I’ll assume you’re all familiar with the news about the new NIE about Iran and the Bomb.
Reading it ought to give us all an appreciation for how difficult it is to make judgements in areas where the facts seem apparent but are really so unclear (see: AGW).
My position on Iran hasn’t changed.
Here’s what I wrote in early 2006:
We need to do four things in parallel as regards Iran, starting pretty much right now.
* First, we need a national energy policy. It’s not a matter of saving trees, it’s a matter of national defense. We should have done it a decade ago, but tomorrow’s the soonest we can start. Doing this not only has real impacts, but sends clear signals about our intentions and capabilities as well.
* Next, we need to build up our invasion-ready forces, by planning with allies, expanding the Army, and rebuilding some of the capability that has been used up in Iraq. We should have been doing this since 2002, but starting today is better than starting tomorrow. See above re signaling capabilities.
* Next, we need to sit down and start talking. We need to talk to the Iranian regime, to their opponents, to Russia and China most of all. What are we talking about?
- – To the regime, our unwillingness to allow Iran to become a state locus for a worldwide Islamist movement – we may not be perfectly happy for them to be an Islamic state, but we’ll be tolerant of it.
- – To their opponents, we need to be giving whatever encouragement and tools we possibly can.
- – To Russia and China, we need to make it clear that we’re not planning on taking their oil away.
Yes, I know it’s only three things…sigh.
And I should have been clearer that the issue is Iran as a locus for a violent Islamist movement. If Islamists want to come door-to-door and hand out copies of the Qu’ ran, I’m all for it. I’ve got Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses and born-again Christians walking up my driveway already….(and yes, I know that’s a uniquely American view of it and not really applicable).
But my basic point stands. We need to calm down, build capabilities, open dialogs, and watch things very damn carefully. To be honest, I think that the Administration is setting close to the right tone. The hysterics on the right are arguing for an immediate strike, and the hysterics on the left are using those arguments as evidence that any American action is really preparation for a surprise attack.
We’ve got some time, and that gives us space to look for ways to defuse the confrontation. As I said in 2006:
Let’s remember that Iran is 30 minutes away from becoming a sheet of glass at our command. That power is real, and gives us both the space to maneuver and the responsibility to use it wisely.
–
_”Let’s remember that Iran is 30 minutes away from becoming a sheet of glass at our command.”_
In theory, perhaps, but in reality of course not. Here is the problem- if you have a weapon that everyone knows you arent going to use, do you really have a weapon?
A couple of years ago i proposed a doctrine whereby we made it publically known that any rogue regime out of compliance with UN inspections would automatically be assumed to be guilty in the event of an untraceable nuclear strike. IE- a bomb goes off in London, NK and Iran get an automatic reprisal. This idea was an attempt to reintroduce MAD into an uncertain world, or least give these nasty regimes a powerful incentive to not proliferate as their survival is tied to whomever they sell their weapons to.
This was met by an unexpected level of revulsion from people on both sides of the argument. The idea that we might _really_ have to nuke a nation full of innocents ruled by a tyrant was just too much to contenance. The Cold War we apparently grew into over so many years it didnt really register that that was EXACTLY our policy, and indeed the policy of MAD some seem to yearn for.
Since then I just have no real confidence the West will use their nuclear arsenals in any circumstance short of immediate, automatic global nuclear war with the Russians or Chinese. Any time required to stop and think and we will find reasons not to do it.
This flatly contradicts Wretchards famous conjectures, and i accept that.
Mark – that’s much like the ‘Godfather’ policy I set out in the linked article. I may expand on that in a post tonight…
…and don’t be so sure about the reaction. Mass opinion is notoriously unstable.
A.L.
I am as conservative as the day is long, but on the subject of national energy policy, I guess I don’t get the whining and hand ringing over a modest increase in the automobile CAFE standard to 35 MPG.
Yes, the current CAFE is imperfect and has unintended side-effects (the lumping of categories of vehicles killed the family station wagon and brought it back as a sedan-crunching SUV).
Driving is both a privilege and an activity requiring social cooperation — I am entirely with Senator Chris Dodd on his remarks about entitling undocumented immigrants a driver’s license. If nothing else, CAFE stands to even the playing field with regard to vehicle weight — yes the cars will have to get lighter (after having bulked up), and yes a lighter vehicle is less safe in a crash with a heavier vehicle, but CAFE standards stand to reverse the arms race of up armored cars competing against each other regarding who gets out of an accident unscathed.
A V-6 engined Toyota Camry has a sub 6-second 0-60 time — this is complete madness that the improvements in engine tech have gone into faster cars to this degree instead of increased fuel economy.
The 28-35 MPG improvement is less drastic than one would think as it is based on the “old EPA” calculation method rather than the derated numbers that make consumers more satisfied with their driving.
Paul – did you see my old post on “The 3% Solution”:http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/008766.php ??
A.L.
_My position on Iran hasn’t changed._
Why would it, I’m not sure the NIE is a significant change from the 2005 NIE.
In 2005, the NIE was that Iran was 10 years away from producing a sufficient quantity of highly enriched uranium to make a nuclear weapon. The 2007 NIE also places this timeline at 2009-2015 (though the concensus seems to be closer to 2015)
In the 2005 NIE, it was believed that the bulk of Iran’s capabilities were being developed “through its energy program” through which it “is acquiring and mastering technologies that could be diverted to bombmaking.” In the 2007 NIE, it is believed that “Iranian entities are continuing to develop a range of technical capabilities that could be applied to producing nuclear weapons” such as “Iran’s civilian uranium enrichment program.”
In the 2005 NIE, some sort of nuclear weapons program was suspected: there are “credible indicators that Iran’s military is conducting clandestine work. But the sources said there is no information linking those projects directly to a nuclear weapons program.” In the 2007 NIE, “[w]e also assess with high
confidence that since fall 2003, Iran has been conducting research and development
projects with commercial and conventional military applications — some of which would
also be of limited use for nuclear weapons.”
“2005 NIE summary”:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080101453_pf.html
“2007 NIE”:http://www.dni.gov/press_releases/20071203_release.pdf
In short, the timeline has not even slowed, Iran continues to develop nuclear capabilities through its energy program without full cooperation with IAEA, and we are left with some undecidables about whether Iran in a few years time will begin to cross its nuclear and conventional weapons program so as to have nuclear weapons as early as the next President’s term.
Anybody willing to bet on our intelligence services hasnt been paying attention.
You want the real poop- watch how the Israelis behave.
The weird thing is how strongly this is being portrayed as a ‘Complete Stop’ by Iran in 2003. And yet the enrichment work continues.
Enrich enough and you really don’t need anything fancy to set it off any more. The more fissile material you’re willing to use, the higher the purity, and the simpler the detonator gets.
Barak stated that the NIE is bunk, Iran is still working on weapons.
As a practical matter, Iran’s civilian nuclear power program is producing HEU and plutonium required for bombs. The process of machining plutonium into spheres, and constructing the explosive lenses and triggers is quite complex but can be done in small labs outside any practical observation absent inspect-on-demand.
This is how North Korea, Pakistan, India, South Africa and Israel were able to develop nuclear weapons to the surprise of the CIA and other intel agencies.
It’s easy to spot a Hanford reactor (raw material), it’s hard to spot a Los Alamos (manufacturing facility).
Very likely Iran is 18 mos to 2 years away at most from nuclear weapons. We have likely punted this problem (when manageable) to unmanageable. When Iran has nukes it has a shield to do whatever it wants. WMD against the US through Hezbollah? Quite practical since Iran would have a nuclear shield and be untouchable. Iran would be able to attack us with impunity — that’s why nations GET nuclear weapons — to do what they want with impunity.
We’ll lose a few cities, Liberals will dither and grovel/apologize, and then we will be forced by logic to wipe out a few nations that are suspect, Iran among them. To prevent loss of more cities.
This is all very “tragic inevitability.”
_Enrich enough and you really don’t need anything fancy to set it off any more. The more fissile material you’re willing to use, the higher the purity, and the simpler the detonator gets._
Enrich enough and you eventually get enough fissile material to build a very expensive bomb.
Put the same material into a reactor and you can get lots of cheap plutonium. Or for that matter thorium. You can make lots of cheap bombs as a side effect of your power reactors. You don’t need expensive uranium bombs.
For that matter once you have enough plutonium you can make plutonium/thorium reactors and stop bothering with the expense of enriching uranium.It’s like a bootstrap thing. If nobody will give or sell you plutonium, the obvious way to build a reactor is with painfully-enriched uranium. But once you have plutonium you don’t need to do the hard stuff.
To make it work we need to persuade the rest of the world that nuclear weapons are not actually worth having. I think we can persuade them of that fairly easily. Look at us — over the years we’ve spent well over a trillion dollars on them. We’ve risked nuclear war. We’ve had smart people spend many years working out game theory. And the end result is that we’re still afraid of getting our cities nuked. The only thing our nuclear program has gotten us, once the russians had nukes too, is that it’s kept us from getting nuked. All the expense, the risk, the wasted engineering talent, and that’s all we got.
Of course it’s better than the alternative of getting nuked, but we’d have that result a lot easier if there weren’t any nukes, or only a few.
Nukes have driven us crazy for 60 years, and all I got out of it was this stupid NO NUKES t-shirt.
J Thomas —
I fail to see your logic. Nuclear weapons for those who are willing to use them, particularly on neighbors who don’t have them, have very positive advantages. Even when others have them they offer a deterrent. An ultimate fall-back that guarantees no military oblivion.
Consider North Korea. What negatives did having nukes give them? Or Pakistan? Or India? Or Israel? Or South Africa?
Iran having Nuclear Weapons allows itself total freedom of action to do whatever it wants, secure from any US action. If Iran wants to invade Iraq, or Afghanistan, and wipe out US forces there, it can. Secure that nuclear weapons protect it from any major loss. Particularly since Iran feels their will beats ours. That we won’t use nukes but they will.
This is my problem with Liberals: not serious. Nukes exist. Anyone who doesn’t have them relies on a nuclear power as protector or is helpless before his neighbors who DO have them. In a world where nuclear powers include: Pakistan, North Korea, likely Iran, besides the others, how do we prevent others from nuking our cities and shrugging saying “it wasn’t us?” The problem is too much for Liberals because all likely solutions conflict with their religion: PC multiculti idiocy so they simply shrug their shoulders and walk away.
Iran’s advantages under nukes GUARANTEES they will get them UNLESS we remove the regime. It’s as simple as that.
_”The only thing our nuclear program has gotten us, once the russians had nukes too, is that it’s kept us from getting nuked. All the expense, the risk, the wasted engineering talent, and that’s all we got.”_
Not having been nuked by the Soviets is ‘all we got’? Guess i’ll have to live with that. Even preventing a conventional war with the Soviets over Europe must rank with the most fantastic investments of all time.
_”Of course it’s better than the alternative of getting nuked, but we’d have that result a lot easier if there weren’t any nukes, or only a few.”_
Depends who owns the ‘few’, which has always been the point. Whether we have nukes are not is beside the point. NK and Iran arent builing nukes out of fear of us nuking them- they are building them to give themselves a get out of jail free card against _conventional_ action from any opponent. This may seem well and good (particularly to those with a deeply sophist view of American power) but these are also the nations with a very nasty track record of proliferation, agression, kidnapping, etc.
Its a misnomer and an easy way out to cling to the belief that Iran is just arming itself to protect itself from us. Thats half the story. The other half is that Iran is intent on doing things that will draw American attack- from ANY administration. What they do now (attacking our forces in Iraq, arming international terrorists, promoting violence in Israel and Lebanon) without a bomb walks a very fine line of casus belli few nations would stand for. The question is what will Iran do along these line once it does have a bomb? The answer cant be good.
_Whether we have nukes are not is beside the point. NK and Iran arent builing nukes out of fear of us nuking them- they are building them to give themselves a get out of jail free card against conventional action from any opponent._
Do you believe that works?
Imagine that it’s us doing a conventional attack on somebody for strong reasons. We negotiate before the attack.
“Suppose you use nuclear weapons. Then we will destroy you. On the other hand, suppose you negotiate a surrender. We will promise not to execute any of your leaders, provided you don’t do war crimes before the surrender. We might do you other favors after we find out what’s most important to you. We will delay our attack a short time to discuss this with you, if you like. We will publish the surrender agreement; we don’t want the world to see us breaking our word. You can trust us.
