A look at how the United States has been helping curb proliferation, which is very bad, and the United States is very concerned about it because it is very bad:
At first sight, China’s proposed sale of two civilian nuclear-power reactors to Pakistan hardly seems a danger sign. Pakistan already has the bomb, so it has all the nuclear secrets it needs. Next-door India has the bomb too, and has been seeking similar deals with other countries.
[snip]
Great job, America. Now to bomb a middle eastern country and continue with those valiant efforts to make the world safe. Yaay!
Yeah, uh, nuclear power plants and nuclear bombs are two completely different things.
Frankly, I find the demonization of nuclear power to be the saddest part of our whole Cold War legacy here.
Yes, I know. But that doesn't mean that retaliation is non-credible. It is in fact, quite clearly credible on many levels.
It is credible in that fact that if it were not, the equilibrium position of the game would have each player nuking each other. Yet here we are, unnuked. If the threat of retaliation were not credible then the first thing anyone would have done is nuke the other guys before they nuked you back (since they would not retaliate).
Since we don't live in the post-apocalypse its fairly easy to say that the threat is credible.
The other way we know its a credible threat is by simply asking ourselves whether people believe its a credible threat. And there are thousands of pages of documents dealing with the various crisises where its made very clear by all parties that they consider the threat credible.
And the third way we know its credible is that it is just plain rational to do and you simply do not know what rationality means
A look at how the United States has been helping curb proliferation, which is very bad, and the United States is very concerned about it because it is very bad:
At first sight, China’s proposed sale of two civilian nuclear-power reactors to Pakistan hardly seems a danger sign. Pakistan already has the bomb, so it has all the nuclear secrets it needs. Next-door India has the bomb too, and has been seeking similar deals with other countries.
[snip]
Great job, America. Now to bomb a middle eastern country and continue with those valiant efforts to make the world safe. Yaay!
Yeah, uh, nuclear power plants and nuclear bombs are two completely different things.
Frankly, I find the demonization of nuclear power to be the saddest part of our whole Cold War legacy here.
At first sight, China’s proposed sale of two civilian nuclear-power reactors to Pakistan hardly seems a danger sign. Pakistan already has the bomb, so it has all the nuclear secrets it needs. Next-door India has the bomb too, and has been seeking similar deals with other countries.
Yet the sale (really a gift, as Pakistan is broke) has caused shudders at the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), an informal cartel of countries who want to stop their advanced nuclear technology getting into the wrong hands. They are meeting in New Zealand, for what was supposed to be a quiet and nerdish rule-tightening session. But their efforts may now fall victim to China’s rivalry with America.
By any measure, Pakistan is a shocker. Its proliferation record would make the serial nuclear mischief-makers of North Korea blush. If the Chinese reactor deal goes ahead, the damage will be huge: beyond just stoking the already alarming nuclear rivalry between Pakistan and India.
That does not deter China, which still seethes about the way in which the Bush administration in 2008 browbeat other NSG members into exempting America’s friend India from the group’s rules. These banned nuclear trade, even civilian deals, with countries like India and Pakistan, but also Israel and now North Korea, that resist full international safeguards on all their nuclear industry.
America argued that India had a spotless non-proliferation record (it doesn’t) and that bringing it into the non-proliferation “mainstream” could only bolster global anti-proliferation efforts (it didn’t). The deal incensed not just China and Pakistan but many others, inside and outside the NSG. An immediate casualty was the effort to get all members of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), who have already promised not to seek the bomb, to sign up to an additional protocol on toughened safeguards. Many have, but on hearing of the America-India deal Brazil’s president is reputed to have flatly ruled that out. And where Brazil has put its foot down, others have also hesitated.
What particularly riles outsiders is that America did not get anything much out of India in return. It did not win backing for new anti-proliferation obligations, such as a legally binding test ban or for an end to the further production of fissile uranium or plutonium for bombs. India has since designated some of its reactors as civilian, and open to inspection, but others still churn out spent fuel richly laden with weapons-usable plutonium. India can potentially make even more of the stuff. Now that it can import uranium fuel for its civilian reactors, it can devote more of its scarce domestic supplies to bomb-making.
Pakistan suffers no such uranium shortage and is determined to match India. According to analysis of satellite imagery by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, it is greatly expanding its capacity to produce weapons-usable plutonium, as well as uranium.
