just be a new band of terrorists on hand to launch a new strike eventually?
In short, if a significant portion of a country’s citizenry/government give aid and support to terrorists, is it reasonable to consider the terrorists a de facto element of that country’s government?
Clearly, that’s not the thinking now – we KNOW that powerful Saudis have supported and do support al-qaeda prior to and after 9/11, but because the Saudis who are in power have made a big show of cooperating with us, we haven’t commenced hostilities with them.
Would the same reasoning apply in a nuclear scenario?
It was your idea that we stopped people having them, I was just pointing out it may be hard to get people that already have them to give them up without um… dying. I can only speak for the English (sort of), but I don’t think our government could justify them to us in any other way than a deterrent. Status Quo wouldn’t justify the expense.
Yeah, or we could all nuke each other and all die.
No, of course it wouldn’t be easy. But surely the only option is to work together. Is there any other scenario than death if the big powers don’t?
It isn’t just prudent. It is essential if you want the US and the world to survive. Sure, the US is the most powerful country in the world, it also has some great ideals in my opinion, but the US as we know it would be destroyed with the rest in a nuclear war with the other big powers. No-one is nuclear proof, and there are plenty enough nukes to wipe out the US in Russia, China and Western Europe.
You brought up the photo and sympathy point, man.
I don’t doubt your good intentions and that you wish for a better world, but it just seems like you are only looking at things from one side and being naive. Just think for a moment of the views on the other side of the pond. Not everyone is your enemy, and you can’t beat everyone at once.
Incidentally, speaking of the Iraq war, the mp3 below will make a few people laugh.
http://www.wastednetwork.com/wn_sing/wn_saddam.mp3
(Might have to right click and Save As.)
Things would be very different after a nuclear attack during peacetime. And, even major countries would be quite wary of a pissed off nation who lost the major city. One the one hand, they could risk total wipe out of their own country. On the other, they could risk looking weak by reducing their nuclear arms. I guess each country would have to weigh their own options.
Except that we see that nations working together without leadership (i.e., the UN) just isn’t working. Rogue nations just laugh at UN penalties. Major nations just bribe and coerce everyone to foist their own policies onto the world.
Something a little different is needed. If we are lucky, we’ll find it before a major city is nuked. If not, we’ll find it after.
So be it. But, if we come to the point where some major city is nuked by terrorists, certainly no city or person in the world would be safe from attack. I’d rather risk the small chance of a nuclear nation not backing down than the much larger risk of the terrorists learning that they can get away with nuking a major city anytime they want.
**
Yes I did. But, I didn’t present the scenario as a play for sympathy. I presented it as show of determination. “Look what letting you guys police the world has gotten us. Now we’ll do it our way.”
Under the circumstances I described, I really don’t think we’d have to beat the entire world. I think most, if not all, countries would support the anti-terrorism movement rather than defiantly get nuked out of existance.
Ok, fair enough if that is your opinion, there’s no point us arguing about it, but I ask again… If a Russian city got nuked and they consequently demanded that the US and the rest of the world reduced their nuclear stockpiles to two weapons or face an unprovoked nuclear strike, would that be fair on the US, and do you think they’d accept it and roll over?
If you do believe the US would roll over, at least you’re being consistant!
Incidentally, if a US (or Russian) president ever decided on your path, how would they sell it to their own people? “Yeah, I’m gonna start a nuclear war and we’re all gonna die, but don’t worry, it’s right cuz we were wronged first by some other party entirely.”
The only scenario in which I could see such demands being made, let alone listened to, would be if one country accidentally nuked another. Then the offended nation could demand (among other things) that they remove their remaining nukes in case it happened again, and retaliatory strikes could be avoided.
Sorry… been out of town for a few days without net access.
Fair enough - that’s your opinion. I disagree. The citizens of all countries involved suffer through the nuclear fall-out, and the major chunk of humanitarian attention is diverted away from the citizens of the aggressor? Frankly, unless the government of that country itself turns down aid, I don’t see your theory ever coming into practice. I believe humanitarian aid would be spread out evenly based upon need, and the aggressor country would be faced with strict international supervision as far as its military is concerned, as was the case in WWII with Germany.