“So what will it be, do you want to be destroyed, or will you negotiate? Or perhaps you’d like to try to win a conventional war?”
We’d be risking them bombing our staging areas in a nearby country. That isn’t something we’d do just to gain an advantage. But we’d take that risk if we had good reason to.
_Iran is intent on doing things that will draw American attack- from ANY administration. What they do now (attacking our forces in Iraq,_
We have people who claim that, but have we actually provided evidence?
_arming international terrorists,_
And we are not? For example aren’t we arming kurds and baluchis in iran? We have an official policy that we will try to overthrow the iranian government. How different is that from a declaration of aggressive war?
_promoting violence in Israel and Lebanon_
Those are violent places. I’m starting to get the sense that what you object to is that iran isn’t aligned with our goals, and you want to invade them over it.
So, you think iranians believe they’ll be safe if they have nukes, that we’ll be scared to attack them. But consider — we’ve never attacked any nation that didn’t have nukes except for japan. And we’ve seldom threatened to attack nonnuclear nations, the only one that particularly comes to mind is iraq. But we’ve continually threatened to attack russia the entire time they’ve had nukes. And we’ve threatened china. We’ve publicly considered a nuclear pre-emptive attack on iran when we thought they were getting nukes, and surely that would get worse when they do get nukes.
Getting nukes increases their chance of getting nuked. It doesn’t increase their survival chance at all.
We are not better off with nukes. Russia is not better off with nukes. China doesn’t have many nukes, not enough to seriously threaten the USA or russia, and they might be better off with the weak nuclear force they have. India does not have many nukes and they might be better off with their weak nuclear force. Pakistan might be better off with a few nukes but they sure don’t benefit from having very many.
Israel does not benefit from nukes. The one time they threatened to use them, it nearly resulted in killing everybody in the world — not good for israel. Israel’s nukes are a major cause for arabs and muslims to try to get nukes. Would israel be better off with nobody in the middle east having nukes, or would israel be better off with multiple middle east nations having nukes?
I understand this might seem counterintuitive, but the only thing nukes are good for is threatening other nuclear nations to get them not to nuke you. Every other use backfires.
We may have to wait and let the world figure this out by experience. Get some proliferation going and let everybody notice what happens to the nations that use nukes.
#3 from Paul Milenkovic at 4:39 pm on Dec 04, 2007
Paul, I am as conservative as the day is long myself and I agree with everything you said in your post. I would like to know if you are as concerned as I am about ideological purity replacing rational debate within the Republican Party? I am Speaking Conservative to Conservative not as a Democrat.
#1 from Mark Buehner at 4:14 pm on Dec 04, 2007
“Let’s remember that Iran is 30 minutes away from becoming a sheet of glass at our command.”
*In theory, perhaps, but in reality of course not. Here is the problem- if you have a weapon that everyone knows you arent going to use, do you really have a weapon?*
Everyone Knows?
*A couple of years ago i proposed a doctrine whereby we made it publically known that any rogue regime out of compliance with UN inspections would automatically be assumed to be guilty in the event of an untraceable nuclear strike. IE- a bomb goes off in London, NK and Iran get an automatic reprisal. This idea was an attempt to reintroduce MAD into an uncertain world, or least give these nasty regimes a powerful incentive to not proliferate as their survival is tied to whomever they sell their weapons to.
This was met by an unexpected level of revulsion from people on both sides of the argument. The idea that we might really have to nuke a nation full of innocents ruled by a tyrant was just too much to contenance.*
Gee, I know what you mean, no one listens to me either.
*The Cold War we apparently grew into over so many years it didnt really register that that was EXACTLY our policy, and indeed the policy of MAD some seem to yearn for.*
There is a bit of a difference of threatening to Release a massive nuclear strike against a power who has multiple nuclear Warheads pointed at you city in case of a nuclear strike by them from one of the platforms in their triad and a general announcement that anyone in any country who we don’t happen to like gets fried if anything nuclear goes off, no matter where the perpetrators are from.
_Since then I just have no real confidence the West will use their nuclear arsenals in any circumstance short of immediate, automatic global nuclear war with the Russians or Chinese._ *Any time required to stop and think and we will find reasons not to do it.*
And this is a bad thing?
Now the Israelis are up at arms over the NIE on Iran’s nuclear program. By the way, that estimate provides a more clear assessment of US perceptions, the political positioning (or lack of it) of US Intelligence and US politics in general than it does Iran’s actual nuclear program. Still, for those of us seeking a peaceful resolution, it is something of a step back from war and that is welcome news.
#10 from Jim Rockford at 10:52 pm on Dec 04, 2007
You know, I am always charmed by your consistency in your defense of/reactions to your fears.
_Nuclear weapons for those who are willing to use them, particularly on neighbors who don’t have them, have very positive advantages._
May I point out that the U.S. is the only country that has ever used them so is it the U.S. you are referring to? I grew up during the Cold War and I have no doubt that we would use them again, but only in the most extreme of circumstances. You just seem to sling around nuclear war like it is an order of hash-browns. Every post of yours appears to be about nuclear holocaust. Is there a reason for this?
_Even when others have them they offer a deterrent. An *ultimate* fall-back that guarantees no military *oblivion*._
Comic book language
_Consider North Korea. What negatives did having nukes give them? Or Pakistan? Or India? Or Israel? Or South Africa?_
*North Korea* – Their people have been trapped inside a living hell for 80 years while their brethren to the south have one of the largest GNP’s per capita in the world.
*Pakistan and India* – They have been involved in a fratricidal religious war for 80 years since partition. They have squandered precious resources, physical and intellectual on their nuclear program and have stayed at the bottom of the per capita income scale in the world. Add to that they have to live under the fear of annihilation every time their is friction between the two countries.
*Israel* – I doubt that there is any sane Israeli who would rather not have been forced to develop nuclear weapons in the fifties in partnership with the French. But, of course the Israelis had just bore witness to the Shoah. They knew, in reality, they faced genocide.
*South Africa* – A paranoid repressive regime (Unless, of course, if you do not consider repression of every other race in the country other than what they consider white, is not really repression) Decades of pariah status.
The question should be. what good did or does their nuclear programs do for them? At best, they are the definition of a necessary evil.
_Iran having Nuclear Weapons allows itself *total freedom of action to do whatever it wants, secure from any US action* ._
This is utter nonsense. You make statements like this as if they were handed down to Moses.
And again in comic book language.
*If Iran wants to invade Iraq, or Afghanistan, and wipe out US forces there, it can. Secure that nuclear weapons protect it from any major loss. Particularly since Iran feels their will beats ours. That we won’t use nukes but they will.*
More utter nonsense and worse, defeatist in tone.
This is my problem with Liberals: not serious.
Nukes exist. Anyone who doesn’t have them relies on a nuclear power as protector or is helpless before his neighbors who DO have them. In a world where nuclear powers include: Pakistan, North Korea, likely Iran, besides the others, how do we prevent others from nuking our cities and shrugging saying “it wasn’t us?” The problem is too much for Liberals because all likely solutions conflict with their religion: PC multiculti idiocy so they simply shrug their shoulders and walk away.
*Iran’s advantages under nukes GUARANTEES they will get them UNLESS we remove the regime. It’s as simple as that.*
Well, at least you are consistent
_”Everyone Knows?”_
Everyone that isnt a loonytoon knows the US isnt going to launch a first nuclear strike, yes.
_”There is a bit of a difference of threatening to Release a massive nuclear strike against a power who has multiple nuclear Warheads pointed at you city in case of a nuclear strike by them from one of the platforms in their triad and a general announcement that anyone in any country who we don’t happen to like gets fried if anything nuclear goes off, no matter where the perpetrators are from.”_
Whats the difference to the victims? The entire point of MAD is that you threaten something insanely immoral in the hope of preventing something insanely immoral from happening to you. Whats the material difference? Anybody that wants off the threat list simply has to verifiably renounce nukes.
And thanks for making my point about people freaking out.
_”And this is a bad thing?”_
No. I didnt make a moral judgement, I made a statement i believe to be likely. But it certainly turns the idea of MAD (or at least reprisal) on its head.
Anyone arguing its fine for Iran etc to posess nukes because they wouldnt be crazy enough to use them better have an answer as to whether _they_ believe we have the will to use them in reprisal. Whether we do or not is far less important than what Iran believes.
Do we have the stones to obliterated 10 million Iranians if they slip a nuke to Hezbollah?
_”Imagine that it’s us doing a conventional attack on somebody for strong reasons. We negotiate before the attack.”_
I can imagine your scenario but its a fantasy. No nation is going to take seriously that we will tolerate a nuclear first strike against ourselves, our vital interests, or our allies. If Iran assassinates the King of Saudi Arabia, how do we punish a nuclear Iran exactly?
_”We have people who claim that, but have we actually provided evidence?”_
What the difference? You’ll call the generals political hacks and the journalists liars if you disagree with them. Pass.
_No nation is going to take seriously that we will tolerate a nuclear first strike against ourselves, our vital interests, or our allies. If Iran assassinates the King of Saudi Arabia, how do we punish a nuclear Iran exactly?_
When we assassinated the king of saudi arabial, who punished us? Did we do that? Who knows? If we did it I guess we got away with it. On the other hand, if syria assassinated a prominent lebanese politician, they didn’t get away with it. Whether it was them or not. Funny how that works.
So, you figure all taiwan has to do to be safe is get nukes? China is heading toward taking them back, right? And we’re a nuclear power but so is china. We say no. Only what if the chinese jump up and down on the big stack of dollars they’ve collected, and they threaten to wreck our economy by calling in their debts? We could argue that they’re bluffing, that they have to keep loaning us more money so we can buy their consumer goods and if they stop paying their people to make stuff for us for free, it will wreck their economy. Or we could threaten to nuke them. Or we cold give them taiwan. What do you think we’d do?
But if taiwan had their own nukes then china wouldn’t do anything to them, right? No assassins, no blockade, nothing to weaken taiwan because the alternative would be, what? Taiwan nukes china?
See, nukes don’t mean what you think they mean. Did we think there was a possibility Sadddam had nukes? I think our military planners thought so, they knew the intelligence wasn’t very good and for all they knew Saddam could be years ahead of schedule. They didn’t know the intelligence was completely fabricated. But we invaded anyway. We told Saddam if he used germ warfare or nerve gas we’d nuke him, and he didn’t do any of those. The possibility that he had nukes didn’t stop us, it didn’t slow us down. If iran set off a nuke tomorrow would it make us less likely or more likely to attack?
Neither us nor anybody else has ever nuked a nation that didn’t have nukes. (Except for our blunder with japan.) Nobody has even said they were going to nuke a nation that has nukes. Even when it’s only a few nukes. We could kill everybody in every chinese city and all the farmers along their coast, and in return china probably couldn’t kill more than 30 million of us. Would we nuke china even when their response is so weak? No way in hell, not unless they attack first. Would they attack first? No way in hell.
Here’s a joke. An insane dictator goes to his psychiatrist and says, “I have a plan to nuke a US city, and I think I’ll get away with it because they won’t know who did it.” And then he asks, “Am I insane?” I can’t think of a good punchline, but it’s still a joke.
Nukes aren’t good for *anything* except keeping other nations from nuking you. Nothing. And once they get it thought out a bit, other nations aren’t going to nuke you because they understand that their nukes aren’t good for anything except keeping us from nuking them.
“We have people who claim that, but have we actually provided evidence?”
_What the difference? You’ll call the generals political hacks and the journalists liars if you disagree with them. Pass._
Shouldn’t we provide evidence for the people who’d actually believe evidence? Under the circumstances there’s hardly anybody outside the USA who’d take our word about anything _without_ evidence.
_Do we have the stones to obliterated 10 million Iranians if they slip a nuke to Hezbollah?_
A foreign dictator goes to his psychiatrist and says, “I have a plan to give nuclear weapons to a bunch of foreign terrorists because I believe they’ll use them the way I want them to, and they promise if anything goes wrong they won’t say where they got them. Am I crazy?”
Kim has claimed regulation golf scores below 40 in the NK state press. Do YOU think he’s 20 strokes better than Tiger Woods? Is this the stability you’re betting millions of lives on?
(I could live with him lying about his golf score, to the point where he’s a world-class golfer, even; it’d just be one more lie. But come on, it gets to the point where no sane person could believe it! What kind of man tells that sort of lie… not even a “big lie” kind of lie, but even on a worthless topic like that?)
