While there are many that argue against this point and I am sympathetic to them, Mutually Assured Destruction is a very powerful deterrent.
One of the reasons why many treaties came a long after WW2 was because for the first time ever, we had weapons on a scale that could truly cause civilization ending events. There is talk about strategic strike capabilities and from the little bits that trickle out from within, it is considered a potential path forward. But it is a path forward that is both political and literal suicide.
A scenario played out in the book 'Decline and Fall: The End of Empire and the Future of Democracy in 21st Century America' by John Michael Greer makes a decent point. Say the US decides to strategically strike an opponent. They manage to take out 199 of 200 potential retaliatory strikes - a great success in terms of the ratio. But that one missile that gets through detonates over San Fransisco becoming the single most deadly event in US history. It just isn't seen as a viable path forward.
Luckily those in power are there because of those below them, you cannot be too loose of a cannon at the top but even that doesn't put ones mind at ease as you just do not know on what could happen. Maybe the lunatics to get control of it all. Strange things can happen.
“Are there any checks in place to keep the US President from starting a nuclear war?”
What’s amazing about this question, really, is how seriously it misunderstands the logic of the US command and control system. It gets it exactly backwards.
The entire point of the US command and control system is to guarantee that the President and only the President is capable of authorizing nuclear war whenever he needs to. It is about enabling the President’s power, not checking or restricting him.
> entire point of the US command and control system is to guarantee that the President and only the President is capable of authorizing nuclear war whenever he needs to
This may be necessary to ensure the deterrent is credible. But for first strike use, authorisation should require at the very least Congressional approval. (Not the whole Congress, obviously, but maybe the Senate Select and House Permanent Select Committees.) Ideally, all three branches of government.
Ah, should - imagine a world in which "should" carried sway.
Meanwhile: Air Force Doctrine Publication 3-72 - Nuclear Operations (2020)
POSITIVE CONTROL
The President may direct the use of nuclear weapons through an execute order via the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the combatant commanders and, ultimately, to the forces in the field exercising direct control of the weapons.
For anybody in the chain that might question that, or want Congressional approval consider the fate of Harold Hering, the Major who was kicked out of the Air Force for asking a “dangerous question” while training to be a Missile Launch Officer at Vandenberg Air Force Base.
Hering had asked, in essence, how could he, in his Minuteman missile bunker, know that an order to launch he received from the President had been a legal, considered, and sane one?
The answer is, you don't, you just jump as high as you can.
( even if the guy telling you to jump is also telling you they're eating cats and dogs in Ohio )
> anybody in the chain that might question that, or want Congressional approval consider the fate of Harold Hering, the Major who was kicked out of the Air Force for asking a “dangerous question” while training to be a Missile Launch Officer at Vandenberg Air Force Base
I mean, yes. Hering was in the chain of command. The nuclear chain of command. About the last thing you want in that chain is even a notion of a whiff of a perception that when the President says launch the missiles don't launch.
It's completely different for e.g. the Congress to ask these questions. They don't because this isn't an issue Americans have cared about for a while.
If the President orders a launch, the military launches ... that's it.
Congress can ask questions about that later, if they're still about - but they don't have a place in the chain between POTUS deciding to launch and the launch.
Ordering a strike before any missiles have landed on US soil has been possible the entire time (ie ordering what would be an effective First Strike) and deemed neccessary as carrying out such orders after missiles have landed has been considered as likley too little to late - predicated on having accurate justification (knowledge of incoming missiles) etc.
History has been littered with false alarmns that should have (but didn't) trigger a launch - that remains at the judgement of the serving POTUS who might be a combat veteran or a reality TV show host.
> If the President orders a launch, the military launches ... that's it
Sure. That doesn't mean every launch must be legal or undeliberateable.
> they don't have a place in the chain between POTUS deciding to launch and the launch
Why not?
The Constitution "vests in the Congress the power to declare war" [1]. It has largely delegated that power to the President. But the spirit of the War Powers Clause recognises that war is a major political decision with national consequences. So is a nuclear first strike.
> Ordering a strike before any missiles have landed on US soil has been possible the entire time (ie ordering what would be an effective First Strike)
Not what first strike means [2]. (You're describing launch on warning, which is firmly in the retaliatory column [3].)
> Nuclear war between US and Russia is less likely with Trump
Incredibly difficult to estimate this, in large part because the probabilities are so small.
What we can say is neither Russia nor America wants MAD. So the way an exchange would happen would be due to a fuckup. And not any old fuckup, e.g. Ukraine hit Moscow with an American missile or whatever. But a nuclear fuckup, e.g. Moscow thinks it's detected multiple missile launches and can't get the President on the phone.
