#Deterrence

[mapsontheweb]

1961 US map depicting a nuclear counterstrike using strategic bombers and long ranged missiles against the two preeminent Socialist powers, USSR and China.

#maps #1961 #cold war #deterrence

[nicklloydnow]

“This is not an all-out war but a decentralized one with seemingly unconnected fronts that span across continents. It is fought in a hybrid style, meaning both with tanks and planes and with disinformation campaigns, political interference, and cyberwarfare. The strategy blurs the lines between war and peace and combatants and civilians. It puts a lot of extra fog in the "fog of war."

China, Russia, and Iran disagree on many things, but they all have the same goal: ridding their regions of U.S. influence and creating a multipolar global governance system and Tehran, Beijing, and Moscow know that U.S. political and military might is the only force preventing them from imposing their will on their neighbors.

(…)

When it comes to this war, the United States is asleep at the wheel. U.S. strategy has been about preparation for a large conventional war, containment, and weak deterrence. Washington has been pitifully absent in the irregular warfare field. There are almost no punishments or accountability—besides ineffective sanctions—for the nations that attack us.

(…)

Should the Biden administration continue its ineffective course, these countries will only be emboldened. Should support for Israel or Ukraine fail, China will be more likely to invade Taiwan. Deterrence is a great strategy but only works when the other side believes you will carry out your threats. You must establish that understanding by holding your enemies accountable for moves they take against you.

(…)

The Biden administration's support for Ukraine has been a rare show of force that has sent a strong message to the world. But it isn't enough. The U.S. foreign policy establishment must recognize the hybrid war being waged against it and show up on the irregular field of battle. Like it or not, the United States is the guarantor of stability in the world. By retreating from its responsibilities, the only thing Washington is guaranteeing is dark times ahead.”

“The list encompasses not just the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, but hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh, Serbian military measures against Kosovo, fighting in Eastern Congo, complete turmoil in Sudan since April, and a fragile cease-fire in Tigray that Ethiopia seems poised to break at any time. Syria and Yemen have not exactly been quiet during this period, and gangs and cartels continuously menace governments, including those in Haiti and Mexico. All of this comes on top of the prospect of a major war breaking out in East Asia, such as by China invading the island of Taiwan.

The Uppsala Conflict Data Program, which has been tracking wars globally since 1945, identified 2022 and 2023 as the most conflictual years in the world since the end of the Cold War. Back in January 2023, before many of the above conflicts erupted, United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed sounded the alarm, noting that peace “is now under grave threat” across the globe. The seeming cascade of conflict gives rise to one obvious question: Why?

(…)

The first explanation holds that the cascade is in the eye of the beholder. People are too easily “fooled by randomness,” the essayist and statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb admonished in his 2001 book of the same title, seeking intentional explanations for what may be coincidence. The flurry of armed confrontations could be just such a phenomenon, concealing no deeper meaning: Some of the frozen conflicts, for instance, were due for flare-ups or had gone quiet only recently. Today’s volume of wars, in other words, should be viewed as little more than a series of unfortunate events that could recur or worsen at any time.

(…)

Although coincidences certainly do occur, the current onslaught happens to be taking place at a time of big changes in the international system. The era of Pax Americana appears to be over, and the United States is no longer poised to police the world. Not that Pax Americana was necessarily so peaceful. The 1990s were especially disputatious; civil wars arose on multiple continents, as did major wars in Europe and Africa. But the United States attempted to solve and contain many potential conflicts: Washington led a coalition to oust Saddam Hussein’s Iraq from Kuwait, facilitated the Oslo Process to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, fostered improved relations between North and South Korea, and encouraged the growth of peacekeeping operations around the globe. Even following the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, the invasion of Afghanistan was supported by many in the international community as necessary to remove a pariah regime and enable a long-troubled nation to rebuild. War was not over, but humanity seemed closer than ever to finding a formula for lasting peace.