Avatar, J Thomas’s point seems to be that nukes are so awful that if we get rid of most of ours it will still help the world get to zero nuclear weapons, pretty much no matter what anyone else does. Because nukes are BAD, mmmkay? We can get to zero, all over the world.
Temporarily. Yes, he used that word. That part of his plan/description puzzles me: I’m still wondering why it’s going to be temporary. I would expect that the ensuing chocolate river and the gumdrop mountain and the lemonade rain for only fifteen minutes every day, etc., would keep everyone happy and banish all negativity forever, but apparently I’m missing something.
I apologize for the snark. I’m probably just abreacting to a roof leak here at my residence.
Nortius, we got into a crazy arms race with the USSR. We assumed they might try to destroy us without being destroyed themselves. So we needed to have enough nukes that we could destroy them even after they attacked us and destroyed most of ours.
We had money to burn, so we consistently stayed ahead of them technologically. We build missile silos they couldn’t expect to knock out in a first strike. We developed precise targetting that would let us knock out missile silos like that. Then when we figured they could knock out our missile silos we went to “launch on warning” so our missiles would get off anyway. Luckily, we didn’t launch on warning during repeated false alarms.
We were driving the arms race. We developed the technology to do a first strike against the USSR, on the assumption that the fallout from our attack wouldn’t kill us. We developed special low-fallout bombs for that. If we had slowed down our research would the russians slow down too, or would they try to overtake us? No way to tell now, we didn’t try it.
The arms race was entirely between the USA and the USSR. Nobody else built more than a few hundred bombs. Everybody else thought that was enough. A few hundred nukes are enough to ruin your year.
Now suppose that the USA or the USSR had gone through with it. They make a successful first strike on us, and destroy all of our nukes. They pretty much have to kill us all or else put us under permanent occupation, right? If the USA isn’t destroyed, in 5 years we’re building nukes and we’re _mad_. If they leave survivors they can’t feel safe for the next hundred years.
And the russians never had the illusion they could win a first strike. They swore they wouldn’t try it, but that any attempt on them would result in everybody dying. They practiced MAD.
We went through lots of game theory on the assumption they were willing to accept a lot of destruction themselves to destroy us. We went way overboard on that. It did work, they never attacked us just as they swore they never would. Maybe the resources they put into matching our nukes helped destroy their economy. Maybe they bluffed us and put a lot less into that than we thought.
Nobody else in the world is trying that. What happens if a nation that only has a few nukes nukes us, and we know who did it? Whoah.
What happens if a nation that only has a few nukes nukes another nation that only has a few nukes? Whoah. None of these other nations is trying to win a nuclear war. They all settle for doing unacceptable damage to a nation that nukes them.
Suppose we got rid of all but 250 nukes, and for awhile we put dummies into the excess launchers. Would the russians try a first strike? I don’t think so. I think they’d get rid of all but say 500 nukes, fairly quickly. They know our ABM systems are junk. If they think we’re getting an ABM that works they can put together more missiles and warheads fast enough to stop that.
Would anybody else see that we only have 250 nukes and nuke us? I don’t think so. 7000 nukes is not really a better deterrent than 250.
Suppose we change our minds? If we leave our nuke-creation technology intact (which we have to do somewhat to continually rebuild our bombs) then we can build back our arsenal in 2 years. If it’s lost, either to depreciation or to a small nuking, it might take us 5 years. Probably less, we know what we’re doing.
Two other issues, and they’re related. What if some foreign leader is crazy and doesn’t mind getting nuked? What if somebody smuggles a bomb into the USA and anonymously destroys a US city? This is already kind of long, I’ll do those later.
J Thomas, my issue here is not with the desirability of arms reduction. My issue here is not with your calling the US decision to use nuclear weapons a “blunder”. My issue here is not with your claim that the USSR actually built a doomsday device. Need I continue with my litany of what my issue is not?
My specific issue here is with your utterances (elsewhere) that total nuclear weapon disarmament (a) is achievable and (b) will be temporary. Perhaps I misconstrue. But as matters sit at present…
I don’t understand the combination as you’ve expressed it — I assume you remember saying both things? Rather than going on in your declared direction, would you mind addressing the evident disconnect?
Say you get your wish, and the President of the US puts out your PSA, and everyone falls into line. No nuclear weapons on Planet Earth. Hurrah.
Why “temporary?” Please: Why?
Disclosure: A part of me has rather outlandish wishes for the future, including things like Orion-style propulsion. I don’t see that sort of capability _not_ being weaponizable. And I don’t expect it to be fielded until defenses in depth of kinds not easy to create are in place (maybe “Blue Goo”, unlikely as that probably is). I lack any confidence that my preferred future is of high likelihood.
And as I’ve said elsewhere in a thread you’ve participated in, I think the degree of policing required to get to truly confirmed zero nukes would necessitate a repressive world government –a Niven “ARM” or a Vingean “Peace Authority” — or, I’d now add, a whole lot of _Day the Earth Stood Still_ Gorts (see also “Blue Goo”, supra}. Or something a lot uglier still.
Not sure I like that a whole lot. Not sure whether what I like matters.
Sorry for all the extropianoid jargon, I lack the time to plug in links at present. I might come back and touch this post up to include some. One of the perks of being a Marshal.
It’s good to see that there are now forces in our intelligence community that are willing to fight the neocon/zionist lobby (e.g.
Norman Podhoretz, godfather of the neocons and now foreign policy adviser to Rudi Giuliani’s presidential campaign, who wrote in Commentary last June, “Please Mr. President, as an American Jew, I beg you, bomb Iran.”)
What is reprehensible is that Bush/Cheney must have been aware of the analysis prior to its public release, but they kept beating the war drums – ostensibly over Iranian nuclear developments. It was to be the Iraq boondogle all over again.
They should be made to pay for that.
Since there are no nuclear weapons sites to bomb, what then are to bomb in Iran? The entire country?
The only presidential candidates worth considering are those farthest removed from the zionist lobby. This eliminates all republicans and Hillary as well.
Nortius, OK!
What we need is the general recognition among practically everybody that nukes are not worth having.
The main purpose of nukes is to make sure that nobody else nukes you.
It’s generally a bad idea to threaten to nuke other people. Bad idea.
You might possibly choose to secretly nuke somebody. Risky. Bad idea. The best you can hope for is you nuke them a little bit and never again, and they don’t find out who did it. Think about what the USA was like after 9/11. Think about what the USA would be like after one of our cities got nuked and we couldn’t figure out who did it. It takes a crazy person to want to live in that world. Bad idea.
If pretty much the whole world sees that nukes are a bad idea, then we don’t have to work real hard at inspections and agreements and all that. While people think that getting nukes means you’re a bigshot, and we’re trying to stop them from getting nukes because it makes them bigshots and we don’t want that, while a lot of the world thinks that we want a nuclear monopoly because we want to be ultimately powerful while everybody else is weak, they’re going to want nukes. When they think that nukes don’t make you powerful but just cost a lot of money for nothing, then it gets a whole lot easier.
Somebody starts a nuclear program. We mostly don’t notice. We don’t much care. They do a nuclear test and we notice. “Oh, what a shame, yet another country has wasted their resources building nukes. Send them the regular packet explaining what they’ve gotten into. Tisk, tisk, when will they learn?” It isn’t a big deal, it doesn’t make them a bigshot, it’s just one more thing to deal with.
It might not take a whole lot of that before everybody who has nukes will be ready to give them up. Have the UN put out a list, and anybody who signs the list promises to give up their nukes. Not a real big deal. Nobody wants to get nuked so nobody wants to nuke a nation that has nukes. Nobody wants to be the second one to use nukes against a nation that doesn’t have them. It would be pretty easy to get the UN to agree to a rule that says it’s open season on the first nation to use nukes, _if the USA didn’t oppose it_.
Say a nation keeps a few nukes secretly. No big deal. The things are useless for any practical purpose. If several nations break their word and keep the things secretly, no big deal. Are they going to threaten people with them? “I promised I’d get rid of my nukes. I lied. Now sign this peace treaty or else.” Not a real good basis for treaties. Are they going to use them in secret? Probably not. Probably they’re going to think it over and get rid of them.
But with lots of reactors and lots of plutonium in the world, lots of nations could build nukes if they wanted to. If they know how. And lots of nations would know how. But they mostly won’t bother because they think that nukes are like white elephants.
Why do I say this would be temporary? Because it depends on common sense, which is never universal. At some point somebody thinks they can get ahead by being the only nation with nukes. So they build a few and they announce it. Maybe they build a lot and nobody notices before they announce it. So they announce that they’re the only nation with nukes and everybody has to do what they say, and they publish their list of demands. Then what? Probably we’d freak out. We start making nukes, and it might take us six months to a year to make as many of them as we choose. Various other nations do it too. Some nations might have nukes hidden away and they don’t need any time.
Do we negotiate? Put them off until they see that they don’t get anything useful from their nukes? I hope so. Do we or others start nuking them? Send in nukes on cruise missiles that are mostly invisible to radar, or that look like private planes, or whatever? I hope not. I’m reasonably sure that after it’s over, the world sees one more example of nukes not being useful to the people who try to gain by them. But after we get a scare we likely won’t agree to go back to universal disarmament. We’ll probably keep a few nukes. We might make an agreement with russia and a few other nations — the first nation to use nukes gets nuked by all of us. That would pretty much take care of any threats to use nukes.
To sum up — our thinking about nukes so far is based on fantasy. “What if our enemy is crazy?” Nukes are getting cheaper and more available, and more nations are thinking out the implications. There’s some more experience, as we get standoff between india and pakistan etc. We might easily get effective nonproliferation as a world consensus builds that nukes are simply not worth having. The details of that consensus are not certain because world opinion is a bit fickle, but it could go like:
Nukes are only good for keeping crazy people from nuking you, when they’re not completely crazy. Or
Nukes are only good for persuading crazy people with nukes that it doesn’t make them bigshots. Or
Nukes are not worth having.
World opinion might change in detail over time.
J Thomas #19:
_”Nukes aren’t good for anything except keeping other nations from nuking you. Nothing.”_
Hiroshima.
Nagasaki.
You may think you have covered that with _”Except for our blunder with japan”_
Blunder?
As in oops, sorry about the annihilated cities?
Or blunder as in “Japan would have surrendered anyway.”
Maybe; though quite a few historians might argue on when and at what cost the anyway point would have been reached.
The point is the US did not need to bother about the “anyway”.
Against a non-nuclear opponent nukes can have considerable utility.
The other point is that nuclear weapons, even when mutual, can act as a shield for aggressions or other actions that might otherwise be countered by war.
Take this hypothetical:
1939, both Germany and Britain have nukes.
Germany invades Poland.
Does Chamberlain declare war?
I don’t think so.
Would the USSR, without the minimal nuclear systems it had at that point, have risked the Korean invasion, or countenanced the Chinese counter-intervention?
Fortunately, the Soviets were mostly cautious players.
What would Tehran cover with a minimal nuclear deterrent capacity? Do we want to find out?
The good news from the NIE is that we most likely have a five year period for other options before that decision point arrives.
Um, JT when you say that “The main purpose of nukes is to make sure that nobody else nukes you.” you might explain it in the context of Hiroshima and Nagasaki – were we worried about being nuked by Japan?
And when you say that “You might possibly choose to secretly nuke somebody. Risky. Bad idea. The best you can hope for is you nuke them a little bit and never again, and they don’t find out who did it.” I’ll flatly disagree – another option is that we surrender because we’re afraid it’ll happen again; another option is that we build an internal police state and high walls; another option is that we go batshit crazy and nuke everyone we suspect of having a nuke…oh, wait, we don’t have any nukes. So what do we do than? We can’t strategically bomb five countries. So there’s a good chance that whoever did it might get away with it…hmmm, this sounds like a better idea every day.
I think we need a predefined response to that event, along the ‘Godfather’ lines, with the proviso that you can get out of the target list by providing samples of your nuclear material so that we can trace your bombs back. If you don’t, and the bomb isn’t traceable, then – well, you’re on the list.
My bigger concern, to be blunt, is that they will use a single weapon on Israel, which will immediate cause Israel to unleash their nukes – all of them, I would imagine – changing the complexion of things in the ME pretty substantially.
A.L.