>Incredibly difficult to estimate this, in large part because the probabilities are so small.
The UN chief has been stating that the risk of nuclear warfare is at the highest point in decades. Not because of the risk of a 'fuckup', but due to geopolitical tensions. Historically the risk has been highest during periods of geopolitical tension.
Trump wants a peace deal in ukraine that could involve land concessions. Kamala would likely continue the policy of continuous, slow escalation. The most recent escalation is Ukraine shooting long range weapon into Russia, what's next?
Ending a conflict won't affect the probabilities compared to escalating it? De-escalation through escalation will end up in the the history books as the dumbest things western politicians believed in 2024
> Ending a conflict won't affect the probabilities compared to escalating it?
If affects it. We just can't universally say which way.
Appeasement is the classic example of escalatory de-escalation. But a better one is the Cold War: America or the USSR entering or withdrawing from a particular theatre, e.g. Vietnam or Afghanistan, was on average orthogonal to risk of nuclear war.
Whether a peace deal enhances or damages the peace is context dependent and can swing either way.
> De-escalation through escalation will end up in the the history books as the dumbest things western politicians believed in 2024
What a strange comment to make in the context of nuclear strategy. Should the U.S. unilaterally dismantle its nuclear deterrent?
Thank you for actually advocating for the most rational and realistic response to this situation. While one cannot expect peace from this, it is better to be in open communication than to be left to create images of what they think they are up against.
Seems that a lot of people prefer the approach of "surrender absolutely everything to Putin preemptively". Granted America is at basically zero risk of a Russian invasion, but letting Putin roams free means that Ukraine would only be the first step. I don't really know what Putin's Europe once he gets it all would look like but I don't expect human rights to be a part of it.
> Surely if one side is a Russian asset it would be less likely we go to war with them?
Difficult to estimate because the situation is de-stabilising--the assurances of MAD no longer hold if one side thinks it can prevent the other from launching.
Well, Trump fired a bunch of diplomats, and never hired replacements (or replaced them with donors with no relevant experience), which hollowed out US foreign policy.
The Biden administration largely turned the lights back on in the parts of the government you are asking about, I think. They tried, at least. The GOP tried to block re-hiring foreign policy experts towards the beginning of his administration.
Every admin gets to set up their State Dept. Biden could have done whatever he wanted with regard to stationing diplomats.
Moreover, The Russia and China embassies were not affected And importantly there were not active conflicts, saber rattling and serious instigations as we have now. I mean, who gives a rat's arse about the ambassador to Paraguay.
Just the other week, the admin told the USN to prep for war against China in '27.
We assassinated an Iranian major general [1]! We were occupying Afghanistan, supporting Riyadh in its war on the Houthis and ramping up troops deployed in Syria and Iraq [2].
> saber rattling and serious instigations as we have now
The Trump administration wasn't instigating China [3]?
> Instead it’s “l-l-l-l-let’s play chicken!” (Bob Barker voice)
Unfortunately, if Putin decides this is a game he wants to play, then this is a game we cannot choose not to play. We can choose not to play it now, but we will have to play it later. That's a lesson Chamberlain and the whole world learned in 1938/39.
I think your understanding of the geopolitical game state here is way off. The reality is that nuclear war is less likely in now that it was during the cold war. We aren't in isolated echo chambers fearing an ideology we don't understand, the only reason anyone wants nukes is to prevent other people from nuking them. The world is running on capitalism, there isn't the same ideological drive to conflict. We're in a metastable equilibrium. Ukraine blowing up ammo depots in Russia is far further away from catalyzing WW3 than the Cuban Missile Crisis. Vasily Arkhipov etc etc.
People are missing the tree for the forest. If the “concerned” folks are to be believed, after more than a decade of corruption fighting Xi has missiles filled with water rather than rocket fuel. How do you think the Soviet hand-me-downs are going?
The problem isn’t Putin or Xi committing global suicide, it’s they’re not paying attention to the details: Sgt. Boris or Liu driving off with thermonuclear warheads and selling them.
> problem isn’t Putin or Xi committing global suicide, it’s they’re not paying attention to the details
The problem with Putin or Xi is that they're dictators. Dictatorships trade the immortality of the state for the mortality of a man.
The de-stabilising moments will come in the moments (a) before they are removed from power, by death or another's gunpoint, and are no longer weighing the interests of the world or even their country but their personal surival and (b) immediately after, when both succession and the chain of command are ambiguous. (In the latter respect, the CCP is at least an institution.)