Over the subsequent decades, the United States seemed to fritter away both the goodwill needed to support such efforts and the means to carry them out. By the early 2010s, the United States was bogged down in two losing wars and recovering from a financial crisis. The world, too, had changed, with power ebbing from Washington’s singular pole to multiple emerging powers. As then–Secretary of State John Kerry remarked in a 2013 interview in The Atlantic, “We live in a world more like the 18th and 19th centuries.” And a multipolar world, where several great powers jostle for advantage on the global stage, harbors the potential for more conflicts, large and small.

Specifically, China has emerged as a great power seeking to influence the international system, whether by leveraging the economic allure of its Belt and Road Initiative or by militarily revising the status quo within its region. Russia does not have China’s economic muscle, but it, too, seeks to dominate its region, establish itself as an influential global player, and revise the international order. Whether Russia or China is yet on an economic or military par with the United States hardly matters. Both are strong enough to challenge the U.S.-led international order by leveraging the revisionist sentiment they share with countries throughout the global South.

(…)

Suppose, though, that the proliferation of wars doesn’t have a systemic cause, but an entirely particular one. That the world owes its present state of unrest directly to Russia—and, even more specifically, to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February of 2022 and its decision to continue fighting since.

The war in Ukraine, the largest war in Europe since World War II and one poised to continue well past 2024, is absorbing the attention of international actors who otherwise would have been well positioned to prevent any of the abovementioned crises from escalating. This case is not the same as the great-power distraction, in which the world’s most powerful states simply fail to focus on emerging crises. Rather, the great powers lack the diplomatic and military capacity to respond to conflicts beyond Ukraine—and other actors know it.

(…)

These three explanations—coincidence, multipolarity, Russia’s war in Ukraine—are not mutually exclusive. If anything, they are interrelated, as wars are complex events; the decline of U.S. hegemony contributes to growing multipolarity; and great-power competition has surely fed Russia’s aggression and the West’s response. The consequence is that others are caught in the great-power cross fire or will seek to start fires of their own. Even if none of these wars rise to the level of a third world war, they will be devastating all the same. We do not need to be in a world war to be in a world at war.

Wars were already a persistent feature of the international system. But they were not widespread. War was always happening somewhere, in other words, but war was not happening everywhere. The above dynamics could change that tendency. The prevalence of war, not just its persistence, could now be our future.”

#world war 3 #wwiii #russia #ukraine #israel #hamas #iran #china #taiwan #deterrence

[philosophybitmaps]

#philosophy #quotes #Hannah Arendt #Eichmann in Jerusalem #Arendt #punishment #deterrence #crime #justice #humanity

[warsofasoiaf]

What happened to the Little Entente?

France not being able to underwrite any of their defense commitments. While the Little Entente continued to exist on paper, France was the big deterrent factor in ensuring that Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia would be secure in their own territories and not falling prey to revanchist power aims.

Thanks for the question, Cle-Guy.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

#history #foreign policy #deterrence

[kp777]

#hiroshima bombing #atomic weapons #deterrence

[migueruta]

The beautifull melody «Love Deterrent» video recapping the Story of Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes - video by Migueruta

#love #deterrent #deterrence #love deterrent #love deterrence #videogames #metal gear solid v #metal gear solid #metal gear #fanart #video games #videojogos #movie recap #anime recap #resumo #migueruta #story #plot #ground zeroes #peace walker #medley #melodia #song #guitar

[bearkunin]

Mad about MAD

I have a need to shout this into the void: One of the biggest myths in the common discourse of nuclear strategy is to do with MAD. The idea behind MAD is that if both you and your opponent were doomed to fail, to complete utter annihilation, then you would never use nuclear weapons.

One thing though: MAD as a doctrine or strategy does not exist, and has never existed mutually. The Soviets had plans for battlefield use of nuclear weapons. They thought if push came to shove in Europe, they would be able to use nuclear weapons and this would not be assured destruction on themselves. You're not slapping tactical nuclear ammunition into specially-designed artillery aimed at infantry in the Fulda Gap if you plan on Moscow being turned into cinders by strategic nuclear ICBMs.