_”A foreign dictator goes to his psychiatrist and says, “I have a plan to give nuclear weapons to a bunch of foreign terrorists because I believe they’ll use them the way I want them to, and they promise if anything goes wrong they won’t say where they got them. Am I crazy?””_
The point is Iran wouldnt really care if the world knew who supplied the nuke (it wouldnt exactly take Jack Bauer to figure it out anyway).
Your idea that nukes arent useful in a conventional world is just bizarre. Again- why has NK (amongst others) worked so hard and spent so much money attaining them? To prevent a US nuclear strike? Thats absurd. Either these nations are flatly irrational or you are dead wrong.
Nukes provide a seat at the table in international affairs, immediate regional credibility (if not control), and insurance against _conventional_ attack. You immediately enter the escalation game. If you blockade nuclear Iran and they sink your ships, how do you escalate? At some point you either have to blink or take the gloves off militarilly, at which point you threaten the survival of the people with their fingers on the trigger.
Men considerably smarter than you or I have spent decades trying to figure out how to fight a conventional war between nuclear powers, and nobody managed to do it. Either you fight over things neither side gives a damn about, or you dont fight. The more belligerent side always has an advantage in this, and quite frankly we have more to lose if Iran starts rearranging the region to its taste. Again- we _cant_ go to war with a nuclear Iran over trivial things like arming terrorists or overthrowing neighboring regimes or even invasion. Even Mathew Broderick figured that out in Wargames, the logic of escalation causes one side to either quit or nuclear war to break out. Lets not forget Iran already has missiles capable of targetting a good chunk of the region. Another few years and there is no reason to believe Europe if not the US will be viable targets. Are we going to risk losing London to prevent Iran from seizing the Persian Gulf?
All your arguments seem to have the naive assumption that all the actors are acting in good faith (except the US i’d imagine). Basically you see to think Iran isnt going to push us as far as they can, bluff or not. Nothing in their behavior since the revolution supports that idea.
“Nukes aren’t good for anything except keeping other nations from nuking you. Nothing.”
_Hiroshima._
_Nagasaki._
One incident. 62 years ago. Nobody understood it then.
You think maybe we’ll nuke iran? Chad? Venezuela? Is there any nonnuclear nation on the planet that we’d nuke? The closest we come is “We have secret information that they’re building nukes and the only way to stop them is nuke the nukes.” Even that looks implausible.
Do you have a second example?
Two incidents, to be pedantic.
But I take your point.
The thing is, there hasn’t yet been a conflict between nuclear and non-nuclear (including fairly reliable allies in the equation) that was any where near as high-stakes.
But if, say, the USSR had still been non-nuclear, and the US/UN force close to being driven into the sea during Korea, would the US have used nukes?
If the Arabs had broken the Israeli army in the Yom Kippur war?
All what-iffery, sure. But it only is because we’ve been fortunate, and the parties involved have been relatively prudent.
_”You think maybe we’ll nuke iran? Chad? Venezuela? Is there any nonnuclear nation on the planet that we’d nuke?”_
You’ve set yourself up a paradox. I agree- its an absurd thought. So why are these rogue nations trying to gain nuclear weapons if they are only good for defending yourself against an attack you yourself admit is impossible?
As the pace of change increases ,it makes it more and more likely that new events will occur. Two nukes used at the end of a bitter war sixty years ago by a rational player does not provide much insight into the possible uses of a nuke by some oddball leader today. And stating that the only use of a nuke is to prevent ones self from being nuked is in fact a damn good reason for having them – Hitler with nukes, anyone?
_Again- why has NK (amongst others) worked so hard and spent so much money attaining them? To prevent a US nuclear strike? Thats absurd. Either these nations are flatly irrational or you are dead wrong._
NK was misguided. They thought it would get them benefits which have so far not shown up, right?
Nukes provide a seat at the table in international affairs, immediate regional credibility (if not control), and insurance against conventional attack.
Those are all kind of true today. We do a lot to make them true, and we don’t have to. Like, it’s been the custom that nuclear powers get a permanent seat in the UN security council. But not israel. If south africa had gotten nukes would we have put them on the SC? Libya? This is a custom whose time has passed.
Nukes needn’t provide any regional credibility. To the extent they do it’s because people have not thought it out.
Insurance against conventional attack? We’ve done that because we’re wimps. It doesn’t have to be so.
_insurance against conventional attack. You immediately enter the escalation game. If you blockade nuclear Iran and they sink your ships, how do you escalate? At some point you either have to blink or take the gloves off militarilly, at which point you threaten the survival of the people with their fingers on the trigger._
What kind of war are you thinking about fighting? Escalation? Like vietnam? Like the Monty Python fish ceremony? “I don’t like you. I will slap your cheek with this fish.” “Well I don’t like you, _I_ will slap _your_ cheek with this bigger fish.” What the hell?
_Men considerably smarter than you or I have spent decades trying to figure out how to fight a conventional war between nuclear powers, and nobody managed to do it._
You misunderstood that. We had teams of mathematicians trying to figure out how we could fight a conventional war agianst *the USSR* and win it! Very different question. What did it mean to win a conventional war against the USSR? Even if we “won” we’d have to occupy their industrialised areas for the indefinite future, right? If we go away then they re-arm and our problems are worse. If we leave them a conventional smoking ruin then our problems are worse. If we keep the army it takes to occupy them, our problems are worse.
And for a long time it wasn’t clear we could win a conventional war against the russians, not in western europe or eastern europe or russia.
It wasn’t a question of fighting a nuclear iran or a nuclear argentina. We had to not only find ways to keep it conventional (which was pretty easy if not completely reliable), we had to win the conventional war and then the conventional peace, against the USSR. Larger population, larger army, home team advantage.
_The more belligerent side always has an advantage in this, and quite frankly we have more to lose if Iran starts rearranging the region to its taste._
You figure we have more to lose than iran does? They only stand to lose their nation and their population.
_Again- we cant go to war with a nuclear Iran over trivial things_
Do you *want* to? What the hell? Are you saying that if it turns out that iran really doesn’t get nukes, that we’ll want to move in and attack them for trivial advantages? I mean, what the hell?!
_Are we going to risk losing London to prevent Iran from seizing the Persian Gulf?_
You know we would. In an eyeblink. If we stood back and didn’t interfere than russia would. Britain, of course, would probably decide about then that they want to modernise their nuclear force. 😉
But look at the logic. Iran is doing what, invading other nations with their army, and we block them conventionally, and … and iran threatens to nuke London unless we back down! Can you imagine them getting away with that? Maybe they’d like to threaten Paris too? How about Moscow, Moscow is no farther. They probably figure they need all the enemies they can get. I know! They could threaten to nuke Mecca! And Baghdad! Islamabad! Ten years after the war is over they’ll want to be all buddy-buddy with all those places, right? They might as well give all their potential friends and allies something to think about.
_Basically you see to think Iran isnt going to push us as far as they can, bluff or not._
They might try. But we’ve been perfecting our skills at that for 50+ years. We have consistently outbluffed the russians. If we were bluffing. The russians let us get away with it. We risked the whole world for trivial gains, and we got them. It isn’t worth it. It might take one small nuclear war for the world to think it out and see that the gains just aren’t worth the risk.
If they bluff us we will call their bluff. We can ignore their threat and see if they carry it out. And if they do, they can be the first example that shows how useless that strategy is.
Never be the first to use nukes. The consequences aren’t worth it.
_But if, say, the USSR had still been non-nuclear, and the US/UN force close to being driven into the sea during Korea, would the US have used nukes?_
I don’t know. We didn’t have that many nukes at the time. If we used nukes and they weren’t decisive, that would have created a very different world.
_If the Arabs had broken the Israeli army in the Yom Kippur war?_
They did. Israel threatened to nuke egypt. The russians sent nuclear material through the dardanelles and we threatened the USSR with a great big first strike.
I contend that if the USA and USSR hadn’t intervened and israel had nuked egypt, israel would not have lasted 10 years after that. And we’d be a lot closer to disarmament than we are. It would be much clearer that nuclear wars don’t really get won. That’s my opinion. It didn’t happen so I can’t test it.
_You’ve set yourself up a paradox. I agree- its an absurd thought. So why are these rogue nations trying to gain nuclear weapons if they are only good for defending yourself against an attack you yourself admit is impossible?_
Because they don’t have it thought out. They want to be permanent members of the Security Council? They want to be bigshots? Their own people think it’s a big prestigious deal to get nukes? We to around talking like we won’t attack them conventionally if they get nukes, and they believe it?
These perceptions are likely to change with experience. We can help them change by speaking and acting like we don’t believe those same things.
_”Because they don’t have it thought out.”_
In other words, they are behaving irrationally?
You know, JT, every thread here is becoming an ‘argue with JT’ thread, which just isn’t very interesting to me at this point. I’m going to start ignoring you,and suggest that you throttle up the level of your contributions (you’re typically gainsaying – why not take a little more time and build up and flesh out the actual positive arguments you want to make) and throttle back the frequency.
I’d seriously suggest that you get your own blog – you seem to have the bandwidth for it.
I’m happy to see you here banging away on my arguments (or anyone elses) but looking at the last hundred or so comments, a whole lot of them are yours….
A.L.
_”What kind of war are you thinking about fighting? Escalation? Like vietnam?”_
Name any war we have fought in the last 50 years and lets assume the enemy had nuclear weapons. Changes things pretty dramatically, no?
_”You figure we have more to lose than iran does? They only stand to lose their nation and their population.”_
But we’ve already established we arent going to use a nuclear first strike, so those things arent actually at risk, right?
_”But look at the logic. Iran is doing what, invading other nations with their army, and we block them conventionally, and … and iran threatens to nuke London unless we back down! Can you imagine them getting away with that?”_
So what’s our alternative? We’re back to escalation. War has a way of expanding itself unpredictably (we ought to know that by now!). Sooner or later (sooner probably) somebody is at the edge of losing something they can’t afford to lose, particularly somebody not entirely rational- acting on religious impulses would qualify.
_”Do you want to? What the hell? Are you saying that if it turns out that iran really doesn’t get nukes, that we’ll want to move in and attack them for trivial advantages? I”_
JT, I meant trivial in the context of nuclear war as an alternative, which pretty much encompasses anything conceiveable. Iran invading Iraq is trivial compared to nuclear war between the US and Iran.
_”If they bluff us we will call their bluff. We can ignore their threat and see if they carry it out.”_
This works fine if everyone is a rational actor with access to perfect information. That isnt the case. Its real easy to convince yourself you can get away with something when you feel you have little to lose. Again- you are putting yourself in Iran’s shoes, which is a mistake. What they consider a rational goal or vital interest compared to what you do are two different matters. Things get terribly dangerous when they dont well understand each other. You are saying they will ‘come to jesus’ with an understaning of how the nuclear game is played in the manner we play it. This is a big assumption
_”Never be the first to use nukes. The consequences aren’t worth it.”_
We believe that. Everyone knows we believe that. Whether our enemies believe that is another thing, and whether we believe they believe it. Thats why we’ve been living in fear for 60 years of some cockup that ends the world.
JT –
Seriously…just looked, and you have 19 of the last 100 comments; I have 9…
A.L.
“Never be the first to use nukes. The consequences aren’t worth it.”
_We believe that. Everyone knows we believe that. Whether our enemies believe that is another thing, and whether we believe they believe it. Thats why we’ve been living in fear for 60 years of some cockup that ends the world._
Traditionally every nuclear power but us swore they wouldn’t be the first to use nukes. Maybe some of the more recent nuclear powers have joined us in that. Israel has.
We refused to swear we wouldn’t be first. We didn’t want to commit the resources to win a defensive conventional war in western europe, and we said we’d use tactical nukes, and the russians said if we used any nuke they’d do massive retaliation, and they never got around to invading western europe so we could find out if somebody was bluffing. The USA and israel are the ones who don’t believe that, so far.
_Its real easy to convince yourself you can get away with something when you feel you have little to lose._
Nobody who has a nation that can build nukes has little to lose. They can have their nation and their people.
_Again- you are putting yourself in Iran’s shoes, which is a mistake. What they consider a rational goal or vital interest compared to what you do are two different matters. Things get terribly dangerous when they dont well understand each other._
There’s a simple approach and a complicated approach. The complicated approach is to tell them what we think our vital interests are and let them tell us what they claim their vital interests are, and then if they believe we’re bluffing they can fail to back down and see if we nuke them. The good result of this is that we’re good at getting the other side to back down and we tend to get our “vital interests”. The bad result is that if there’s too much miscommunication etc we wind up with a nuclear war.