Yes, I am aware that Japan and South Korea don’t have nukes. I made my inference from your own post. You said
What you’re saying is that if a country that isn’t signatory to the NPT were to use nukes, even if in a like retaliation, then it should be prepared to face disarmament, which could even be forceful in nature. So far good? Incidentally, why only NPT signatories? And then in the same post you go ahead and state that if N. Korea were to use her nukes on S. Korea or Japan, thereby putting American troops in danger, a retaliation in kind would be justified. By your argument above, N. Korea and the country retaliating in kind would therefore then be under intense pressure to disarm too, failing which force would be used. Right? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. If this is what you implied, then I misunderstood your point and I apologise. If not, then I stand by my earlier post.
Debaser. Sorry, it wasn’t your statement per se which I amusing. I read Saen’s post, where he stated that both initiator and retaliator in a nuclear exchange would need to be forcefully disarmed, yet condoned an American retaliation, and then I read your post where you said retaliation in kind was justified. It was a sarcastic barb, unintentionally aimed at you. I apologise.
Incidentally, India’s official stance is that WMDs will be met with a like retaliation - India has a declared no-first-use policy as concerns her WMDs. Same as the US.
I understand what you are saying now. But you also have to understand that I was refering to any country who did not make a commitment to reduce or even foresake nuclear weapons. If Pakistan and INdia made usch a commitment then force would not be necessary. If they stcik to their guns, as thay have been for the past several decades then punishment would probably be necessary.
My thoughts would be that after a major nuclear exchange the primary goal would be to reduce the risk of such to happen again, as I have said in my post. And as has been acknowledged by the international community, one of the tools to reduce the risk of nuclear wars is the NPT. If every country in the world gets a nuke I would hazard a guess that my grandchildren would be living in a different world than I could imagine.
The intn’l community does, in effect, already “punish” governments who do not sign or adhere to the NPT. The US is a signatory. India, Pakistan, and North Korea (as of late) are not, or at least in the case of NK not strong adherents… Neither is Israel.
But lets get serious, even if the US wasn’t a signatory, it would be near impossible to disarm it of it’s weapons by force. So you can keep your indignant posturing. Although I wouldn’t think an agreement to massively reduce nuclear arsenals by most countries as being a side effect.
It depends. I notice that you didn’t mention that Russia would declare themselves to be the world’s police force. You just claimed that Russia would demand reductions without offering anything in return. If that’s the case, I’m sure that many countries, especially the US, would refuse to go along.
Now, if you meant that Russia would indeed step up and agree to be the world’s police force, and the rest of the world believed that they had the resolve and the ability to do it, I’d say that there would be a good chance the rest of the world would agree.
Yet, I don’t think Russia has the resources or organization to do it (especially if Moscow just got nuked). The US, on the other hand, does have the resources to get things started.
"Yo, yo. Listen up, homies. I know that most of you lost a loved one last Thursday–we all did. I’m here today to tell you that I am not going to let terrorists destroy any more of our cities. Tomorrow, I’m going to tell the UN that our country is going to be the police force of the world. And, any country that does not like it will be the target of our wrath.
“Such a country will fight back, of course. So, I urge you to write to your relatives in those countries and urge them to bring their leaders in line. Together, we can do this.”
As I say, the world will be a different place on the day when a major city gets wiped out.
The NPT is heavily skewered in favour of the original 5 nuclear weapons states, and did in no way seek comprehensive nuclear disarmament from any of these states. History records that it was for this very reason that India backed out of the treaty. As long as nuclear weapons exist, India reserves the right to have them too.
Having said that, India is indeed a strong adherent to the basic principles of the NPT. Its civilan nuclear installations operate under the scrutiny of the IAEA, it has never been suspected of transfering weapons technology to another country, yet it has transferred ‘peaceful nuclear’ tech. It has, and continues to, push for comprehensive global nuclear disarmament. India has declared a moratorium on nuclear tests, thus complying with the CTBT too. To club it into the same group as N. Korea and Pakistan is asinine, and displays your ignorance.
Each country has its own threat perceptions, and it is nobody else’s business to tell that country how to deal with those perceptions. You can call it indignant posturing if you want, but that’s life. It’s a new world - get used to it.
Furthermore, your faith in the international community is touching, but misplaced.‘Punishment’ by way of sanctions (after the '98 nuclear tests) were applied to India, but have almost all been removed, even by Japan. You wanna know why? Because the world wants to do business with India and sanctions come in their way. Even in the case of Pakistan, where proliferation might actually be an issue, several sanctions have been removed because that country is slipping even deeper into a mess, and sanctions are not helping much.