Is nuclear deterence morally defensible?

Is nuclear deterrence morally defensible? 

 

It is hard to morally defend nuclear deterrence, but, to follow the realist train of thought, nuclear weapons exist and are now an established part of the security dilemma faced by the world’s great and regional nuclear powers (US, Russia, China, India, France, Britain, Israel, and Pakistan).  The threat of the annihilation of not only a foreign military, but the people, infrastructure, cities, culture – as former Secretary of Defense R. McNamara often expresses – the destruction of nations is not morally defensible.  I believe it is an unwinnable argument to try and convince others that the annihilation of a people is morally defensible.  However, the defense of one’s own people is morally defensible, it is absolutely necessary for the survival of a nation.  Therefore, offensive nuclear use is morally repugnant, but the maintenance of a nuclear deterrence in response to the threat of another nuclear nation is defensible. 

 

However, Iran is furiously working towards the development of a nuclear capability because of the threatening language (Axis of Evil) we continue to use against them.  I would propose that it is not morally defensible to blatantly threaten other nations, to the point of threatening pre-emptive nuclear force (remember, Secretary Rumsfeld brought up the use of low-yield “bunker busting” nuclear weapons as permissible to use in the “new age” post-September 11, with a not too-veiled threat aimed at Iran).  However, as Schelling wrote, “And before brute force succeeds when it is used, whereas the power to hurt is most successful when held in reserve.  It is the threat of damage, or of more damage to come, that can make someone yield or comply.”

 

I would also argue that some strategies of nuclear deterrence are more ethical than others.  Currently, I work for NATO and the current strategy we hold, in regards to nuclear weapons, is flexible response.  Despite what we see in popular culture, NATO, since the 1960s, has never intended a conflict to be settled through the immediate launching of all first-strike weapons – devastating the entire Warsaw Pact territory, followed by sea-launched, and land based second-strike weapons.  The doctrine of flexible response dictates a proportional use of force.  For example, if there had been an invasion of West Germany during the Cold War, we would have fought conventionally while using tactical (read: smaller, less damaging) short range nuclear missiles against military targets.  In response to a strike against a city like Brussels, where NATO head quarters is located, we would have destroyed a capital city of a Soviet Satellite state, example, Prague, or Budapest.  I realize it is very gut-wrenching to even think about what flexible response involves in terms of horrendous loss of life and destruction, but it does not involve the immediate launching of everything, and the wonton destruction of the entire northern-hemisphere.  I don’t believe flexible response is very morally defensible, but it is an attempt to rationalize the unfathomable and to put some sort of proportionality to nuclear deterrence. 

 

Question: I am writing about Cold War military strategies, but this is all changing now that we face global terrorism.  What if a nuclear terrorist attack took place in the US, or Europe against one of our allies, with ten-of-thousands of casualties, maybe more, in my opinion, “flexible response” is useless against a non-state actor.  How do we deter this?  What would be our response?  Shawn wrote earlier, in describing morality, that morality is conforming to standards of right or just behavior.  Does that same concept of morality apply when we are certain our enemies (terrorists) would not only not abide by these standards, but use them to their advantage?

 

 

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Personalities in the Second World War

To what extent can the outbreak of World War II be attributed to the personalities of the leaders involved? 

The personalities of the Great Powers in the years preceding the Second World War directly influenced events that led to conflict.  While systemic failures took place in the international system, such as the failure of Collective Security best exemplified by the League of Nation’s ineffectiveness in preventing conflict, which led to conflict, it was the personalities of world leaders that took the Great Powers to war.  Hitler, following a deranged ideology of racial superiority and anti-Semitism, led Germany to slowly dismantle the punitive measures of the Versailles Treaty which ended the First World War, then rearmed, and eventually sought territorial expansion at the expense of Austria and Czechoslovakia. Finally, his personal ambitions for lebensraum (living space) in the East led to the invasion of Poland, and the greater European conflict in 1939.  Hitler moved beyond realist international theories of maximizing power, it was his undoubted oratorical excellence, coupled with a diabolic plan of a single, armed, militant state, marching to war against lesser races, conquering and subjugating nations and people.  Many nations go to war, but unbridled aggression, a fascination with struggle and dominance, racism and the holocaust are uniquely the product of Hitler’s Germany. 

Mussolini, bandwagoning with the hegemonic Germany to form the Axis pact, used his Charisma and forceful personal leadership to drag Italy into the Second World War by attacking France in 1940.  Already losing his popular grip forged in the 20s, it took the single party state and its terror apparatus, dreamed up by Mussolini and his black shirts to force Italy into an unpopular conflict in 1940. 

Other leaders led their nations into the Second World War as well.  FDR’s oil embargo on the Japanese, though in response to Japanese aggressiveness and atrocities committed in building the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”, was a determining factor in the Japanese military hierarchy’s decision to invade the oil rich Dutch East Indies while simultaneously attacking the US Pacific Fleet in Hawaii territory.  FDR’s forceful policy pushed the Japanese to make desperate decisions leading to war.  Interestingly, the Japanese were not led by one personality bent on conquest, despite the vilification of Emperor Hirohito and General Tojo at the time, but by a collaborative group of military leaders. 

Finally, Stalin, always paranoid and Machiavellian, was willing to sign the Pact of Steel in 1939, carving up Poland with Germany, the ideological counterbalance to communism.  This pragmatic move, inspired Hitler to dismantle Poland, leading to the declarations of war by Great Britain and France. 

Personal decisions by leaders had an enormous effect on Germany, the UK, the USSR, and the US in the beginning of the Second World War.  My question is this: With greater media coverage of world events, the internet and free flowing information around the world, are leaders now more limited in their ability to manipulate populations to their own decisions?  Have vibrant democracies in the west made the risk of conflict based on personality less likely?

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