Facts are russia is corrupt and bankrupt, they havent serviced/maintained nuke arsenal since forever. They cant even make new ICBMs anymore, their fifth try blew up on launch pad https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/09/23/russia-sarma... just like four previous attempts.
Out of 6,000 units, even 1% of theirs working would be devastating (you know they have MIRVs), not to mention what launching ours would do. This is a stupid thought.
It's a consequence of social media, where people believe if they make a statement that gets enough up arrow clicks, physical reality changes to match their desired outcome. Most of the time it's of little consequence, especially when the people posting and voting have little actual connection to the subject matter, but things are quite different when the outcome involves nuclear detonations.
> Facts are russia is corrupt and bankrupt, they havent serviced/maintained nuke arsenal since forever. They cant even make new ICBMs anymore, their fifth try blew up on launch pad https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/09/23/russia-sarma... just like four previous attempts.
Yep ^ it's unlilkely they have very few in a launch-able state.
Although, they don't have a detonate a nuke to make parts of the world unlivable. They have plenty of radioactive material; simply detonating a salted conventional bomb would be pretty nasty.
While there are many that argue against this point and I am sympathetic to them, Mutually Assured Destruction is a very powerful deterrent.
One of the reasons why many treaties came a long after WW2 was because for the first time ever, we had weapons on a scale that could truly cause civilization ending events. There is talk about strategic strike capabilities and from the little bits that trickle out from within, it is considered a potential path forward. But it is a path forward that is both political and literal suicide.
A scenario played out in the book 'Decline and Fall: The End of Empire and the Future of Democracy in 21st Century America' by John Michael Greer makes a decent point. Say the US decides to strategically strike an opponent. They manage to take out 199 of 200 potential retaliatory strikes - a great success in terms of the ratio. But that one missile that gets through detonates over San Fransisco becoming the single most deadly event in US history. It just isn't seen as a viable path forward.
Luckily those in power are there because of those below them, you cannot be too loose of a cannon at the top but even that doesn't put ones mind at ease as you just do not know on what could happen. Maybe the lunatics to get control of it all. Strange things can happen.
> you cannot be too loose of a cannon at the top
Meanwhile, in reality:
In a three part detailed longform:The President and the Bomb (2016) https://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2016/11/18/the-president-and...
Part II https://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2016/12/23/the-president-and...
Part III https://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2017/04/10/president-bomb-ii...
> entire point of the US command and control system is to guarantee that the President and only the President is capable of authorizing nuclear war whenever he needs to
This may be necessary to ensure the deterrent is credible. But for first strike use, authorisation should require at the very least Congressional approval. (Not the whole Congress, obviously, but maybe the Senate Select and House Permanent Select Committees.) Ideally, all three branches of government.
" should "
Ah, should - imagine a world in which "should" carried sway.
Meanwhile: Air Force Doctrine Publication 3-72 - Nuclear Operations (2020)
Page 21 of 29: https://www.doctrine.af.mil/Doctrine-Publications/AFDP-3-72-...For anybody in the chain that might question that, or want Congressional approval consider the fate of Harold Hering, the Major who was kicked out of the Air Force for asking a “dangerous question” while training to be a Missile Launch Officer at Vandenberg Air Force Base.
Hering had asked, in essence, how could he, in his Minuteman missile bunker, know that an order to launch he received from the President had been a legal, considered, and sane one?
The answer is, you don't, you just jump as high as you can.
( even if the guy telling you to jump is also telling you they're eating cats and dogs in Ohio )
> anybody in the chain that might question that, or want Congressional approval consider the fate of Harold Hering, the Major who was kicked out of the Air Force for asking a “dangerous question” while training to be a Missile Launch Officer at Vandenberg Air Force Base
I mean, yes. Hering was in the chain of command. The nuclear chain of command. About the last thing you want in that chain is even a notion of a whiff of a perception that when the President says launch the missiles don't launch.
It's completely different for e.g. the Congress to ask these questions. They don't because this isn't an issue Americans have cared about for a while.
If the President orders a launch, the military launches ... that's it.
Congress can ask questions about that later, if they're still about - but they don't have a place in the chain between POTUS deciding to launch and the launch.
Ordering a strike before any missiles have landed on US soil has been possible the entire time (ie ordering what would be an effective First Strike) and deemed neccessary as carrying out such orders after missiles have landed has been considered as likley too little to late - predicated on having accurate justification (knowledge of incoming missiles) etc.
History has been littered with false alarmns that should have (but didn't) trigger a launch - that remains at the judgement of the serving POTUS who might be a combat veteran or a reality TV show host.
