Obama Limits When U.S. Would Use Nuclear Arms

[Crossroads Inc.]

I hope this is not too much of a Bump of this thread, But after viewing the Far rights response to this decision I find myself, as always, baffled by their outcries. In columns articles and of course on Faux News, the shriek is the same. Obama stating that he will use Nukes only if the US is nuked itself is somehow "Emboldening" terrorists to strike at us with horrible weapons without fear of being retaliated against!

In an article a few days ago in my Home News 'The Arizona Republic' a local commentator made the following scenario. What if NewYork was attacked with a bio weapon and we knew what country did it. He argues under Obama, America is 'impotent' to properly respond! Im sorry if this sounds callous, but I kind of thought that Nukes were only ONLY used against other nukes... If someone attacks us with bombs bio weapons or what not, if they kill 10,000, or a 100,000 people, we can bomb them back into the stone age, but would we ever have the right to Nuke them?

The way the far right are talking you would think we had used Nukes on a regular basis, or that they were somehow the automatic response for some dread attack upon us. I know the right wing wackos want to be "NO" on everything Obama does, no matter how beneficial it may be. But trying to imply that restricting Nukes to use only against another nuke is somehow "Emboldening Terrorists" just curdles my brain. I have to wonder if others have heard the same similar sort of nonsense.

[Sea Skimmer]

In an article a few days ago in my Home News 'The Arizona Republic' a local commentator made the following scenario. What if NewYork was attacked with a bio weapon and we knew what country did it. He argues under Obama, America is 'impotent' to properly respond! Im sorry if this sounds callous, but I kind of thought that Nukes were only ONLY used against other nukes... If someone attacks us with bombs bio weapons or what not, if they kill 10,000, or a 100,000 people, we can bomb them back into the stone age, but would we ever have the right to Nuke them?

You thought dead fucking wrong. It has been public policy of the United States for as long as we have had nuclear weapons that ALL weapons of mass destruction are treated equally. Because as of 1992 the US only retains operational nuclear weapons, then any enemy WMD attack would have to be met with nuclear weapons. The entire point of this is credible deterrence. No fucking window that someone can drive through to kill 100,000 people and then not get ahit back with anything but a conventional bomb they don’t give a shit about. Cross that line, and you get hit in return. Very simple, and 100% effective for over 50 years.

So why the fuck change it to create that huge window against the two types of weapons of mass destruction that are overwhelmingly most likely to be used against the US? The reason is simple, Obama wants to abolish nuclear deterrence completely and just rely on the love and warmth of the world community to keep America safe. This is the first step down that road of insanity. Anyone arguing this does not reduce deterrence is just a liar, Obama has not exactly made a secret of his long term intentions. His entire goal is to reduce deterrence until its so useless he can get away with abolishing it.

You want a scenario. See Gulf War 1. The US specifically threatened Iraq, which had only biological and chemical weapons with nuclear attack if it used them. Iraq didn’t and was swept out of Kuwait in a colossal conventional military defeat. Now if we took away nukes as Obamas policy now has, Saddam would have zero reason not to have used nerve gas, easily killing thousands or even tens of thousands of American troops. He used gas countless times against Iran and his own people after all.

[Samuel]

Let's illustrate further with the bomb analogue: if the person you have entrusted the bomb gives the remote to someone else, what will you then do? Or if he later in his life changes (becomes alcoholic, dependent on drugs, demented etc.), what will you then do? You have already given him remote control to your very existence and he can act with impunity with it and you, may I add, have no say in the matter.

Except the same holds true for your country.

Sweden might be able to totally outsource, say, its agriculture to Finland - but what will Sweden do if Finns elect a total asshole of an government which has no respect for sovereignity of Sweden or any other country for that matter?

Unlike Sweden the US has the military capacity to... insure people remain nice to us.

And then there's the problem of losing domestic jobs:

I'm just going to say this once- economics is NOT a zero sum game. Do I have to explain comparitive advantage?

since you have no ability to pay for the foreign workforce and producers not to mention that you now face disturbingly angry domestic populace

Than people have been living above their means and the problem is that (and a lack of wealth redistribution), not outsourcing.

This is enlightened self-interest:

Sure- screwing over foreigners is always profitable. Than everyone copies you and everyone is worse off.