The simple approach is to tell them we aren’t going to nuke them unless they use nukes first. They look at their nukes and they look at our nukes. They think about what they have to lose. They don’t use their nukes, and things proceed as they would conventionally if neither side had nukes. If we approach a conventional victory we negotiate with them, we offer not to kill their leaders etc — we want them to have a lot to lose if they do a last-minute nuclear exchange. The big advantages of the simple approach are that it’s simple and easy to understand, and it’s unlikely to result in a nuclear war. The disadvantage is that we lose whatever advantages we get from bluffing; our victories are limited to what we can win conventionally.
I claim the risk of global nuclear war is consistently too big to justify our little bluffing victories. I’m open to being convinced that sometimes the spoils do justify that risk.
_So what’s our alternative? We’re back to escalation. War has a way of expanding itself unpredictably (we ought to know that by now!). Sooner or later (sooner probably) somebody is at the edge of losing something they can’t afford to lose, particularly somebody not entirely rational- acting on religious impulses would qualify._
If they actually make a nuclear attack then we’re stuck, we have to hit them back or admit we aren’t going to. But if we’re talking to them while we fight, and they see they’re losing so they try the threat of escalation, we can show them what they’re choosing. That’s pretty sobering. Then we offer them a deal that’s a little better than they have a right to expect — not quite unconditional surrender, and we’re sympathetic to some of their problems, and we don’t taunt them or lord it over them, and we give them their best chance to back down gracefully.
If it does turn nuclear then it will be an object lesson for the world — we didn’t get what we wanted, they didn’t get what they wanted, having nukes didn’t really work. The one that did first-use nukes out of weakness lost big. A nation that is winning conventionally and uses nukes (because they want to win faster? Scare people? Kill the enemy?) gets a reputation that will serve them badly in other wars, and in most cases (and maybe all cases) wins less than they’d get from a conventional win.
AL, this is a topic where I appear to be the only visionary posting at the moment. I’ve been glad for the chance to get critiques.
I’ll try to tone it down.
J Thomas:
bq. [I]t’s been the custom that nuclear powers get a permanent seat in the UN security council.
-This claim of yours is just bizarre.- That’s an interesting take on things.
I seem to recall that it was the policy (not custom) that the significant contributors to the Allied victory in WWII got a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. And with it, veto powers.
Basically, because they were the leading original members of the UN in San Francisco. Which comprised, not to put too fine a point on it, the “good guys” as defined by the Allied side of things.
Let’s set aside the factoid that the USSR and UK did not have nukes when the SC first formed; I might be wrong about that, I am not precisely sure when the first SC session was held. I am pretty darned sure that France didn’t get nukes until well after it was seated with the “Big Five”. And it got its seat as a kind of postwar consolation prize along with part of Germany and Berlin.
But China’s place was taken by the Kuomintang government. I think you’ll agree that Taiwan never has had (very many) nukes, right?
Then — much later — Nixon either chumped Taiwan or played a masterstroke of diplomacy, depending on one’s point of view, and the Taiwanese found the locks on the doors changed — and the “China” seat in the SC was suddenly occupied by the PRC.
Edited to remove redundancy.
A number of these comments have Iran depicted as capable of acting against national self-interest. That’s unrealistic. In fact, in terms of national defense and priority, these days the Iranians are something of a reflection of the Israelis, but perhaps a couple of decades behind.
Nortius Maximus #44:
You’re correct; the Security Council had its first session in 1947 (in London; it moved to Lake Success, NY, 1947-51 and then to New York).
USSR tested it’s first atomic weapon 1949, UK 1952, France 1960.
J. Thomas #36:
Re: Arab breakthrough in Yom Kippur war: _”They did…”_
That is _very_ arguable. The Egyptian army breached the Bar-Lev line October 6-8, stopped the Israeli counter and consolidated October 8-14, then were smashed in their attempted resumed offensive October 14-15.
The Syrian army came close to breakthrough at time from 6 to 8 October, but failed and were on the defensive from that point on.
Regarding the possible Soviet intervention, possible USSR movement of nukes to the region, US going to DEFCON 3: surely this illustrates the potential for risky miscalculation in such circumstances. The USSR was likely tempted to think that it could safely intervene against Israel, due to the MAD relation with the USA.
Incidentally, see also the not-very veiled threats to Britain and France by the USSR during the Suez Invasion.
The British determination to expand its existing nuclear force, and the French decisions to press ahead with its nukes, were very likely related to that experience.
J. Thomas:
Regarding London as a target option, you’re almost certainly correct that Iran would _not_ risk that: if Iran were to strike London, Iran would cease to exist, even absent a US response.
200 thermonuclear MIRV warheads (current UK strategic arsenal IIRC) will spoil your whole day.
Whats more worrying would be a strike on a non-nuclear European state.
But even there the economic and radioactive collateral would almost certainly lead to British and/or French retaliatory strikes, even if the USA held fire.
But would Tehran realise that, if things were coming to that point?
I say again: the real worry about a potential nuclear state is the nature of its rulers and those rulers intentions, and the likelihood of miscalculation on either side.
What might it get away with under a deterrent shield; even more, what might it think it could get away with and miscalculate.
Mutual deterrence may work on even “less than ideally rational” regimes. Nazi Germany never used poison gas bombing against the UK in WW2, knowing that the UK would retaliate in kind.
But in the uncertainties and mis-estimates and errors and fear and rage of a conflict emerging by mistake, what could happen?
I contend it would be a lot better never to risk finding out.
How many times would could you rerun equivalents of Cuba or Yom Kippur before the cards come up aces and eights?
And as A.L. said: “We’ve got some time”: there is still time enough for the possibility of avoiding the “nuclear Iran”/”war with Iran” dilemma.
_” The USA and israel are the ones who don’t believe that, so far.”_
I thought we’d already established that the US using these weapons first was absurd? So again, you are either wrong our our enemies are irrational. Might want to think about the consequences of both of those.
_”Nobody who has a nation that can build nukes has little to lose. They can have their nation and their people.”_
Again- that is your determination based on good solid modern Western thinking. Its a dangerous thing to assume everyone in the world thinks that way. Can you think of any historical examples of world leaders with little regard for their people? I think we could come up with a name or two.
_”The complicated approach is to tell them what we think our vital interests are and let them tell us what they claim their vital interests are, and then if they believe we’re bluffing they can fail to back down and see if we nuke them.”_
Thats not an approach, its an eventuality. That’s the complicated version? Do you play much p0ker JT?
_”The simple approach is to tell them we aren’t going to nuke them unless they use nukes first.”_
Huzzah, they already know that. This idea that they are quaking in fear of a first nuke strike is a total cannard. It reeks of apologist.
_”They look at their nukes and they look at our nukes. They think about what they have to lose.”_
Human beings arent computer programs. I have to go back to p0ker- two ‘honest’ players would play open hands and the worst hand would fold every time. Does that sound remotely like how anything in real life works?
_”I claim the risk of global nuclear war is consistently too big to justify our little bluffing victories. “_
You are completely confusing me. You keep saying the only reason to have nukes is to defend from nukes, and that nobody is going to use nukes first, but also that the threat of nuclear war is now too high?
How is it that proliferation doesnt worry you but global nuclear war does? Im at a loss.
_”But if we’re talking to them while we fight, and they see they’re losing so they try the threat of escalation, we can show them what they’re choosing.”_
Do you really believe this nonsense? Didnt you just say you were worried about too much titty-bumping accidently causing a global nuclear war? This is just incoherent.
_”If it does turn nuclear then it will be an object lesson for the world”_
At least there’s a silver lining…
This whole idea is predicated on irrational actors acting rationally. Its dangerous in the extreme. How many times did the US and USSR go to the brink of nuclear war, sometimes because of sheer accident? Thats with (at the time) very modern systems and professionals running them. Now we’re talking about tin horn dictators who think Allah has big plans for him being woken in the dead of night with the go/no-go decision because radar picked up a blip and the decision cycle is about 30 seconds.
Let me put it this way- the fewer individuals that can start WW3 because they are having a bad day, or are off their meds, or a blip on radar, or because Allah said so, the better.
#17 from Mark Buehner at 5:26 am on Dec 05, 2007
_Everyone that isnt a loonytoon knows the US isnt going to launch a first nuclear strike, yes._
Our policy towards Iran and their “weapons Program” publicly does not rule out the use of tactical Nuclear weapons. Who is the loony Toon here? All you are saying is that you don’t “think” we would use them. I do not think that is the impression our policy is crafted to make on Iran. Your comment is pretty meaningless.
_Whats the difference to the victims?_
Another meaningless rhetorical comment.
_The entire point of MAD is that you threaten something insanely immoral in the hope of preventing something insanely immoral from happening to you. Whats the material difference?_
The point of MAD had nothing to do with morality. It had to do with a logical defense posture in the situation we were in vis-a-vis the Soviet Union. The only way to *prevent either side* from launching a first strike was to guarantee that the price would be mutual annihilation. Your “plan” if you caould call it that has nothing to do with MAD and everything to do with rather bizarre exercise of power. We become the nuclear policeman for the world, tie everyone we do not like or exercises a choice that they do not want to join the NPT and essentially set off a Doomsday Machine in host countries.
Great script for a Marvel Comic.
Anybody that wants off the threat list simply has to verifiably renounce nukes.
Gee thanks.
_And thanks for making my point about people freaking out.
“And this is a bad thing?”_
To put the comment in context
*Any time required to stop and think and we will find reasons not to do it.*
_And this is a bad thing?_
My point is that you do not want to stop and think. Do you seriously think stopping and thinking is a bad thing? you want
_No. I didnt make a moral judgement, I made a statement i believe to be likely. But it certainly turns the idea of MAD (or at least reprisal) on its head._
Who is talking about a moral judgment? By the way, I suggest you read up on MAD before you use it in an argument. What you are speaking about has nothing to do with Mutually Assured Destruction. Trynot to use terms incorrectly. It wastes peoples time
_Anyone arguing its fine for Iran etc to posess nukes because they wouldnt be crazy enough to use them better have an answer as to whether they believe we have the will to use them in reprisal._
Who is arguing that? Certainly not me. Great Strawman
_Do we have the stones to obliterated 10 million Iranians if they slip a nuke to Hezbollah?_
This is by far the funniest comment I have heard in years. Is this supposed to be some sort of rallying cry?
_”Our policy towards Iran and their “weapons Program” publicly does not rule out the use of tactical Nuclear weapons. Who is the loony Toon here?”_
I think its pretty clear you are.
#51 from Mark Buehner at 9:28 pm on Dec 05, 2007
“Our policy towards Iran and their “weapons Program” publicly does not rule out the use of tactical Nuclear weapons. Who is the loony Toon here?”
I think its pretty clear you are.
Can you point out where that is clear? Or is this another thing that you “think” is true.
You come up with a completely cockeyed scheme based on a complete misinterpretation and misuse of a specific term, MAD. I point that out and your response is that it makes it clear that I am a loony?
OK, whatever you say. Loony Toon is a phrase you brought up to defend a very weak and misinformed argument. I suppose insulting people rather than rationally debating is your MO. Again, OK. Now I know what to expect from you.
Anyone that believe the US will actually use a nuclear weapon in a first strike is a Looney Tune, and it has nothing to do with announced US policy. We dont have a policy against invading Western Europe and enslaving the French either. Do I need to make it any plainer? If you believe the US would conceivably use a nuclear weapon as an instrument of policy, you are a looney tune. Hope that cleared things up.
PS- just to make it clear, i dont see any point in arguing with looney tunes. You have your view of America, who we are, what we are willing to do, and what color the sky is- it just doesnt match mine or the rest of the rational world. Thats all.
_Let’s set aside the factoid that the USSR and UK did not have nukes when the SC first formed; I might be wrong about that, I am not precisely sure when the first SC session was held._
No, you’re right about that. But for a good long time the four nuclear powers were 4 of the 5 permanent SC members. And soon after china got nukes we put china in as the fifth member.
Israel and south africa never publicly announced getting nukes, nor did taiwan. So it makes sense they wouldn’t be invited into the SC nuclear club. But india and pakistan got nukes and there has been no attempt to expand the SC club.
For awhile there it was 5 permanent SC members who were the 5 nuclear nations. This surely increased the prestige of nukes.
_”For awhile there it was 5 permanent SC members who were the 5 nuclear nations. This surely increased the prestige of nukes.”_
Bass Ackwards.