China has given Pakistan lots of nuclear and missile help in the past. It even passed it a tested design of one of its own missile-mountable warheads. This was one of the most damaging proliferation acts of the nuclear age, since the same design was later passed by Pakistan to Libya and possibly Iran and others.
But after China joined the NPT in 1992 and the NSG in 2004, it reined in such help, at least officially (some Chinese firms are still involved in illicit nuclear trade with several states). But on joining the NSG, it argued that it had already promised to build the second of two nuclear reactors for Pakistan at Chasma in Punjab and would therefore go ahead. Some grumbled. But it seemed a price worth paying to have China inside, playing by the NSG’s rules rather than outside, undermining them. The latest sale blows a hole in that hope.
A big leaky tent
China is trying a legalistic defence of the sale of the third and fourth reactors at Chasma. But its real point is this: if America can bend the rules for India, then China can break them for Pakistan.
Pakistan hopes that it will eventually get a deal like India’s. Some in Barack Obama’s administration have supported this, on the ground that America needs Pakistan’s support in the fight against al-Qaeda and the Taleban. Israel wouldn’t mind such an exemption either.
The NSG’s damage-control efforts now centre on a new rule to bar the sale of kit for uranium-enrichment or plutonium-reprocessing to any country outside the NPT. That, predictably, annoys India.
The deal also affects efforts to contain Iran. Western diplomats seeking support for UN sanctions on the Islamic republic find themselves receiving a wigging over the double standards used with India. Iranian officials used to argue that they just wanted to be treated like Japan. It has free access to advanced nuclear technology. But unlike Iran, Japan does not repeatedly violate nuclear safeguards. Some Iranian officials now muse boldly that the big powers will eventually come to do deals with them, just as they did with India. Iran’s latest raspberry in response to a fourth round of UN sanctions was to ban two nuclear inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear guardian. Iran dislikes its reports on the regime’s dubious nuclear activities.
If Pakistan really is worried about India’s growing nuclear arsenal, diplomacy might work better than an arms race. George Perkovich of the Carnegie Endowment, a think tank, says Pakistan should lift its veto on a ban on the production of fissile materials for bombs. That would put India (which claims to support a ban) on the spot. Like enriched uranium, hypocrisy can be costlier than it seems.
Part of me is wondering if you'll repost the article a third time if I respond to it.
But what the hell, I'll go for it. I did read the article, I was saying that the NSG's stance on equating power reactors with nuclear weapons is detrimental both to non-carbon-emitting power generation and to nuclear nonproliferation.
Part of me is wondering if you'll repost the article a third time if I respond to it.
But what the hell, I'll go for it. I did read the article, I was saying that the NSG's stance on equating power reactors with nuclear weapons is detrimental both to non-carbon-emitting power generation and to nuclear nonproliferation.
I will go ahead and help out by quoting the relevant part of the article which addresses your specific issue
India has since designated some of its reactors as civilian, and open to inspection, but others still churn out spent fuel richly laden with weapons-usable plutonium. India can potentially make even more of the stuff. Now that it can import uranium fuel for its civilian reactors, it can devote more of its scarce domestic supplies to bomb-making.
Pakistan suffers no such uranium shortage and is determined to match India. According to analysis of satellite imagery by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, it is greatly expanding its capacity to produce weapons-usable plutonium, as well as uranium.
Part of me is wondering if you'll repost the article a third time if I respond to it.
But what the hell, I'll go for it. I did read the article, I was saying that the NSG's stance on equating power reactors with nuclear weapons is detrimental both to non-carbon-emitting power generation and to nuclear nonproliferation.
I will go ahead and help out by quoting the relevant part of the article which addresses your specific issue
India has since designated some of its reactors as civilian, and open to inspection, but others still churn out spent fuel richly laden with weapons-usable plutonium. India can potentially make even more of the stuff. Now that it can import uranium fuel for its civilian reactors, it can devote more of its scarce domestic supplies to bomb-making.
Pakistan suffers no such uranium shortage and is determined to match India. According to analysis of satellite imagery by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, it is greatly expanding its capacity to produce weapons-usable plutonium, as well as uranium.
Right, except earlier in the article it showed that none of the reactors used to be civilian, e.g. it was using its domestic supplies for bomb-making anyway and getting power somewhere else, presumably coal or oil.
For those who claim that we never really came near to the possibility of nuclear war, here's one incident. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, a Soviet submarine (the B-59) was caught by an aircraft carrier called the USS Randolph and a fleet of destroyers not far from Cuba. The sub was ordered to surface for identification, but didn't respond, so the fleet started dropping depth charges intended to force it to surface.