> If the President orders a launch, the military launches ... that's it
Sure. That doesn't mean every launch must be legal or undeliberateable.
> they don't have a place in the chain between POTUS deciding to launch and the launch
Why not?
The Constitution "vests in the Congress the power to declare war" [1]. It has largely delegated that power to the President. But the spirit of the War Powers Clause recognises that war is a major political decision with national consequences. So is a nuclear first strike.
> Ordering a strike before any missiles have landed on US soil has been possible the entire time (ie ordering what would be an effective First Strike)
Not what first strike means [2]. (You're describing launch on warning, which is firmly in the retaliatory column [3].)
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Powers_Clause
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_strike_(nuclear_strategy...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Launch_on_warning
> you cannot be too loose of a cannon at the top
And with Putin on one side and possibly (hopefully not) Trump on the other, that makes two loose cannons. Comforting thought.
Nuclear war between US and Russia is less likely with Trump
> Nuclear war between US and Russia is less likely with Trump
Incredibly difficult to estimate this, in large part because the probabilities are so small.
What we can say is neither Russia nor America wants MAD. So the way an exchange would happen would be due to a fuckup. And not any old fuckup, e.g. Ukraine hit Moscow with an American missile or whatever. But a nuclear fuckup, e.g. Moscow thinks it's detected multiple missile launches and can't get the President on the phone.
>Incredibly difficult to estimate this, in large part because the probabilities are so small.
The UN chief has been stating that the risk of nuclear warfare is at the highest point in decades. Not because of the risk of a 'fuckup', but due to geopolitical tensions. Historically the risk has been highest during periods of geopolitical tension.
Trump wants a peace deal in ukraine that could involve land concessions. Kamala would likely continue the policy of continuous, slow escalation. The most recent escalation is Ukraine shooting long range weapon into Russia, what's next?
Ending a conflict won't affect the probabilities compared to escalating it? De-escalation through escalation will end up in the the history books as the dumbest things western politicians believed in 2024
> Ending a conflict won't affect the probabilities compared to escalating it?
If affects it. We just can't universally say which way.
Appeasement is the classic example of escalatory de-escalation. But a better one is the Cold War: America or the USSR entering or withdrawing from a particular theatre, e.g. Vietnam or Afghanistan, was on average orthogonal to risk of nuclear war.
Whether a peace deal enhances or damages the peace is context dependent and can swing either way.
> De-escalation through escalation will end up in the the history books as the dumbest things western politicians believed in 2024
What a strange comment to make in the context of nuclear strategy. Should the U.S. unilaterally dismantle its nuclear deterrent?
What's the best thing that can be done to reduce the risk of conflict?
Probably having the three major powers have regular contact with each other rather than pretending they're not there and refusing to take their calls.
Thank you for actually advocating for the most rational and realistic response to this situation. While one cannot expect peace from this, it is better to be in open communication than to be left to create images of what they think they are up against.
Seems like a great idea. What can people in the US do to facilitate this you think?
Couldn't hurt to vote for the party who aren't Russian assets
Bayesian priors need updating
Seems that a lot of people prefer the approach of "surrender absolutely everything to Putin preemptively". Granted America is at basically zero risk of a Russian invasion, but letting Putin roams free means that Ukraine would only be the first step. I don't really know what Putin's Europe once he gets it all would look like but I don't expect human rights to be a part of it.
I'm confused. Surely if one side is a Russian asset it would be less likely we go to war with them?
> Surely if one side is a Russian asset it would be less likely we go to war with them?
Difficult to estimate because the situation is de-stabilising--the assurances of MAD no longer hold if one side thinks it can prevent the other from launching.
Well, Trump fired a bunch of diplomats, and never hired replacements (or replaced them with donors with no relevant experience), which hollowed out US foreign policy.
The Biden administration largely turned the lights back on in the parts of the government you are asking about, I think. They tried, at least. The GOP tried to block re-hiring foreign policy experts towards the beginning of his administration.
Sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/30/trump-us-amb...
https://www.npr.org/2021/11/13/1055575802/lack-of-american-a...
https://www.npr.org/2020/08/18/903199848/under-trump-more-bi...
Every admin gets to set up their State Dept. Biden could have done whatever he wanted with regard to stationing diplomats.
Moreover, The Russia and China embassies were not affected And importantly there were not active conflicts, saber rattling and serious instigations as we have now. I mean, who gives a rat's arse about the ambassador to Paraguay.
Just the other week, the admin told the USN to prep for war against China in '27.
> there were not active conflicts
We assassinated an Iranian major general [1]! We were occupying Afghanistan, supporting Riyadh in its war on the Houthis and ramping up troops deployed in Syria and Iraq [2].