The current Russian government practices war games with tactical nuclear weapons (which it has a variety of) all of which is a massive waste of time and money if you are following a doctrine of MAD. Russian nuclear strategy through the 1990s and 2000s involved the idea of escalate-to-deescalate, which is impossible to reconcile with MAD.

The United States itself has not believed in mutually assured destruction for over half a century. In the 1960s they shifted away from massive escalation to a posture of flexible use. Every development of smaller yield nuclear warheads, every dollar spent on ballistic missile defence, every public statement on nuclear weapons for the past sixty years, is all running counter to an idea of MAD. The US refusal to commit to a no-first-use policy isn't entirely against MAD, but does show they want to keep the door open for other purposes.

Pretty much all effort in nuclear strategy for many decades has been ways to conceive of ways to use nuclear weapons that would not assure mutual destruction. If China uses a tactical nuclear weapon to take out an aircraft carrier, America wants ways to respond that will not "assure" that the United States is wiped off the map. In fact, promising to end the whole world over a a tactical nuke in the South China Sea seems so incredible it would probably be taken literally as such: not credible. This in turn is what can increase the risk of nuclear weapon usage.

The United States wants defences, it wants flexible responses that will not escalate the situation beyond all hope. If you nuke one of our carriers, we can nuke one of yours. Escalation Dominance or Escalation Ladders are the buzzwords of today, not MAD.

It is the ability to respond flexibly, not to assure mutual destruction, that is at the heart of modern nuclear deterrence.

#nuclear strategy #MAD #deterrence #strategy

[ourwitching]

1961 US map depicting a nuclear counterstrike using strategic bombers and long ranged missiles again...

#originaltags #cold war #deterrence #maps #t:1961

[defensenow]

#youtube #militarytraining #Dragon2024 #NATO #Allies #Strengthening #Deterrence #Defence #Military #Security #GlobalSecurity #InternationalRelations #Peace #Alliance #Strength #Strategic #Power #MilitaryAlliance #Deterrent #DefensePolicy #SecurityPolicy #NATOSummit

[pecuniaetbellum]

Windows of Crises and Opportunities

What do nuclear weapons have in common with CO2?

By Alexandros Sainidis There can be found simplicity in nuclear weapons – because total annihilation is quite straightforward and ultimate. Foolishly, we transfer the same view to nuclear deterrence – we don’t shoot ’cause they will shoot back and the damage will be too much to bear. The Antiballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty is one evidence of deterrence complexity. Signed by the United States and…

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#ABM #CO2 #deterrence #Energy #game theory #History #international affairs #International Relations #nuclear #nuclear power

[linuxgamenews]

Discover the Action-Packed World of Deterrence on Linux

Deterrence launches the tower defense and real-time tactics hybrid game on Linux as well as Windows PC. Thanks to the brilliant minds at Pisces Studios for their captivating effort. Available now on both Steam and itch. Alright, let’s talk about the launch of Deterrence on Linux. Due to take place in the near future, when humans are up against some rogue AI. This isn't your typical strategy experience – it's a blend of tower defense and real-time tactics, loaded with action that'll keep you sharp. What sets it apart? Flexibility. You're not just planting towers and watching the action unfold. You’re in the thick of it, making split-second decisions that can make or break your defense. Repairing structures, moving troops around, calling in airstrikes – it's hands-on and dynamic. Every level in Deterrence launches you into a new challenge. Think of it like a puzzle but with more explosions. You need to be sharp, adapting your strategy on the fly. One minute you’re shoring up defenses, the next you're setting up an artillery barrage. And the setting? Interactive. Blow up a bridge to stop an enemy advance, or garrison troops in buildings for an extra edge.

Deterrence Launch Date Reveal Trailer

Deterrence does not launch you into a straight line from A to B. You pick your battles, earn rewards, and advance through a tech tree that lets you tailor your capabilities. Plus, the pace is in your control – ramp up the speed when you’re cruising, or slow it down to manage those intense moments. It’s a bit like They Are Billions, keeping you engaged at every turn. What I like about the game is how it respects your time and intelligence. It challenges you to think, adapt, and overcome. It's the kind of experience that keeps pulling you back for 'just one more level.’ Whether you’re a long-time fan of strategy games or just dipping your toes in this launch, Deterrence is accessible, deeply engaging, and just plain fun. It’s strategy, action, and quick thinking all rolled into one. So, gear up and get ready to take on those rogue AIs on Steam or itch. Priced at $7.99 USD / £6.80 / 7,80€ with the 20% discount for Linux and Windows PC.