JT – huh? When did Mao’s China get nukes?? – 1964.
Mainland China in the UN and on the Security Council? – 1971.
Come on – get the basic facts right…
A.L.
#53 from Mark Buehner at 9:57 pm on Dec 05, 2007
_Anyone that believe the US will actually use a nuclear weapon in a first strike is a Looney Tune, and it has nothing to do with announced US policy._
This is what you think. Nothing more.
The facts are, the United States Strategic Nuclear Defense Policy for the first 15 years of the Cold Aar was first strike capability. It was replaced by MAD when we no longer had the ability to effictively wipe out the Soviet capability to respond after a first strike. Read a little about it you might be able to enlighten yourself.
As far as the Use of tactical nuclear weapns being used against hardened Nuclear facilities. No options have been taken off the table and the administration has asked for the development of these type of weapons, so get your facts straight.
_We dont have a policy against invading Western Europe and enslaving the French either._
Good, don’t address the issue make meaningless statements like this one
_Do I need to make it any plainer?_
Yes, you do.
_If you believe the US would conceivably use a nuclear weapon as an instrument of policy, you are a looney tune._
The United States has used Nuclear Weapons as an instrument of Policy since they were developed. We have never renounced the right to launch a first strike. The only reason that the Soviets ever did is that it was to their advantage, when we had First Strike capability and they didn’t.
I think all of this is very good strategic thinking. You make these statements, all people names and the fact of the matter is that you do not have the slightest idea of what you are talking about.
_PS- just to make it clear, i dont see any point in arguing with looney tunes._
Yet even more name calling.
_You have your view of America, who we are, what we are willing to do,_
Not only that I have a clear view of our defense posture.
_and what color the sky is_ This is, I imagine is supposed to be clever?
_it just doesnt match mine_
No it doesn’t.
_or the rest of the rational world. Thats all._
Are you saying that the entire American Defense establishment for the past 60 years is not in the rational world?
If you are uninformed, educate yourself, don’t call people names. It is not only not very effective nor does it doesn’t intimidate anyone, nor does it refect very well on you, nor does it do anything to support your position. Just my opinion, for what it is worth..
Mark B.,
At the risk of being thought looney by you, I feel the need to say that is very conceivable to me that the US might indeed launch a first-strike nuclear attack against another country. This belief has nothing to do with my opinion of who we are as a people, a nation, a place or a society. It has everything to do with my opinion of human nature, history and the fact all it takes is for one individual to make the decision and that there is a chain of command, each link of which is extremely well trained to obey a command regardless of the reasonableness of the command, that will carry out that decision in a flash.
If the threat is perceived to be grave enough and the consequences of not acting significant enough and the efficacy of non-nuclear force suspect enough, I believe that someone with a mindset similar to that of our current VP might very well order such a tactical strike and that it would be carried out.
If we are truly engaged in a struggle between good and evil, and the circumstances were right, why wouldn’t we? If we believed an enemy had the capability and intent of causing us severe harm and the best way of ending that threat was judged to be a tactical nuclear strike, we just might, depending upon what kind of leader we had elected, call for such a strike.
The decision to drop a nuke on two Japanese cities in order to end WWII was a decision to use nukes as an instrument of policy. It’s hard to believe that the fact that Japan had attacked first had much bearing on the decision to use nukes. The decision hung on its perceived efficacy and the perceived cost of NOT dropping the nukes.
We would invade western europe and enslave the french if such actions were perceived to reduce or eliminate a serious enough threat. We are as practical a nation as any other.
_”We would invade western europe and enslave the french if such actions were perceived to reduce or eliminate a serious enough threat. We are as practical a nation as any other.”_
Yes. But the idea that this is a reasonable enough scenario to base policy on it is, again, looney. That is the point.
Look kids- we dropped 2 nukes on Japan long before the nuclear Taboo existed. I’m not going to go through the evolution of mankinds relationship with nuclear weapons, but lets just say by the development of the H bomb in the early 50s the world had a very different take on what they were than in WW2. This weapon is perhaps so unlike any other its HAD to be demonstrated to be understood.
Skip ahead to the Cold War- with _our survival at stake_ in an arms race with the Soviets, we developed our nuclear doctrines. In fits and starts, depending on the cabalitiies of both sides. Before the nuclear submarines provided a guaranteed 2nd strike platform, the idea that a preemptive strike might be necessary was logical in that there was a real chance the first strike would destroy any ability to respond. Hence retaining your right to a first strike keeps the enemy from edging too close to their own first strike line and eliciting a preemption. This is pure self defense in a world where there is no second strike.
It also became US POLICY that our decision to use nukes would be intentionally ambiguous. This kept the Soviets with a real fear that pushing too hard could trip some unknown American red line.
That is the key here- because all this nonsense TOC is spouting about American policy was born and raised _in that climate._ It remains in our Pentagon playbook for the same reason half the Cold War relics do- its been there so long nobody knows what to do with it.
For that matter I guarantee you there are plans in some dusty Pentagon file for the invasion of Canada. Does that make it a reasonable fear?
So, I will say this one last time- WHATEVER our official policy might say, this nation will never use a nuclear weapon in a first strike to impose our will. And yes- anyone that thinks that is an America-hating backstabber carrying our Enemys’ water. Or a lunatic.
You guys really have it in your thick skulls that Bush might drop a nuke on Iran just like that. I feel sorry for you.
Mark B.
Your opinion in this matter seems to me to be based on the belief that all of mankind has somehow together gone through an evolution about how the use of nuclear weapons is perceived and that a prohibition against their use has emerged that is so strong that no one will ever violate it.
I think that is an belief without any foundation.
I do not believe or fear that Bush will nuke Iran before he leaves office. I do, however, believe it is possible for a set of circumstances to arise sometime in the next 20 to 30 years in which the US may elect to use nuclear weapons, on a large or small scale, to eliminate a perceived existential threat.
For me the important question is what is the likelihood of such a threat ever arising, not what our response might be. It would be irresponsible in some situations not to use nuclear weapons to protect ourselves if the danger were severe enough and if conventional weapons were judged inadequate or risky.
Mark B.
p.s., I can assure you that there is no need to feel sorry for me. I seem to be able to function quite well, quite productively and quite happily. While appreciate your pity, I will ask you to take my word that it is misplaced.
Hey, how bout we get back to the NIE, eh? The really interesting topices are these:
Why is it that our intelligence services can’t shed any more meaningful light on the unanswered questions that the IAEA has regarding Iran’s nuclear program?
Why is it that it took four years to figure out that the weapons development program was frozen? Why the total 180 degree turn in the NIE in a scant 2 years, from high confidence in intent to develop to high confidence in a freeze? Is it just the nature of the operating environment, a change in sources – what? What’s the basis?
Why is it that, despite the freeze, the time estimate for a nuclear-armed Iran is almost unchanged? Could it be that it’s because enrichment, and not the mechanical design of the weapon, is the critical path? If so, does that not suggest that shutting down enrichment is as vital now as it was before we knew of the freeze?
What confidence do we have that, God forbid, should the program be re-started, our intelligence services can detect it in less than four years, or in any time frame sufficient to head it off before completion?
Look – it’s interesting to debate what American policy might be to a hypothetical nuclear armed Iran. I at a loss to predict with confidence what the presidential front runners in either party might do. But I would really rather not find out the hard way. The questions above need answers, but I fear that the current polical environment here and abroad will prevent that discussion from taking place.
“Why is it that, despite the freeze, the time estimate for a nuclear-armed Iran is almost unchanged? Could it be that it’s because enrichment, and not the mechanical design of the weapon, is the critical path?”
Bee Eye En Gee O
Unless NIE is prepared to make the distinction between nuclear bombs using uranium and plutonium this arguement is rendered moot by the simplicity of the uranium based weapon. Iran can do those w/ a computerized milling machine. What they may not have is the ability to work at the tolerances necessary for a plutonium based one.
_Why the total 180 degree turn in the NIE in a scant 2 years, from high confidence in intent to develop to high confidence in a freeze?_
I appear to be the only one on the face of the earth who doesn’t think there has been a 180 degree turn. At least if the WaPo’s description of the 2005 NIE can be believed:
bq. _The new National Intelligence Estimate includes what the intelligence community views as *credible indicators* that Iran’s military is conducting clandestine work. But the sources said there is *no information* linking those projects directly to a nuclear weapons program. What is clear is that Iran, mostly through its energy program, is acquiring and mastering technologies that could be diverted to bombmaking._
That doesn’t sound like high confidence to me. That sounds like reasonable suspicion about the existence of a program that can’t be confirmed. The 2007 NIE appears to move on two fronts by both confirming the existence of the program, while finding it suspended in 2003. Because the program is suspended, the main change in the NIE is that previously it was believed that Iran intended to develop nuclear weapons. Now “we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.” That doesn’t strike me as 180 degree turn (which would be we know that Iran does not currently intend to develop nuclear weapons) It’s a switch from certainty to uncertainty.
_Why is it that, despite the freeze, the time estimate for a nuclear-armed Iran is almost unchanged?_
Because both the 2005 NIE and the 2007 NIE found that Iran’s capability to create a nuclear bomb is progressing independently through its nuclear energy program and conventional weapons program. But we all appear to know that.
_”I do, however, believe it is possible for a set of circumstances to arise sometime in the next 20 to 30 years in which the US may elect to use nuclear weapons, on a large or small scale, to eliminate a perceived existential threat.”_
And I beleive its possible in the next 20 to 30 years we will see federal troops kicking the doors in of Muslim households and dragging women and children to concentration camps for slave labor and execution.
It _could_ happen. But guess what, allowing for that possibility in rational discourse as though it is anything other than an outlandish nightmare simply reinforces the propoganda of our enemies that depict us as violent, racists, murderous villians intent on destroying Islam.
So yeah, I get bent out of shape when _our_ people get so wrapped up in their ridiculous fantasies of Bushhitler that they start espousing outrageous blood libels against _ourselves._ Because people ARE listening. These juvenile fantasies are hurting us and hurting the world.
Sorry, but liberals are such hypocrites and have shown their penchant for only believing news/intel that fits their agenda.
When the US could not find WMDs in Iraq, they pilloried Bush for believing intel, including UN inpsection reports, that said Saddam had the weapons.
Now, just a few months after the same intel agencies told everyone Iran had an active nuke weapons program, they change their minds and say the program was stopped, though the components necessary for it are still in place (including the fact that Iran is still enriching uranium – a material only used in nuke weapons).
However, the Dems and other liberals are falling over themselves to condemn Bush for “lying” and saying Iran is not a threat. So now the intel is to be beleived at face value with no skepticism??!!
Ridiculous.
The logic of J Thomas “use nukes first loses” is that it does not address non-US actors.
If Iran nukes Israel first, through a surprise attack via Lebanon, what do they achieve and what do they pay?
Iran eliminates a nuclear competitor. Lose a few cities and perhaps a few million people (not much a concern for them so they have said, from Khomeni to Khameni to Rafsanjani to Ahmadinejad). But now stands alone as the major military power in the ME and can dictate how people in other countries act.
Why would not Iran strike first? Or consider Israel. If they are convinced that Iran will strike them first as soon as they are able, why not strike first with nukes to destroy the attacker (i.e. replay the 1967 Six Day War with nukes).
Moreover J Thomas misses the point about deniability. A state such as Iran can use Hezbollah as a deniable proxy to say, nuke Paris in support of an independent “Islamic Republic of France” and then issue more threats that are in effect unstoppable. Particularly since nukes can be used to “decapitate” foreign adversary leadership.
The US faces the threat of non-state adversaries who might think “destroy DC and NYC and America collapses just like the movies” and carry it out. Particularly since security and integrity of nuclear arsenals in places like Pakistan, Iran, India, and North Korea may not be high.
The biggest problem here is the Cold War thinking and “let’s party, no threat, peace in our time” that the NIE has produced. Iran is portrayed in the NIE as an innocent, non-hostile nation that will never ever make nuclear weapons. The Press and Dems have also pushed this view. What happens if say, Iran DOES produce nukes and uses them via Hezbollah to nuke DC and NYC, have Hezbollah issue “demands?” Or perhaps an organization unknown and which might have ties to Pakistan, Iran, or any other nation with nukes.
What is our response? What do we do then?
IMHO pushing the NIE political actions further, this NIE seems to strongly suggest that Israel will nuke Iran first.