The B-59 was a nuclear-armed sub. The captain, Savitsky, took the charges as a sign that they were under attack, and believed that war might have already started. He ordered the launch of a nuclear torpedo against the 'attacking' fleet.
To authorise the launch of nuclear weapons the captain needed the unanimous agreement of the top three officers on the sub: himself, the commissar, and the second-in-command Arkhipov. Two of them voted to launch. Arkhipov was against it, and managed to argue Savitsky into surfacing and waiting for orders from Moscow. Once they surfaced they realised that they weren't in a state of war (there was a band playing jazz on one of the destroyers) and identified themselves to the US fleet.
If Arkhipov had voted yea to the launch, a Russian submarine would have blown up a dozen US ships with a nuclear torpedo in the Western Atlantic at the height of the CMC. That nuclear war would follow isn't too unlikely a conjecture. I'm sure it wasn't the only incident of its kind, either.
Kawinky-fucking-dink! I just got done reading a book on nukes. And the subject of NMD systems (Nuclear Missile Defense) sees so much more complex. As in, the various systems designed to swat enemy nukes out of the atmosphere. Incredibly complicated topic.
For those who claim that we never really came near to the possibility of nuclear war, here's one incident. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, a Soviet submarine (the B-59) was caught by an aircraft carrier called the USS Randolph and a fleet of destroyers not far from Cuba. The sub was ordered to surface for identification, but didn't respond, so the fleet started dropping depth charges intended to force it to surface.
The B-59 was a nuclear-armed sub. The captain, Savitsky, took the charges as a sign that they were under attack, and believed that war might have already started. He ordered the launch of a nuclear torpedo against the 'attacking' fleet.
To authorise the launch of nuclear weapons the captain needed the unanimous agreement of the top three officers on the sub: himself, the commissar, and the second-in-command Arkhipov. Two of them voted to launch. Arkhipov was against it, and managed to argue Savitsky into surfacing and waiting for orders from Moscow. Once they surfaced they realised that they weren't in a state of war (there was a band playing jazz on one of the destroyers) and identified themselves to the US fleet.
If Arkhipov had voted yea to the launch, a Russian submarine would have blown up a dozen US ships with a nuclear torpedo in the Western Atlantic at the height of the CMC. That nuclear war would follow isn't too unlikely a conjecture. I'm sure it wasn't the only incident of its kind, either.
Yes but that's why there's so much redundancy in the decision making process.
HamHamJ on
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
It's both, really, since it only came down to the one guy because of effective redundancy, but came down to only one guy because of insufficient redundancy.
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
HamHamJ on
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
Well, hell, it worked, I guess. I'm sure glad they had three people in charge of ending the world rather than just two. Good to know the system holds together!
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
I say again: are you honestly suggesting that this situation was an example of sufficient redundancy? Savitksy and the commissar were both in favour of the launch. If Arkhipov hadn't voted no, and maintained his position in the face of argument from his two superior officers, it would have meant nuclear war.
I can't penetrate your reasoning here. A group of three people is a perfectly adequate level of redundancy against the possibility of nuclear armageddon? As this example clearly illustrates, because one guy voted no?
Well, hell, it worked, I guess. I'm sure glad they had three people in charge of ending the world rather than just two. Good to know the system holds together!
Shit, more to the point what if someone decides a majority vote is enough?
Well, hell, it worked, I guess. I'm sure glad they had three people in charge of ending the world rather than just two. Good to know the system holds together!
Shit, more to the point what if someone decides a majority vote is enough?
It's good to know the Soviets aren't democratic, then.
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
I say again: are you honestly suggesting that this situation was an example of sufficient redundancy?
Since it resulted in the correct result, that would be the obvious conclusion.
HamHamJ on
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
I say again: are you honestly suggesting that this situation was an example of sufficient redundancy?
Since it resulted in the correct result, that would be the obvious conclusion.
Any system that relies on every officer to overrule his superiors every time to avoid the end of the world sucks. Even more so when we're talking about a soviet style military.
I don't disagree that we came close, specifically during the Cuban missile crisis, but at least we can hope everyone has learned from that event --don't try to stick nuclear missiles right near an enemy that is normally thousands of kilometers away. They think you're up to something. And I mean that just as much (if not more) for the US sticking missiles in Turkey as the USSR sticking missiles in Cuba.