#deterrence #tower defense #real-time tactics #linux #gaming news #pisces studios #ubuntu #windows #pc #unity #Youtube

[nicklloydnow]

“Tragedy is part of Israeli life, and I knew it would be part of my time as president. But none of us imagined a tragedy like this.

Against our will, we in Israel find ourselves at a tipping point for the Middle East and for the world and at the center of what is nothing less than an existential struggle. This is not a battle between Jews and Muslims. And it is not just between Israel and Hamas. It is between those who adhere to norms of humanity and those practicing a barbarism that has no place in the modern world.

Just like ISIS and Al Qaeda, the Hamas terrorists who attacked Israeli homes and families had no qualms about burning babies. They tortured children, raped women and destroyed peace-loving communities. They were so proud of their deeds that they made sure to capture them on video and even broadcast them live. These videos will forever remain a stain on those Palestinians and their supporters who celebrated that day and a testament to the depravity of the terrorists and of the ideas that inspired them.

But almost as disturbing for me is the realization that many in the world, including in the West, are willing to rationalize these actions or even support them outright. In the capitals of Europe we’ve seen rallies supporting the total destruction of Israel “from the river to the sea.” Professors and students at American colleges make speeches and sign statements justifying terrorism, even glorifying it.

We’ve heard certain governments fail to denounce Hamas, instead condemning Israel’s response and even seeking to offer justification for Hamas’s atrocities. It would have been unthinkable to hear such moral confusion uttered after the Sept. 11 attacks or after bombings in London, Barcelona and Baghdad. When I spoke to a joint meeting of Congress this year, I said terrorism “contradicts humanity’s most basic principles of peace.” It turns out that not everyone agrees.

All of this shows that this collision of values is happening not just here in Israel but everywhere and that the terrorist ideology threatens all decent people, not only Jews. History has taught us that foul ideologies often find the Jewish people first — but tend not to stop there. We find ourselves on the front lines of this battle, but all nations face this threat, and they must understand that they could be next.

(…)

But anyone who thinks the cynical exploitation of civilian suffering will tie our hands and save Hamas this time is wrong. For us and for the Palestinians, the suffering will end only with the removal of Hamas. Anyone trying to tie our hands is, intentionally or not, undermining not only Israel’s defense but also any hope for a world where these atrocities cannot happen.

In the months and years before the Hamas massacre, we began to see signs of the emergence of a better Middle East, from the Persian Gulf to North Africa — one inspired by progress and partnership, one in which Israel could finally feel at home among our neighbors. Will this be the world that emerges from this crisis? Or will it be the world desired by the murderous fundamentalists of Hamas?

(…)

Much is at stake at this moment, not just the future of Israel. On Oct. 7 we were all jolted awake and presented with a shocking challenge to our hopes and morals. How we meet this challenge will shape our future.”

“Fears continue to mount that the United States might be dragged into a regional conflict in the Middle East. But this dreaded war has already broken out: In recent weeks, US military bases have come under repeated attack from Iranian proxies in the region, and there is no sign the attacks will abate anytime soon. At first, US Central Command published regular updates and claimed that the attacks had produced no casualties apart from a contractor who died from a heart attack while seeking shelter, as well as 19 service members who had suffered traumatic injury from Iranian-proxy strikes against bases in Syria and Iraq. The drones and rockets were all being shot down, CENTCOM insisted. Now, CENTCOM has ceased issuing updates. How many Americans have been wounded and killed thus far? How many more are at risk of death and serious injury? For the moment, we don’t know.

