The Russian strategic rocket forces (as they style them) have to be the sum of all our fears –’fears’ in the sense not that we tremble in our boots but that we include among the topics we raise with our our (*cough*) office of the CiC is just that particular item –Putin’s spending on massive civil defense, his new generations of rockets and warheads, his crash (or nearly so) modernization of the entire military, his new doctrines of winning a nuclear war, all while we do nothing but watch president Buster Keaton fret about how best to throw away our (deteriorating) deterrent without our (wee the people) much noticing. SecDef Gates, for example, has over the last year or two made some rather stunning remarks about the shifting-against-us balance of strategic weapons power –and the reports get buried on page 31 and have a hour’s legs if any legs at all. Urge selecting the Russian nuke titles in JR Nyquist’s archive and scanning a few of ‘em. Mavbe emailing one or two to Aunt Sally and Uncle Jim.

After all, dropping the ball in this area would be uniquely bad –remember what you heard about your folks and theirs, how they felt on Dec 06, 1941? Or our own attitude as of 9/10/01? –that it was American complacency that encouraged the bad entity to try the attacks. And those attacks were nothing compared to what could happen if we don’t wake up.