Hopefully no one is quite stupid enough to make THAT sort of gesture anymore.
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
I say again: are you honestly suggesting that this situation was an example of sufficient redundancy?
Since it resulted in the correct result, that would be the obvious conclusion.
And if I play Russian roulette with your head and with five rounds in the chamber, but you don't get shot, I'm taking sufficient care of your safety?
I give you a situation where the decision of whether or not to start a nuclear war came down to a single man, and you're suggesting it's an example of effective redundancy?
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
I say again: are you honestly suggesting that this situation was an example of sufficient redundancy?
Since it resulted in the correct result, that would be the obvious conclusion.
Effective redundancy would require at least two different and independent systems working in parallel deducing what to do in the given situation.
Three men in a tin can on the bottom of the ocean is not that.
And to say that the obvious conclusion is that it worked is goosery of the highest caliber. It was pure goddamn luck.
In that case the officer disobeyed the official rules. Soviets were informed by the American (and worldwide) practice of dropping depth charges, and previously the guy had refused to identify themselves. It was not really an unambiguous situation where they had good reason to expect that war had already started, the officer was unprofessional and paranoid and was corrected by his second-in-command. That's not luck, that's one person following their training and another not.
I think that's a proof of the system working. There was no failure involved. It's the same situation as with MacArthur, and we were talking about a far more powerful officer in this case. The thread of MAD is so great that
In fact when you take on account the amount of nuclear weapons, nuclear armed vehicles and people in command of them, the fact that we only know of half a dozen incidents at best where it came anywhere close makes it in itself more impressive then practically every other regulatory system in the world.
Besides, after that incident and the entire CMC, the guidelines and safeties were made stricter, again contributing to the workability of MAD (or beginning it by some accounts). The nuclear weapon era did start from two cities being turned to ash. Name one other weapon that changed the face of warfare in history that never got used again after the first time.
The main problem with talking about how bad MAD is that you can't really propose any workable alternatives. I mean during the height of the Cold War the US and Soviets weren't going to take each other's word that the other was not developing a nuclear arsenal in secret.
Name one other weapon that changed the face of warfare in history that never got used again after the first time.
The Archimedes shield laser.
Although, since it never got used again Mythbusters would therefore have you think it didn't really work. The truth is ancient Greece just made shield laser nonproliferation agreements.
In that case the officer disobeyed the official rules. Soviets were informed by the American (and worldwide) practice of dropping depth charges, and previously the guy had refused to identify themselves. It was not really an unambiguous situation where they had good reason to expect that war had already started, the officer was unprofessional and paranoid and was corrected by his second-in-command. That's not luck, that's one person following their training and another not.
I think that's a proof of the system working. There was no failure involved. It's the same situation as with MacArthur, and we were talking about a far more powerful officer in this case.
Any system in which nuclear war is only averted by a single man acting against his two superior officers is not safe. I'm astonished at the viewpoint you and HamHam seem to share, that because something did happen that means it was guaranteed to happen. If you take that situation and replace one man, it could have meant the deaths of hundreds of millions of people. That is not a sufficient margin of error. That's not "proof of the system working", it's a narrow escape from death.
In that case the officer disobeyed the official rules. Soviets were informed by the American (and worldwide) practice of dropping depth charges, and previously the guy had refused to identify themselves. It was not really an unambiguous situation where they had good reason to expect that war had already started, the officer was unprofessional and paranoid and was corrected by his second-in-command. That's not luck, that's one person following their training and another not.
I think that's a proof of the system working. There was no failure involved. It's the same situation as with MacArthur, and we were talking about a far more powerful officer in this case.
Any system in which nuclear war is only averted by a single man acting against his two superior officers is not safe. I'm astonished at the viewpoint you and HamHam seem to share, that because something did happen that means it was guaranteed to happen. If you take that situation and replace one man, it could have meant the deaths of hundreds of millions of people. That is not a sufficient margin of error. That's not "proof of the system working", it's a narrow escape from death.
It all comes down to how you frame it. In essence, there were three failsafes in place. Two of them failed, but not all three. What you are saying is that because your main parachute failed as did a backup and you had to use a second backup, that means skydiving is absolutely unsafe.
