PJ Media

Moorthy Muthuswamy

“You are completely misreading the thrust of this article”

I’m sorry, but I honestly don’t believe I am. All I’ve done is point out one logical conclusion that follows from what you proposed. Here’s what you wrote (some emphasis from me):

“a nuanced and strong declaratory policy has to _go beyond_ merely singling out those who may have either enabled or facilitated terrorists into obtaining or using the WMD, but also declare the intent to retaliate _disproportionately and devastatingly_ against those states, societies, or groups _that have been engaged in the hateful indoctrinating process_ noted in the previous paragraph”

Does that not mean that in the event of an attack, you think the US would be justified in retaliating against the sources of hateful indoctrination? And why? Precisely because of the difficulty of proving either the source of a particular bomb, or proving a direct link to any specific actor (otherwise a more targeted response would be possible and preferable). So in the event of an attack that could not be traced, your proposed doctrine _requires_ (otherwise it’s not a real deterrent) retaliation against a (potentially) very broad group of countries that host/support terrorist groups. At least, that’s the worst possible interpretation. If that’s not what you meant, you might want to clarify your position in the text.

The stuff about the yemeni koran is interesting, but a bit irrelevant – if you’re interested in some good polemical stuff about the accuracy of the koran, check out jay smith on youtube. It’s an interesting subject.

In the event of a nuclear 9/11 (which probably is a matter of time – time being very large), it won’t be necessary for anyone to use nukes to retaliate (lets put aside the idea that the US has to be the target – that’s not a given, and it just reflects an american egotistical world view). Terrorists are not an existential threat (unlike the cold war was), so an guaranteed, devastating second strike doctrine isn’t useful. We all know that in the real event, the major players will have the time to conduct a serious investigation – and it will BE a global investigation, because a rogue nuclear attack serves no major power’s interests (remember the global response after 9/11? a nuclear terrorist attack would be several orders of magnitude beyond that). We will have plenty of time to find out who was responsible – then I expect that a gulf-war-1 alliance of some sort will bring down the state(s) behind it. That’s what _will_ happen. There’s no point in making stupid “infinite justice” threats that ignore common sense, alienate allies, tie the hands of united states and feed straight into the hands of the hate mongers.

It’ll be much more effective to convince rogue states that the US (and others) _will_ be committed to effectively retaliating against the government(s) responsible, and in the meantime to take every opportunity to tell rogue states we know what they’re up to.

Subotai Bahadur:

“If I may comment, at that point it will not be a matter of trying to win hearts and minds”

Agreed. But the declaration of a doctrine happens BEFORE “that point”. After an attack things are different, yes. But in the meantime, the US still needs cooperation to counter all manner of other risks. Convincing the world’s bad guys that sooner or later they’re going to be devastatingly attacked for someone else’s actions will only give them an iron-clad reason to pay what it takes to show that THEY can retaliate, whether it be against the US or someone closer to home. You’d make it worth their while. You’re proposing a doctrine that will actually encourage nuclear proliferation.

Guys, after 60 years of the US trying to tell the world how it’s gonna be, I would have thought that by now you’d have figured out that it’s counterproductive. The US is 5% of the world’s population, that’s all. The worst fears of americans aren’t the only thing that matters to the world as a whole, and the US needs cooperation to pursue its objectives. Within 20-30 years it’s not going to have the economic clout to dictate terms any more, and in another 30-40 it’s not going to be the world’s most powerful military. That’s probably in our lifetime. I suggest you use time available in a more productive way.

There are some good reads to be found online about the development of nuclear deterrence strategy. The important thing to notice is that it’s critical to think about how the other guy will react in an attack, and how he’ll react to your preparations. If you don’t, it’s not effective. That’s the usual problem with simplistic conservative thinking – it doesn’t seriously ask “what next?”

http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/display.cfm?PubID=585

http://www.rand.org/publications/classics/wohlstetter/P1472/P1472.html

I’ll post a couple more later (I’m not near my bookshelf at the moment)