[Kane Starkiller]

Posture review report

In making this strengthened assurance, the United States affirms that any state eligible for the
assurance that uses chemical or biological weapons against the United States or its allies and partners would face the prospect of a devastating conventional military response – and that any
individuals responsible for the attack, whether national leaders or military commanders, would
be held fully accountable. Given the catastrophic potential of biological weapons and the rapid
pace of bio-technology development, the United States reserves the right to make any adjustment
in the assurance that may be warranted by the evolution and proliferation of the biological
weapons threat and U.S. capacities to counter that threat.

In other words US will not use nukes against "eligible" countries, which Iran and North Korea are obviously not, unless the "eligible" countries enhance their biological capability in which case they will be nuked to shit too.
In plain English you send an anthrax letter and kill 10 people and your country won't be nuked (if you're "eligible") but increase the damage and you get instant sunrise meaning that nothing has changed in any practical terms since US was never going to nuke Paris because some French extremists released a chemical agent in New York subway that killed 15 people.

The real meat of message is Obama calling attention to US rapidly developing "non nuclear" response: GPS, SDBs, MOP, conventional ballistic missiles etc.
This kind of response is much less politically sensitive than any kind of nuclear response and the threshold for its use is much much lower than nuclear response.
So the message is: Remember our nukes? They are alive and well but now we also have a devastating non nuclear capability which means it is now politically viable for us to fuck up your country even for provocations we couldn't justify using nukes. Watch your step.

[Tiriol]

Let's illustrate further with the bomb analogue: if the person you have entrusted the bomb gives the remote to someone else, what will you then do? Or if he later in his life changes (becomes alcoholic, dependent on drugs, demented etc.), what will you then do? You have already given him remote control to your very existence and he can act with impunity with it and you, may I add, have no say in the matter.

Except the same holds true for your country.

This is a completely meaningless statement. If you mean by it that giving the control of this bomb to a government is the same as giving its control to some other part, like another human being, well, yes - but how does that counter the analogue's point of foolishness of giving up vital and essential control? And if you mean that giving the remote control of a bomb that could destroy a country or its infrastructure permanently to some other country is foolish... Nobody is contesting that.

Sweden might be able to totally outsource, say, its agriculture to Finland - but what will Sweden do if Finns elect a total asshole of an government which has no respect for sovereignity of Sweden or any other country for that matter?

Unlike Sweden the US has the military capacity to... insure people remain nice to us.

So you rebut an argument based on exception? And a false one, at that - if the US has indeed outsourced, as in the case I outlined in Sweden vs. Finland hypotethical case, all of its agriculture to another country and then decides to use its arms against that country, the harm has already been done and the country being invaded/attacked may very well resort to the destruction of the assets the US tried to safeguard. And what if the invasion actually fails? Now the country in question is even more disinclined to treat its former client with any respect or giving them anything, not to mention the international outcry about the US acting in this manner (of course, if the country that was invaded was acting like a total douchebag before, the reaction might not be that stern). The US can find other sources of food, of course, but it will take time - and the existing supplies will be diminishing at the same time.

And then there's the problem of losing domestic jobs:

I'm just going to say this once- economics is NOT a zero sum game. Do I have to explain comparitive advantage?

Comparative advantage has nothing to do with this: a nation that outsources enough of its industries will lose domestic jobs as a result in those industries, especially if we go to the absolute limits and dedicate ourselves to total outsourcing.

since you have no ability to pay for the foreign workforce and producers not to mention that you now face disturbingly angry domestic populace

Than people have been living above their means and the problem is that (and a lack of wealth redistribution), not outsourcing.

No, this is not about living above one's means: it's about an economy that has taken a bad beating and people who no longer have jobs because of the said economical hardships and their country's decision to outsource too much. Wealth distribution won't help much if all the money is already flowing away from the country.

This is enlightened self-interest:

Sure- screwing over foreigners is always profitable. Than everyone copies you and everyone is worse off.

How is it screwing over foreigners if a nation wants to preserve some vital parts of its industries in its own hands, to guarantee at least the barest minimum should something bad happen? It may in fact be non-profitable for a nation to do so, but also essential in case the supplies from foreign lands come to a halt.

You are arguing solely based on economical terms and not thinking about political situation at all. A decision might be sound economically, but at the same time completely devastating politically, and vice versa. And no country wants to be totally reliant on someone else in some key industry simply because that country is then politically weaker as a result and country's own populace might take a very dim view of a large chunk of industry being outsourced.