HamHamJ on
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
I think the disconnect here is, if it had been merely the Captain's authority and no three-person consensus needed, then that would have been less safeguards than the actual system they had in place and, well, boom.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
I think the disconnect here is, if it had been merely the Captain's authority and no three-person consensus needed, then that would have been less safeguards than the actual system they had in place and, well, boom.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
The risk in that situation was created by the Soviets putting a nuclear-armed sub in such a highly-charged flashpoint. The redundancy system worked, but it should never have had to be tested in the first place. Remember, the CMC was relatively early in the nuclear-era. The two superpowers hadn't really figured out how to manage a crisis. Both sides were playing an extremely dangerous game of nuclear brinkmanship. Thankfully, they learned their lessons from the experience and decided to be more conservative in their dealings with one another going forward.
Putting a nuclear-armed sub in a situation like that is asking for trouble. Subs can't easily communicate with naval command, so the captains have a lot of discretion in their mission. Thankfully, the redundancy system worked here, but just barely.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
Israel is NOT in regards to Iran. I'm not sure which one would push the button, but a nuclear armed Iran or close to it would probably mean immediate war.
It would mean unilateral Israeli air strikes and a US veto on a security council response. I don't believe Iran would be in a position to strike back effectively.
They have missiles capable of hitting Israel, and Hezbollah with it's 50,000 rockets/missiles/probably SCUDs right at Israel's doorstep.
Israel wouldn't really be able to destroy Iran's nuclear capacity with conventional air strikes like it did with Syria's and Iraq's single shitty reactors. Iran's nuclear program was started like 40 years ago, with the help of America, when Shah was in power. There are seventeen different known sites contributing to a nuclear program and probably more clandestine sites. They are already at a nuclear power level in the sense that they have reactors capable of creating power.
So like previously said, it would require an long-lasting air war with the entire IDF Air Force committed into it, hundreds or thousands of casualties, and without a doubt a reprisal from Iran and Hezbollah. And Iran is certainly not defenseless against an air attack and most of it's nuclear sites are heavily protected - which would mean Israeli casualties as well.
And US certainly wouldn't veto Israel if it goes all Gaza on one of the most important countries in Middle East, even they have a limit. And Saudi Arabia sure as hell wouldn't let IDF use their ground as a base in an open war - single air strike, maybe - they would get lynched by their own populace and provide massive fuel for the Islamists inside in the nation. They didn't let U.S. use them as a staging ground in Iraq War either. And they hated Saddam just as much.
So you know, open war is impossible for Israel logistically and politically as well and wouldn't be painless to itself even if it somehow managed to get it's entire air force in Iran.
There is this sort of mythical view of IDF being capable of doing whatever it wants in the region, but as powerful as it is, it has limits. United States and Russia are pretty much the only countries with an Air Force capable of destroying Iran's nuclear capacity at will and close enough. Maybe Turkey if it was willing to absorb the casualties. Latter two are almost allies of Iran, former one is not going to get into a third horrible Middle Eastern war against even an harder foe.
So Iran is going to get nukes. There is literally nothing that Israel can do about it short of nuking Iran.
And Israel is a rational actor too, no less then Iran is. No way in hell they would have gotten where they are right now without some major brains.
This is an excellent post, and I thank you for your perspective on the situation.
While I disagree that the US would not back Israel up in the security council, no matter what, your logistical assessment, of the infeasibility of unilateral action by Israel, has put me at greater ease with regard to the possibility of it coming to that.
[Edit] And who knows, perhaps the recent unrest, that has caused us to withdraw our support to long time allies in the region, will give us cause to reassess our diplomatic priorities with regard to the middle east. It seems like a longshot to think that we would ever have the domestic support required to separate deprioritzing our support of Israel from political suicide, but one can dream.
I think the disconnect here is, if it had been merely the Captain's authority and no three-person consensus needed, then that would have been less safeguards than the actual system they had in place and, well, boom.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
The risk in that situation was created by the Soviets putting a nuclear-armed sub in such a highly-charged flashpoint. The redundancy system worked, but it should never have had to be tested in the first place. Remember, the CMC was relatively early in the nuclear-era. The two superpowers hadn't really figured out how to manage a crisis. Both sides were playing an extremely dangerous game of nuclear brinkmanship. Thankfully, they learned their lessons from the experience and decided to be more conservative in their dealings with one another going forward.
Putting a nuclear-armed sub in a situation like that is asking for trouble. Subs can't easily communicate with naval command, so the captains have a lot of discretion in their mission. Thankfully, the redundancy system worked here, but just barely.
Wasn't there a similar situation with the US at one point, or am I thinking of a fictional depiction of events in a movie?
