Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
Redundancy, take out the 10, we are defenseless
As I said, we can protect ten.
That being said, you will still need enough to destroy every inch of Chinese and Russian land (with plenty of backups, in case they have anti-missile shields
No, you don't. You need enough to deter an attack, not to destroy all their land.
They're nowhere near a missile shield. If that changes, we can discuss the need for more.
Plus, not all nukes are created equal, you have city busters, tactical nukes, etc.
Not sure what your point is - ten nukes for deterrence would be strategic, massive weapons. We get rid of the rest.
Rainsford:
I'm not sure where you get the figure that we can reliably protect 10 missiles, and ONLY 10 missiles, from attack.
I didn't say we can only protect ten; I said we can protect ten and asked why we need more than ten. We can protect more.
And while 10 might seem like "enough", it does not have the same strategic impact that hundreds of them does. 10 nuclear missiles could totally wreck almost any country on the planet. Take out 10 of their largest cities and that country will take generations to recover, if they ever do. On the other hand, they will survive as a country. Blanket their country with nuclear explosions, and their nation will simply cease to exist for all time. That is a powerful specter to face if you are some national leader looking to make a little noise.
Ten is enough to deter attack (again McNamara thinks our non-nuclear forces are adequate to deter attack). Can you show otherwise?
We don't need 'strategic impact' that's excessive, we need to deter attack.
As for Robert McNamara, I somehow doubt a fellow who thinks zero nuclear weapons is somehow a "reliable deterrent". Did he explain his logic?
Yes; it's as I said, that the purpose is deterrence and we have that reliably without any nukes. He also discussed the benefits such as reducing the risk of nuclear weapons being used, of miscalculations leading to war when to this day there's often short notice for responding to alerts (he mentioned some close calls), and less risk of proliferation.
A few people have touched on it already. 10 puts us at risk since someone might try and take out those 10 some how, or they could fail etc.
For the third time, we can protect ten missiles. Their reliability isn't an issue as their purpose is a deterrent; by the time reliability is an issue, the deterrent isn't relevant.
Look at Iran and North Korea. We know they have none or just a few Nukes right now. So we are FAR better off going in and attacking them now while we can.
Iran has no nuclear weapons. For both of them, they also lack the sort of delivery systems and ability to protect their weapons that we have.
Both countries would be deterred by the threat of our military, much less even one nuclear missile, much less 10. If they wouldn't, they wouldn't be deterred by 10,000.
In five years N Korea will have a few dozen spread out all over the country at that point trying a first strike to eliminate them become FAR more a gamble than hitting them now when we have a nearly 100% chance of taking them all out in one shot.
That's a false analogy. No country can 'take out' our ten missiles, for thr fourth time, we can protect ten missiles.
I've yet to see one reason why ten missiles would not provide a deterrent.
Now a few hundred would do the trick, doubt we need 1000 or more.
At least you are considering the issue some, it's a start.
If people really knew the utter lack of any reason for this huge damage with thousands of missiles, they'd be shocked. It came about when the air force under Curtis LeMay, following WWII and his involvement in mass civilian bombings, simply decided to target basically everything in other nations. McNamara asked why that was needed and there wasn't an answer, they had just targetted it all. He was horrified.
(The military had actually tried to block the new Secretary of Defense McNamara from seeing the plans. He had to have Kennedy directly order them to do so.)
As for all the questions about penis size, breat enlargements, sniper bullets, and so on, they're either without any evidence they relate to the number of 10, or terrible analogies.
I could say we need a million are needed by the same claims. Ten is already overkill.
Reducing our nuclear weapons down to 10 would just be another liberal step in a series designed to neutralize this country.
You get it wrong again Jaskalas. The reason is to keep America strong and give her other benefits. She would have enough to deter attack, and all kinds of advantages.
Amidst the face of nuclear proliferation from any country not yet with a nuclear arsenal, such a move would put us at risk.
Another claim without any evidence or argument backing it up. No, it would not put us at risk, show how it would. What country is going to attack against 10 nukes but not 1,000?
Countries are going to choose what's best for them, and if they're madmen who are going to attack, the number of missiles we have won't matter. For anyone else, the calculation of having ten nukes launched at them is worse than not launching an attack at us, the purpose of the deterrent. What kind of thoughtless assumption it is that there are nations who just can't wait to nuke us so much that they'll do it with ten nukes back, who aren't also just madmen who will attack no matter how many are launched back? None.
Take Castro - during the Cuban Missile Crisis, he wanted the USSR to launch a nuclear attack on the US, knowing Cuba would be nuked - he offered that as a sacrifice.
Having one or ten or 1,000 nukes didn't make any difference to him. Ten is enough to deter attack.
Why would Russia or China want a nuclear war where they lose ten major targets and hundreds of millions of people? Why would they want nuclear war where they lose one?
If we went to war, we could quickly build more nukes if needed - we're talking about a deterrent. Ten deters attack.
If we were to pursue this, I think we should do it where other nations also agree to have no more than 10. If they refuse, we could re-consider; I don't think they would refuse.