Israel is engaging in a “everything must go!” round of concessions to get any deal at all with Palestinians and Arab governments. Even Bibi who would gain electoral advantage is not making an issue of this. Why?
If Israel is determined to strike Iran before it is struck, this makes sense. “See how reasonable we are? We offered Jerusalem, all of it, to the Arabs!”
If Israel decides to strike, it is pretty much limited to nukes on ICBMs. Quite messy but better than seeing Tel Aviv turned into a glowing crater. Olmert and Barak have said they don’t buy the NIE.
bq. When the US could not find WMDs in Iraq, they pilloried Bush for believing intel, including UN inpsection reports, that said Saddam had the weapons.
Sorry, MIke, bad memory…I don’t recall either the UN inspectors or “intel” stating unequivocally that Saddam had WMDs, which is what Bush, Cheney and Powell were saying. Feel free to refresh me on this.
Perhaps the complaint isn’t about the intel but with they way it seems to be “cherry-picked” and presented to the public?
But I do think it is a valid question to ask who released this latest Iran NIE report and why.
Owen: _Why is it that it took four years to figure out that the weapons development program was frozen? Why the total 180 degree turn in the NIE in a scant 2 years, from high confidence in intent to develop to high confidence in a freeze? Is it just the nature of the operating environment, a change in sources – what? What’s the basis?_
My guess is that Cheney is looking like enough of a lame duck that they’re no longer letting him tell them what to report.
Mike: _Now, just a few months after the same intel agencies told everyone Iran had an active nuke weapons program, they change their minds and say the program was stopped, though the components necessary for it are still in place (including the fact that Iran is still enriching uranium – a material only used in nuke weapons)._
Iran is enriching uranium, yes. Are they enriching a little bit of uranium enough to use in bombs or are they enriching a lot of uranium enough to use in reactors?
One way, they’re probably making expensive lo-tech bombs. The other way, they’re making a reactor that they could use to get plutonium for bombs.
My guess is the latter. U235 bombs are expensive and they don’t get cheaper after you have one. But once they can make lots of plutonium then they can build as many cheap reactors as they want — and their claim they want power reactors rings true. They have their own uranium and they want to use it effectively. Once they have a working reactor it’s far easier to separate out plutonium than to separate U235. Their uranium is then not mostly dross, it’s mostly raw material. HEU gives them a few expensive bombs using technology that points to nukes. Plutonium gives them cheap (but hi-tech finicky) bombs as a side effect of their reactor program.
So once they have a LEU reactor that gives them enough plutonium to build plutonium reactors faster than they can enrich LEU to make U235 reactors, I expect them to shut down their centrifuges and say it’s a big concession. They can let us inspect their old centrifuges and confirm that they only made LEU.
#65 – PD Shaw
bq Because both the 2005 NIE and the 2007 NIE found that Iran’s capability to create a nuclear bomb is progressing independently through its nuclear energy program and conventional weapons program. But we all appear to know that.
Yes. Enrichment is the critical path for Iran, not the mechanics of the weapon itself.
And yes, you may be the only one who believes it isn’t a 180 from 2005. The pundits I’ve heard so far seem to think it is. You might be right on the substance, but the tone seems like a 180. Perhaps my own personal bias? The headlines certainly advertise it as a 180, and I don’t think that the public at large will read enough of it to draw a different conclusion.
#70 – Alan
bq But I do think it is a valid question to ask who released this latest Iran NIE report and why.
The Bush administraion chose to release it. The alternative was to wait for it to be leaked. Being accused of trying to spin the report is preferrable to being accused of trying to cover it up.
_Israel is engaging in a “everything must go!” round of concessions to get any deal at all with Palestinians and Arab governments. Even Bibi who would gain electoral advantage is not making an issue of this. Why?_
Because Bush is leaving office soon. Kind of like Clinton’s last year, no?
#71 – J Thomas
_My guess is that Cheney is looking like enough of a lame duck that they’re no longer letting him tell them what to report._
That thought crossed my mind, but I’m not convinced. I’m not sure which organization has less credibility after the past few years – the VP’s office or our intelligence community. I trust neither. To the extent that his declining influence may have allowed the community to finally put it’s best guess forward, it seems equally possible that his declining influence may have allowed them to simply go get some payback.
There is the third possibility that it’s a legitimate change of opinion for the intel people and Chaney decided that it’s better to live with it in the public domain and regroup diplomatically.
Jim, it’s been reported that Israel and Britain both place the timeline for an Iranian nuclear weapon closer to 2015. “(Link)”:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080101453_pf.html I haven’t seen any suggestion that Israel has changed that assessment; they just disagree with the 2007 NIE’s assessment of Iranian intent. And since intent doesn’t alter the speed at which Iran develops capability, I’m still not sure that’s material.
None of the following we directed at me, but they do continue an established pattern
#59 from Mark Buehner at 11:21 pm on Dec 05, 2007
_Look kids-_
More name calling and condescension.
_And yes- anyone that thinks that is an America-hating backstabber carrying our Enemys’ water. Or a lunatic._
More name calling. This time more wild eyed and extreme.
_You guys really have it in your thick skulls that Bush might drop a nuke on Iran just like that. I feel sorry for you._
More condescension and insults. There is plenty more of this laced through out your posts. Just what is it that you feel gives you the right to behave like this?
The people hear are adults and for the most part behave has such. They come here to have a discussion not to listen to these sort of childish rants.
Would you please be so kind as to give people a modicum of respect rather than go off on these rude and uncalled for rants? You know exercise a minimum of self-control. Your behavior not only does nothing for your position, but brings down the level of discussion and the level of enjoyment people get from what is a pretty good site.
Is that too much to ask?
TOC, i thought i made it clear we were done talkin. That should solve your problem. Happy Holidays.
_To the extent that his declining influence may have allowed the community to finally put it’s best guess forward, it seems equally possible that his declining influence may have allowed them to simply go get some payback._
We know that politicians do that regularly. If our civil service professionals are doing much of it then I fear for the nation.
_There is the third possibility that it’s a legitimate change of opinion for the intel people and Chaney decided that it’s better to live with it in the public domain and regroup diplomatically._
Yes, but what evidence could there be? Even if we have eyewitnesses who say they shut down the centrifuges (but didn’t tell anyone to save face?) how can we be sure there aren’t more centrifuges? Or maybe they’ve been using a thorium process. It’s a big country, and they could be doing anything we lack proof they aren’t doing. Evidence that they aren’t making nukes is negative evidence.
There can’t be solid evidence that they quit. There can be evidence that the evidence we used to rely on was garbage. Maybe my reasoning here is wrong. It doesn’t feel right to me, but I haven’t found the bad assumption.
_you may be the only one who believes it isn’t a 180 from 2005._
I thought so too, but this morning, I’ve got “John Bolton”:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/05/AR2007120502234.html on my side:
bq. _the headline finding — that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 — is written in a way that guarantees the totality of the conclusions will be misread. In fact, there is little substantive difference between the conclusions of the 2005 NIE on Iran’s nuclear capabilities and the 2007 NIE. Moreover, the distinction between “military” and “civilian” programs is highly artificial, since the enrichment of uranium, which all agree Iran is continuing, is critical to civilian and military uses. Indeed, it has always been Iran’s “civilian” program that posed the main risk of a nuclear “breakout.”_
bq. _The real differences between the NIEs are not in the hard data but in the psychological assessment of the mullahs’ motives and objectives. The current NIE freely admits to having only moderate confidence that the suspension continues and says that there are significant gaps in our intelligence and that our analysts dissent from their initial judgment on suspension. This alone should give us considerable pause._
While I don’t necessarily endorse the rest of the article, this point strikes me as important. My sense of the reporting is that we don’t have to worry about Iran any more. But nothing has really changed.
PD, I’ve gotten a very different sense from the reporting than you have, apparently—and I read, watch, listen to all the notoriously liberally biased journalists (NYT, NPR, PBS, etc.).
My strong sense from the reporting that I have encountered about the revised estimate is that Iran’s potential nuclear capabilities are indeed a signficant worry, but that what is changed is this: a) international pressure has an impact; b) the threat is not imminenent and present (but rather future and potential) and that talk of military action is out of place with known reality.
There is an important 180 in the difference between the belief that Iran is working furiously and inexorably to develop a nuclear weapon as soon as possible and the belief that Iran has abandoned (in 2003) a program to develop a nuclear weapon.
The latter belief does not require a companion belief that everything is fine and we can all go back to sleep now.
I hope so Mark. My media sampling may be sketchy, but I pick-up more statements like this: “new questions about why Bush continued to warn the American public about a threat from Iran two months after being told a new assessment was in the works.” “CNN”:http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/12/05/bush.iran/
PD, but that seems like a reasonable and fair question to me. Given the nature of Bush’s statements, it would seem that he had version 1 in mind…I mean that his picutre of Iran’s threat was one that was imminent. If he knew that picture was being revised, it could be argued that he was being misleading and deceptive. of course, he may have had very good geopolitically strategic motives for being misleading and deceptive…perhaps he wanted to get more countries on board with sanctions BEFORE the news got out. I don’t know. So much is possible and we know so little. However, I cannot fault the media for asking the question. Especially in view of the rhetoric that was used to persuade opinion in the lead up to the Iraq invasion, and the subsequent discovery of exaggerated fears re WMD. I think strong skepticism…even suspicion…is healthy in this instance. I think there is good reason to question his honesty and his judgement.
If I understand correctly, this is the statement made by Bush in October:
“If you’re interested in avoiding World War III, it seems like you ought to be preventing [Iran] from having the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.”
That statement seems true to me today as it did then. The strategic threat here is that Iran’s nuclear program encourages Arab countries to develop their own nuclear deterrent. In the last year, thirteen states in the region have stated they want nuclear power. “Link with map and projected completion dates”:http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1101/p01s03-wome.html I believe many of them have said they will do so under IAEA auspices, but if Iran won’t then I doubt they ultimately will either.
PD, there are encouragements from all directions: nuclear equipped Pakistan, India, Russia, Israel, US military bases and naval assets. The region is rather crowded with nuclear arsenals.
PD, well, that is a statement made by Bush, interestingly part of a longer answer to the rather simple and straightforward question of whether he believed Iran was serious about acquiring nuclear weapons. If he knew that there was reason to believe that Iran had abandoned its nuclear weapons program, he might have answered the question differently.
But I think it is a mistake to believe that those who are questioning Bush’s judgement and honesty in this matter are basing their doubts solely on the one sentence that you quoted. Rather many of his statements, as well as Cheney’s Oct. 21st speech, would seem to imply a belief on their part that Iran was actively seeking to build a nuclear weapon. We now know that our intellegence agencies believe that Iran abandonded a once-existing program to do just that.
I don’t think you can ignore the fact that this administration aruged for and launched an invasion of Iraq principaly because they believed–or claimed to believe–that Iraq had an active nuclear weapons program.
You are divorcing the possibility of proposed action against the threat from the mere statement of the threat. Sure, no question, you can say that there is a danger that Iran may acquire nuclear weapons, which would be a dangerous situation. But that’s not all that’s going on here. The questions of how imminent is that threat and what do you do about it loom quite large, especially given recent history. To expect others to ignore all of this and to not ask questions is, I think, a road that can only lead to disappointment.
Syria has proposed having the entire middle east be a nuclear-weapons-free zone. Probably all the arab governments would be glad to do that.
It’s no wonder lots of countries want nuclear power. Oil is above $90/barrel, right? Then there’s coal…. You can argue that countries that have lots of oil ought to burn it instead of sell it to us, but there are some problems with that….
If we want to avoid WWIII probably the most important thing would be for us and the russians to reduce our nuclear stockpiles to around 250 warheads or so each. If we do that then even if we get into a nuclear war it would probably not involve more than about 1000 nuclear explosions, while at present it might easily be close to 15,000.