I think the disconnect here is, if it had been merely the Captain's authority and no three-person consensus needed, then that would have been less safeguards than the actual system they had in place and, well, boom.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
The risk in that situation was created by the Soviets putting a nuclear-armed sub in such a highly-charged flashpoint. The redundancy system worked, but it should never have had to be tested in the first place. Remember, the CMC was relatively early in the nuclear-era. The two superpowers hadn't really figured out how to manage a crisis. Both sides were playing an extremely dangerous game of nuclear brinkmanship. Thankfully, they learned their lessons from the experience and decided to be more conservative in their dealings with one another going forward.
Putting a nuclear-armed sub in a situation like that is asking for trouble. Subs can't easily communicate with naval command, so the captains have a lot of discretion in their mission. Thankfully, the redundancy system worked here, but just barely.
Wasn't there a similar situation with the US at one point, or am I thinking of a fictional depiction of events in a movie?
That was sort of the plot of Crimson Tide. Not sure if that's based on any real-world events.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
I think the disconnect here is, if it had been merely the Captain's authority and no three-person consensus needed, then that would have been less safeguards than the actual system they had in place and, well, boom.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
The risk in that situation was created by the Soviets putting a nuclear-armed sub in such a highly-charged flashpoint. The redundancy system worked, but it should never have had to be tested in the first place. Remember, the CMC was relatively early in the nuclear-era. The two superpowers hadn't really figured out how to manage a crisis. Both sides were playing an extremely dangerous game of nuclear brinkmanship. Thankfully, they learned their lessons from the experience and decided to be more conservative in their dealings with one another going forward.
Putting a nuclear-armed sub in a situation like that is asking for trouble. Subs can't easily communicate with naval command, so the captains have a lot of discretion in their mission. Thankfully, the redundancy system worked here, but just barely.
Wasn't there a similar situation with the US at one point, or am I thinking of a fictional depiction of events in a movie?
There was a similar situation in which a decision making process in Russia bottlenecked at one guy, but it's not nearly as narrow a save as the case of Arkhipov in '62. I want to say 1983, during ABLE ARCHER, and a computer malfunction at a Siberian radar station?
I found out the other day that there's actually a company that is building doomsday bunkers in undisclosed locations. This is their website: Terra Vivos. It's kind of creepy how their sales pitch amounts to "There's a lot of different catastrophic events that could occur; buy your doomsday shelter today!"
Given that there website claims they can create vaults accomodating up to 200 people, this company seems like it might be the real world Vault-Tec.
I found out the other day that there's actually a company that is building doomsday bunkers in undisclosed locations. This is their website: Terra Vivos. It's kind of creepy how their sales pitch amounts to "There's a lot of different catastrophic events that could occur; buy your doomsday shelter today!"
Given that there website claims they can create vaults accomodating up to 200 people, this company seems like it might be the real world Vault-Tec.
And yet you're still way more likely to die in a car crash.
Most doomsdays aren't worth trying to survive. All of them are worth trying to prevent.
I found out the other day that there's actually a company that is building doomsday bunkers in undisclosed locations. This is their website: Terra Vivos. It's kind of creepy how their sales pitch amounts to "There's a lot of different catastrophic events that could occur; buy your doomsday shelter today!"
Given that there website claims they can create vaults accomodating up to 200 people, this company seems like it might be the real world Vault-Tec.
And yet you're still way more likely to die in a Vault-Tec experiment
Most doomsdays aren't worth trying to survive. All of them are worth trying to prevent.
Seriously. Those vaults have, what, like a 9 out of 10 mad-science-genocide rate; with the remaining vaults descending into corrupt dictatorships.
I think the disconnect here is, if it had been merely the Captain's authority and no three-person consensus needed, then that would have been less safeguards than the actual system they had in place and, well, boom.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
Yeah, I'm aware that it worked. It's just that that's pretty much irrelevant to whether or not it was an acceptable margin of safety. When arguing that a safety measure is inadequate, arguing that it hasn't failed yet isn't a valid rebuttal, and when talking about past events, the fact that something didn't happen doesn't mean there wasn't a significant risk of it happening.
It all comes down to how you frame it. In essence, there were three failsafes in place. Two of them failed, but not all three. What you are saying is that because your main parachute failed as did a backup and you had to use a second backup, that means skydiving is absolutely unsafe.