All of this points to an ominous development: the decline of deterrence. Over the past several weeks, US officials pleaded with Iran-backed militants and terror proxies to stop launching drones and rockets and threatened severe consequences should they fail to comply. Washington has followed through on these threats by retaliating with airstrikes, all the while stressing the defensive nature of these strikes and promising to back away the moment the attacks on US bases stop. But after every airstrike, armed groups in the region have dialed up their anti-US activities. Reports are now circulating of several large armed groups in Iraq declaring a de facto state of war against America.

The core of the problem here is that US forces are spread out across more than a dozen bases in the region. None of these bases is strong enough to defend itself from a concerted attack. What they have relied on, instead, was the perception that if you attacked even a weak American outpost, you were asking for trouble: It would only be a matter of time before the entire US war machine descended upon you to neutralize the threat.

The premise was that nobody would ever call the American bluff. Lately, it has dawned on America’s enemies that the promised devastating retaliation isn’t likely to come: Washington is overstretched and too sick of war to put serious muscle behind the threats. Perhaps it is technically possible for the United States to go to war across the Middle East—to dispatch more forces to Syria, to re-occupy Iraq, to launch an air war against the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Yet given the difficulties it faced in Iraq, it is doubtful whether the US military would find success fighting a three- or four-front war; the effort might easily devolve into yet another quagmire. And there is little political appetite for attempting this. The public is tired of war, and congressional divisions over the federal budget show no signs of healing.

Deterrence was at first a helpful side effect of real American economic and military might. But over time, it became a crutch—and then, a Potemkin village: a façade put up as a cost-saving measure, to cover up the fact that the military was shrinking, political dysfunction growing, and fiscal stability eroding. Now, as drones and rockets rain down on US service members across Syria and Iraq, as the Houthis assail the Jewish state despite repeated warnings from Washington not to get involved, and as Hezbollah ramps up its encroachments on northern Israel, it is becoming clear that the Middle East has decided that American threats aren’t all that credible anymore.

Deterrence, once established, is cheap to maintain. But when it fails, it is incredibly costly to restore. Can the United States afford the massive costs that would be required to restore it? The coming days and weeks will provide us with an answer, but the signs are far from auspicious.”

#israel #hamas #war #palestine #civilization #terrorism #isaac herzog #america #deterrence #us military

[philosophybitmaps]

#philosophy #quotes #Hannah Arendt #Eichmann in Jerusalem #Arendt #responsibility #punishment #deterrence #crime #law

[scienceswitch]

The Terrifying Possibility of Accidental Nuclear War

The following is a chilling hypothetical scenario of how a nuclear war could start within minutes due to miscommunication and misunderstandings between nations. It comes from a YouTube channel, Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell, which I wanted to credit upfront for the video that inspired this post. While fictional, the sequence of events described is frighteningly plausible given historical near…

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#accidental war #Cognitive Biases #Cuban Missile Crisis #deterrence #disarmament #false alarms #How A Nuclear War Will Start #human error #miscommunication #misunderstandings #nuclear war

[sgreffenius]

This article raises at least half a dozen questions:

(1) What prevents NATO allies from pursuing these forceful countermoves on their own, without approval or leadership from the United States?

(2) Why does the United States fear nuclear war, and Russian threats of nuclear war, if Ukraine does not? (3) Why did the United States not react when Russia opened the war in 2014?

(4) Why does the United States deny Ukraine defensive and offensive air and naval power it must have to win the war? (5) Do leaders in Washington believe Ukraine can win the war? Do they want it to win?

(6) Do leaders in Washington recognize what will happen if NATO does not force Russian forces out of all Ukrainian territory?

As of today, August 22, 2023, we are a year and a half into this war. The fact that we need to ask questions like these eighteen months in is a bad sign.

#Ukraine #United States #deterrence #countermeasures

[rhk111sblog]

“EDCA will be a DETERRENCE to China!!!” ‘Di kaya ang ibig sabihon pala nila e si “DE TERRENCE” Romeo? LOL’ English Translation (2nd Line): “Maybe what they really meant was “DE TERRENCE” Romeo? LOL”

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#philippines #china #enhanced defense cooperation agreement edca #united states us #deterrence #terrence romeo