_PD, there are encouragements from all directions: nuclear equipped Pakistan, India, Russia, Israel, US military bases and naval assets. The region is rather crowded with nuclear arsenals._
Yes, its a dangerous area, but we’re talking about developments in the last year, not previous decades:
bq. _This week Egypt became the 13th Middle Eastern country in the past year to say it wants nuclear power, intensifying an atomic race spurred largely by Iran’s nuclear agenda, which many in the region and the West claim is cover for a weapons program._
bq. _Experts say the nuclear ambitions of majority Sunni Muslim states such as Libya, Jordan, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia are reactions to Shiite Iran’s high-profile nuclear bid, seen as linked with Tehran’s campaign for greater influence and prestige throughout the Middle East._
bq. _”To have 13 states in the region say they’re interested in nuclear power over the course of a year certainly catches the eye,” says Mark Fitzpatrick, a former senior nonproliferation official in the US State Department who is now a fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. “The Iranian angle is the reason.”_
“Christian Science Monitor (Nov. 1, 2007)”:http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1101/p01s03-wome.html
Bottom line. I wouldn’t want a nuclear arms race in the Balkans in 1907, wouldn’t want one in the Middle East in 2009.
_It’s no wonder lots of countries want nuclear power._
I don’t have a problem with Middle East countries developing nuclear power, so long as its in compliance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Iran has not acted in compliance, it hid its nuclear energy program and now we know why. Its program had an energy component and a weapons program. As I see it, the problem now is that Iran can’t come into compliance with IAEA mandates without accounting for that weapons program. Will it? Or will it cherrypick the publicity from the 2007 NIE, distract and delay?
Iran can’t allow full IAEA inspections without showing us exactly where to bomb.
I think maybe it was a mistake for us to use the inspection program that way. It makes cooperation harder.
#77 from Mark Buehner at 2:47 pm on Dec 06, 2007
TOC, i thought i made it clear we were done talkin. That should solve your problem. Happy Holidays.
Never had a problem, Mark. Nice to see that you are attempting to be a little more civil though.
I still don’t understand why post-Hezbollah war there would be Israeli broad-political spectrum agreement for any kind of peace deal. Bush’s last years or not. Particularly with Barak who was burned out of office on Clinton’s deal. Unless there was the desire to secure the rear in preparation with war with the existential enemy.
Nor do I understand how reducing our or the Russian’s nuclear arsenal affects threats from Iran or Pakistan (or other nuclear countries). If anything by reducing massive retaliation we increase risk of attack through deniable proxies.
Jim, is there a broad-spectrum israeli consensus for a binding peace agreement? Or is it just that time when israel feels obliged to make a show of offering a comprehensive settlement that they can then announce for the next 8 years was rejected by the warmongering palestinians?
_Nor do I understand how reducing our or the Russian’s nuclear arsenal affects threats from Iran or Pakistan (or other nuclear countries). If anything by reducing massive retaliation we increase risk of attack through deniable proxies._
By a sort of system’s-hypnosis, you have learned to consider a strike with 100 nukes as not massive retaliation.
One nuke each on your top 100 cities will ruin your whole economy. If you’re trying to run an army that has supply lines, those supply lines will not have much to pump through them. That’s more true for a country with 50 million people than it is for a country with 300 million, but it’s pretty much true all around. People talk about crazy leaders who think they can get hit by 50 nukes and come out ahead. There may be some crazy leaders like that, but there won’t be after it happens once.
So, you’re thinking iran might give a nuke to Hisbollah and tell them to blow up israel or lebanon or whatever, and then the iranians say “It wasn’t us, none of our nukes are missing, it was that damn Hezbollah, go kill them”. And you figure they’ll think that’s OK when we only have 250 bombs when they’d be too scared if we had 7000, because … because … because 7000 is enough we’d just throw them around like confetti but with only 250 we’d be stingy with them? Because 20 nukes wouldn’t be enough to hurt them, if we decided to just hit them with 20? Because if we only have 250 bombs it makes us look like we aren’t a superpower so they can ignore us?
If they think they can get away with something like that it’s because they think they won’t get caught. The difference between 250 bombs and 7000 bombs has nothing to do with it.
If one nuke goes off in israel and israel stops being a nation, but 10 nukes go off in iranian cities — even 5 nukes — iranians that year and in their later histories are not going to think of it as a victory. They’re going to remember it as a disaster.
One nuke can spoil your whole city.
Lots of nukes is no more deterrent than 250 nukes.In both cases, we will completely and perfectly deter people who didn’t want to do what we’re deterring them from doing.
J Thomas: In most of what I read that you’ve written on this subject, it appears you’re presuming that the only direct effect or purpose of a nuclear warhead is to threaten or kill populations.
You also seem to be assuming that the delivery systems and warheads are (nearly) 100% effective — no system failures, yields nominal.
Have you actually read any of Herman Kahn? Not to brag, but… I have. And he, or any other competent analyst, would take issue with those elements of your stance.
I probably don’t count as a competent analyst, but I felt these matters have to be voiced. There do exist strategic targets that are not populations. Weapons systems are not 100% reliable. And as the old saw has it, no plan survives reality (/contact with the enemy).
Nort
mark (#58) – when you say “At the risk of being thought looney by you, I feel the need to say that is very conceivable to me that the US might indeed launch a first-strike nuclear attack against another country.”
…I’m curious – why do you not think it conceivable that any other country might do so? And if you do think it’s conceivable, why not mention it?
A.L.
Nortius, I read Kahn a long time ago but not recently, so I may have forgotten some of it.
I don’t believe there is any public data about failure rates, reasonably enough. The last I heard, before we tested an ICBM we always checked it very carefully and fixed anything that might be wrong with it, because we reasonably didn’t want foreigners to ever see a test fail. So to discuss it we have to make assumptions about what we don’t know.
The first issue is fail-safe. We want to be sure that a nuke that misses its target by too much doesn’t explode in the wrong country. Like, say, ours. No doubt we have mechanisms in place to prevent that. However, as Gall points out, “Fail-safe systems fail by failing to fail safe.”. But this problem doesn’t affect the question of how many nukes to keep ready. Whatever the failure rate, the more we launch the more will fail and the more will fail unsafely.
Now, for purposes of discussion I will assume that half our nuclear warheads fail to explode at their targets for one reason or another. If the number is much above that, then I want to question what the hell we think we’re doing.
If we have 250 nukes ready, that says at any given time we can successfully hit 125 targets. Or we can be very sure we can hit 50 targets with no feedback about whether we hit or not. Or if we find out which targets are still there after the first couple of rounds then we can be 100% sure about around 100 targets. I think this is enough.
As a related matter, we have lots of plutonium stored and we can make more nukes if we want to, provided those facilities aren’t destroyed. How fast can we make them? Can we make 250 nukes in 6 weeks? 6 months? I’m sure that number is classified too, though we could guess from the rate that we reconstitute existing nukes. If the USA survives a nuclear attack with a lot of damage, and in 6 months we don’t think we’ve gotten enough revenge, we can hit them again. This isn’t guaranteed, but it’s certainly part of the deterrent.
_it appears you’re presuming that the only direct effect or purpose of a nuclear warhead is to threaten or kill populations._
I want to spread that idea. All through the cold war we assumed that we could use nukes for other purposes and get away with it, while the russians claimed that after any nuclear attack they would retaliate against our cities. It never got tested. We kept theorizing that we could use nukes for something else but we never got around to trying it out. It was a fantasy inside our heads. Every time we go the chance to use nukes for some other purpose we chickened out.
Many of our own strategists believed that any use of nuclear weapons would inevitably escalate to full nuclear war. If too many of us had thought otherwise we *would* have tried it out, and there would be data to test these speculations. So maybe the idea that in a nuclear world nukes are only useful as deterrents is a self-fulfilling prophesy. But still, it’s fulfilled so far. We have never actually tried to use nukes for anything but deterrent.
Well, maybe we’ve tried to use nukes as threats for something else. We used nuclear threat to prevent a nuclear standoff between israel and egypt in 1973. We used nuclear threat to keep the russians from invading western europe. We used nuclear threat to stop Saddam from using nerve gas and biowarfare. But in each case against the russians we were deterring them — we were saying unless they caved in on minor points we would kill everybody in the world, and they did get deterred. There’s no evidence they actually planned to invade western europe, but regardless of whether they would have, we kept them from it.
I think that sort of threat is actually more credible with 250 nukes than with 7000. One way we’re saying “This is so important to us that we’re willing to sacrifice part of our population and our economic standing and so on, to stop you.” The other way we’re saying “This is so important to us that we’re willing to kill everybody in the world to stop you.” Which of those threats would you believe easier? Either way, it’s a stupid trick that can be expected to fail often enough that the risk outweighs the reward.
_And as the old saw has it, no plan survives reality (/contact with the enemy)._
Yes, exactly. We have plans to win limited nuclear wars. So far we’ve never trusted any of them enough to try them out. So far, neither has anybody else.
“…very conceivable to me that the US might indeed launch a first-strike nuclear attack against another country.”
_why do you not think it conceivable that any other country might do so?_
I’ll answer that. I think it’s inevitable that someday some national leader will feel that making a nuclear attack is better than any of his other options. As long as there are nations, and some nation has nukes, and they don’t have anything more destructive, that chance will be there and someday it will happen.
It will end badly. They will be an object lesson to anyone else who thinks the same way. Probably by the third time pretty much everybody will get the idea.
A.L.
“…I’m curious – why do you not think it conceivable that any other country might do so? And if you do think it’s conceivable, why not mention it?”
I want to say that, of course, I think it conceivable that any other country might do so. I didn’t explicitly say that for two obvious reasons. 1) I was directly answering the claim that it was looney to believe that US would do so—-other countries weren’t involved in the assertion that I was questioning. 2) the belief that other countries would also do so was implicit in the nature of my whole response, i.e. that my belief was based upon my understanding of human nature and history and specifically NOT about Americans as Americans, that is to say, as something apart from humanity at large. Indeed, the very argument I was making is that at such a fundamental level of fear/survival, etc., Americans are the same as everyone else and it would be a mistake to believe that we would behave differently from others. (It is a further mistake to believe that, regardless of our own beliefs about ourselves, others will believe in our exceptionality.)
If it were not conceivable that any country, including the US, that had nuclear weapons might actually use them then it would be difficult to explain why nuclear weapons engender the fear that they do as well as the very kind of taboo that Mark B. believes is going to keep countries from using them.
In short, I don’t think Americans are any better or any worse than people who aren’t Americans. I don’t see anything in our cultural makeup that would inhibit us from using nuclear weapons if we thought it was a matter of our own survival and that includes first-strike use.
A.L., please don’t misunderstand me. I opposed the invasion of Iraq because I did not view Iraq as a significant enough threat to warrant an invasion and therefore see it as an immoral act. If I had seen Iraq as a threat, I would have supported the invasion. I do not oppose first-strike use of nukes as a matter of principal. The circumstances under which force is used is the vital key to judgement. I don’t think there is any principal in the word that cannot be violated under the proper circumstances.
_”If it were not conceivable that any country, including the US, that had nuclear weapons might actually use them then it would be difficult to explain why nuclear weapons engender the fear that they do as well as the very kind of taboo that Mark B. believes is going to keep countries from using them.”_
Stable nations with leaders not under the threat of death or expulsion, and even then there is always the risk of accident or misunderstanding.
The idea that the US will ever be in the situation you are describing vis-a-vis a decision between survival and first strike is so unlikely in the context we are talking about as to be unserious. If we are talking about another Cold War type standoff its still unrealistic due to our second strike capability. This idea that rogue states might have a good point about needing a nuke to defend against a first US strike just doesnt hold water (and hence my comment about carrying our enemies by taking it seriously).
The contadiction i’m not understanding is why rogue nations will be ok with nukes because they wont use them, but the US might. This isnt even putting the US and NK/Iran on an even footing, seems to me it makes the US look worse.
Mark B., I’ve never argued it’s okay for rogue states to have nukes or that they wouldn’t use them but the that US would. I can understand, however, how a rogue state (or any state, for that matter) might genuinely fear an attack by the US and also believe that having nukes might stave off such an attack. I can also understand (and foresee) a situation in which the US, fearing that that state might acquire nukes AND use them in a first strike against the US, would decide to use nukes to prevent that state from acquiring them.
Whether or not you (or I) believe the US would ever do such a thing is an academic point since neither you or I are going to acquire nukes. The question is whether or not another state might genuinely believe it or if such a fear must necessarily be an invented pretext on their part. Whether or not you think their arguments hold water doesn’t much matter.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that Iran believes that the US might invade. They then have to decide whether having nukes reduces or increases that possibility. We have to figure out what their decision is and, if it is to acquire nukes, we then have to decide what we will do to prevent it.
Keep in mind that rogue states don’t necessarily see themselves as rogue states, or in turn, see the US as a stable and benign entity. They are going to act according to their perceptions, not our arguments.