No. What I am saying is that for a danger of this magnitude, three guys on a sub is not enough of a failsafe. Against which you're arguing, essentially, that because the failsafe worked its success must have been assured, which is clearly fallacious. Similarly, I can consider the use of two parachutes to be an acceptable level of security, even if presented with a situation when both parachutes failed to deploy. The outcome of an event doesn't affect the probability of that outcome before the event. That should go without saying.
And if I play Russian roulette with your head and with five rounds in the chamber, but you don't get shot, I'm taking sufficient care of your safety?
False analogy is false.
Relevant to the statement it was addressing - that the fact that disaster didn't occur that proves acceptable safety measures were in place - it is absolutely applicable.
The main problem with talking about how bad MAD is that you can't really propose any workable alternatives. I mean during the height of the Cold War the US and Soviets weren't going to take each other's word that the other was not developing a nuclear arsenal in secret.
If only they'd had a Great Leader like George W Bush back then. He'd have been able to look into their souls and tell us the Russians were good people and would never, ever nuke us.
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Yeah, uh, nuclear power plants and nuclear bombs are two completely different things.
Frankly, I find the demonization of nuclear power to be the saddest part of our whole Cold War legacy here.
It is credible in that fact that if it were not, the equilibrium position of the game would have each player nuking each other. Yet here we are, unnuked. If the threat of retaliation were not credible then the first thing anyone would have done is nuke the other guys before they nuked you back (since they would not retaliate).
Since we don't live in the post-apocalypse its fairly easy to say that the threat is credible.
The other way we know its a credible threat is by simply asking ourselves whether people believe its a credible threat. And there are thousands of pages of documents dealing with the various crisises where its made very clear by all parties that they consider the threat credible.
And the third way we know its credible is that it is just plain rational to do and you simply do not know what rationality means
But what the hell, I'll go for it. I did read the article, I was saying that the NSG's stance on equating power reactors with nuclear weapons is detrimental both to non-carbon-emitting power generation and to nuclear nonproliferation.
I will go ahead and help out by quoting the relevant part of the article which addresses your specific issue
Right, except earlier in the article it showed that none of the reactors used to be civilian, e.g. it was using its domestic supplies for bomb-making anyway and getting power somewhere else, presumably coal or oil.
The B-59 was a nuclear-armed sub. The captain, Savitsky, took the charges as a sign that they were under attack, and believed that war might have already started. He ordered the launch of a nuclear torpedo against the 'attacking' fleet.
To authorise the launch of nuclear weapons the captain needed the unanimous agreement of the top three officers on the sub: himself, the commissar, and the second-in-command Arkhipov. Two of them voted to launch. Arkhipov was against it, and managed to argue Savitsky into surfacing and waiting for orders from Moscow. Once they surfaced they realised that they weren't in a state of war (there was a band playing jazz on one of the destroyers) and identified themselves to the US fleet.
If Arkhipov had voted yea to the launch, a Russian submarine would have blown up a dozen US ships with a nuclear torpedo in the Western Atlantic at the height of the CMC. That nuclear war would follow isn't too unlikely a conjecture. I'm sure it wasn't the only incident of its kind, either.
Yes but that's why there's so much redundancy in the decision making process.
It's both, really, since it only came down to the one guy because of effective redundancy, but came down to only one guy because of insufficient redundancy.
At the same time.
No it came down to three men, and only one of them was required to be conservative and decide against a launch. Thus, redundancy.
I say again: are you honestly suggesting that this situation was an example of sufficient redundancy? Savitksy and the commissar were both in favour of the launch. If Arkhipov hadn't voted no, and maintained his position in the face of argument from his two superior officers, it would have meant nuclear war.
I can't penetrate your reasoning here. A group of three people is a perfectly adequate level of redundancy against the possibility of nuclear armageddon? As this example clearly illustrates, because one guy voted no?
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Shit, more to the point what if someone decides a majority vote is enough?
It's good to know the Soviets aren't democratic, then.
Since it resulted in the correct result, that would be the obvious conclusion.
Any system that relies on every officer to overrule his superiors every time to avoid the end of the world sucks. Even more so when we're talking about a soviet style military.
Hopefully no one is quite stupid enough to make THAT sort of gesture anymore.
And if I play Russian roulette with your head and with five rounds in the chamber, but you don't get shot, I'm taking sufficient care of your safety?
Effective redundancy would require at least two different and independent systems working in parallel deducing what to do in the given situation.
Three men in a tin can on the bottom of the ocean is not that.