> saber rattling and serious instigations as we have now
The Trump administration wasn't instigating China [3]?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Qasem_Soleima...
[2] https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/12/01/566798632/...
[3] https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/briefings-statements/re...
Vote out neocons for whom war is money is happiness as well as their congressional supporters.
About as much as the Russian citizenry. The problem is the system, not people. Our operating system is out of date.
…Meanwhile in Brussels and Washington: “What red lines? Ignore red lines!” (I'm colorblind, I think those are green!)
It ain’t pre winter of ‘92 no more with “the day after” looming in people’s minds. Instead it’s “l-l-l-l-let’s play chicken!” (Bob Barker voice)
Curtis LeMay was 60 years too early.
The only action that will cause a retaliatory nuclear strike is a first nuclear strike. That's the only red line wrt Russia et al vs the West.
If your primary military targets are innocent people then you should expect them to receive aid.
> Instead it’s “l-l-l-l-let’s play chicken!” (Bob Barker voice)
Unfortunately, if Putin decides this is a game he wants to play, then this is a game we cannot choose not to play. We can choose not to play it now, but we will have to play it later. That's a lesson Chamberlain and the whole world learned in 1938/39.
I think your understanding of the geopolitical game state here is way off. The reality is that nuclear war is less likely in now that it was during the cold war. We aren't in isolated echo chambers fearing an ideology we don't understand, the only reason anyone wants nukes is to prevent other people from nuking them. The world is running on capitalism, there isn't the same ideological drive to conflict. We're in a metastable equilibrium. Ukraine blowing up ammo depots in Russia is far further away from catalyzing WW3 than the Cuban Missile Crisis. Vasily Arkhipov etc etc.
People are missing the tree for the forest. If the “concerned” folks are to be believed, after more than a decade of corruption fighting Xi has missiles filled with water rather than rocket fuel. How do you think the Soviet hand-me-downs are going?
The problem isn’t Putin or Xi committing global suicide, it’s they’re not paying attention to the details: Sgt. Boris or Liu driving off with thermonuclear warheads and selling them.
https://blog.ucsusa.org/gregory-kulacki/xi-jinpings-thoughts...
> problem isn’t Putin or Xi committing global suicide, it’s they’re not paying attention to the details
The problem with Putin or Xi is that they're dictators. Dictatorships trade the immortality of the state for the mortality of a man.
The de-stabilising moments will come in the moments (a) before they are removed from power, by death or another's gunpoint, and are no longer weighing the interests of the world or even their country but their personal surival and (b) immediately after, when both succession and the chain of command are ambiguous. (In the latter respect, the CCP is at least an institution.)
Well, yeah, sure, five billion people could die but at least Putin wouldn't "win", which is what's truly important.
> …at least putin wouldn’t win.
you might be kind of close, but it’s probably more like…
“if i can’t forcibly take over any country i want for my own, ill nuke you.”
…is not a rational policy for the future of world geopolitics and certainly is more nuanced than a sarcastic “at least soandso wont win”
What are you getting at?
And I could date Natalie Portman.
Facts are russia is corrupt and bankrupt, they havent serviced/maintained nuke arsenal since forever. They cant even make new ICBMs anymore, their fifth try blew up on launch pad https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/09/23/russia-sarma... just like four previous attempts.
Out of 6,000 units, even 1% of theirs working would be devastating (you know they have MIRVs), not to mention what launching ours would do. This is a stupid thought.
>This is a stupid thought.
It's a consequence of social media, where people believe if they make a statement that gets enough up arrow clicks, physical reality changes to match their desired outcome. Most of the time it's of little consequence, especially when the people posting and voting have little actual connection to the subject matter, but things are quite different when the outcome involves nuclear detonations.
> Natalie Portman
Meh.
> Facts are russia is corrupt and bankrupt, they havent serviced/maintained nuke arsenal since forever. They cant even make new ICBMs anymore, their fifth try blew up on launch pad https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/09/23/russia-sarma... just like four previous attempts.
Yep ^ it's unlilkely they have very few in a launch-able state.
Although, they don't have a detonate a nuke to make parts of the world unlivable. They have plenty of radioactive material; simply detonating a salted conventional bomb would be pretty nasty.
If anyone tried launching their ICBMs half of them would blow up in their face. So we have that going for us (the peoples of all states).
Wow only 500 nuclear warheads raining down than 1,000? Quite the improvement.
> only 500 nuclear warheads raining down than 1,000
Try 3,000 instead of 6,000 [1].
[1] https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/nuclear-weapons-who-h...