And to say that the obvious conclusion is that it worked is goosery of the highest caliber. It was pure goddamn luck.
Ed I like the Russian roulette analogue
I think that's a proof of the system working. There was no failure involved. It's the same situation as with MacArthur, and we were talking about a far more powerful officer in this case. The thread of MAD is so great that
In fact when you take on account the amount of nuclear weapons, nuclear armed vehicles and people in command of them, the fact that we only know of half a dozen incidents at best where it came anywhere close makes it in itself more impressive then practically every other regulatory system in the world.
Besides, after that incident and the entire CMC, the guidelines and safeties were made stricter, again contributing to the workability of MAD (or beginning it by some accounts). The nuclear weapon era did start from two cities being turned to ash. Name one other weapon that changed the face of warfare in history that never got used again after the first time.
The Archimedes shield laser.
Although, since it never got used again Mythbusters would therefore have you think it didn't really work. The truth is ancient Greece just made shield laser nonproliferation agreements.
Any system in which nuclear war is only averted by a single man acting against his two superior officers is not safe. I'm astonished at the viewpoint you and HamHam seem to share, that because something did happen that means it was guaranteed to happen. If you take that situation and replace one man, it could have meant the deaths of hundreds of millions of people. That is not a sufficient margin of error. That's not "proof of the system working", it's a narrow escape from death.
It all comes down to how you frame it. In essence, there were three failsafes in place. Two of them failed, but not all three. What you are saying is that because your main parachute failed as did a backup and you had to use a second backup, that means skydiving is absolutely unsafe.
In other words, the system they had in place did work, but was simultaneously inadequate. It's like if you build three levels of failsafes, but the first two fail entirely and the third works- it's both a good thing you built three layers, but it's not a good thing the first two failed.
As in, the statements: "It's a good thing the Soviets required three officers to agree!" and "Holy shit, the Soviets only required three officers to agree?!" are both accurate ones.
False analogy is false.
Putting a nuclear-armed sub in a situation like that is asking for trouble. Subs can't easily communicate with naval command, so the captains have a lot of discretion in their mission. Thankfully, the redundancy system worked here, but just barely.
Rigorous Scholarship
While I disagree that the US would not back Israel up in the security council, no matter what, your logistical assessment, of the infeasibility of unilateral action by Israel, has put me at greater ease with regard to the possibility of it coming to that.
[Edit] And who knows, perhaps the recent unrest, that has caused us to withdraw our support to long time allies in the region, will give us cause to reassess our diplomatic priorities with regard to the middle east. It seems like a longshot to think that we would ever have the domestic support required to separate deprioritzing our support of Israel from political suicide, but one can dream.
Wasn't there a similar situation with the US at one point, or am I thinking of a fictional depiction of events in a movie?
Rigorous Scholarship
There was a similar situation in which a decision making process in Russia bottlenecked at one guy, but it's not nearly as narrow a save as the case of Arkhipov in '62. I want to say 1983, during ABLE ARCHER, and a computer malfunction at a Siberian radar station?
Given that there website claims they can create vaults accomodating up to 200 people, this company seems like it might be the real world Vault-Tec.
And yet you're still way more likely to die in a car crash.
Most doomsdays aren't worth trying to survive. All of them are worth trying to prevent.
Seriously. Those vaults have, what, like a 9 out of 10 mad-science-genocide rate; with the remaining vaults descending into corrupt dictatorships.
Yeah, I'm aware that it worked. It's just that that's pretty much irrelevant to whether or not it was an acceptable margin of safety. When arguing that a safety measure is inadequate, arguing that it hasn't failed yet isn't a valid rebuttal, and when talking about past events, the fact that something didn't happen doesn't mean there wasn't a significant risk of it happening.
No. What I am saying is that for a danger of this magnitude, three guys on a sub is not enough of a failsafe. Against which you're arguing, essentially, that because the failsafe worked its success must have been assured, which is clearly fallacious. Similarly, I can consider the use of two parachutes to be an acceptable level of security, even if presented with a situation when both parachutes failed to deploy. The outcome of an event doesn't affect the probability of that outcome before the event. That should go without saying.
Relevant to the statement it was addressing - that the fact that disaster didn't occur that proves acceptable safety measures were in place - it is absolutely applicable.
If only they'd had a Great Leader like George W Bush back then. He'd have been able to look into their souls and tell us the Russians were good people and would never, ever nuke us.