Obama Mulls 80 Percent Disarmament of Nuclear Arsenal

[Moechtegern]

No nuclear winter? Sure, not from the actual blasts. That just causes damage to the ozone layer and other minor problems we tend not to concern ourself with. But an actual nuclear exchange against counter-value targets (AKA: cities) that produces large amounts of smoke? (Whose particles are larger then those of volcanoes, mind you.)

http://www.envsci.rutgers.edu/~gera/...06JD008235.pdf

My mistake was saying a small exchange without specifying there'd have to be a few counter-value targets underneath the airbursts.

[danielc]

Why would a reduction in nuclear bombs be considered a bad thing. No sane US president will consider using such a device against another country, unless they are in the most extreme of circumstances, which is something that is not likely to take place for the near future, and beyond. Even during the cold war, the Soviets had a direct line to the white house to ensure that there were no misjudgements taking place on either side of the fence that could tip both countries to unleash nuclear bombs on each other. It looks like a very good decision on the part of Pres. Obama, and probably a Republican president would do the same.

[CPL Trevoga]

Biggest threat to the US is not military, but economic. All major empires in history declined internally, before they collapsed. Perhaps during the Cold war, having 10,000 nukes accomplished the mission of deterrent, right now situation has changed. Less nukes can accomplish the same mission. There are many smart people in Pentagon, I think they can come up with the appropriate number.

[omen90]

Brother, like you wouldn't believe. Imagine how much money you spend keeping your car in peak condition (the fact that you use it means it's somewhere lower then that, but close because you are still using it without problems after all), and now imagine how hard it would be to maintain a car that just sits in an opened lot. You can't get the parts moving, which is a major component of keeping it in working order, and there's some nuclear materials in there.

And honestly people, you're not thinking strategically. To you this reads "Weakening stockpile of weapons", but quantity isn't always good. A discharge of, say, a dozen nukes would be enough to cause a small "nuclear winter", lower atmospheric temperatures, and shorten harvest seasons. Do we really even need 300? If we use one or two, we can just spend a few billion dollars to replace them before we'll end up using them again.

And honestly, when do any of you think we'll ever use a nuclear weapon? Can't nuke insurgents; they're hiding in civilian populations. Can't nuke small countries; the fallout would do just as much damage to their neighbors. Can't nuke large countries; their economies keep the First World rolling.

So what are we left with? Naval fleets?

PS: I support having nukes, but you have to be practical about it when they're this much trouble. Only a fraction of the nuclear waste we've got was caused by making fuel rods. The overwhelming majority is from weaponization.

100% agree

[C.Puffs]

Don't get me wrong. I'm not some CND lunatic, I certainly value our deterrant and think we should continue to maintain it, but to claim that the at peak numbers the US didn't have enough is insane.

And you base this on? Did you base this on things like the number of targets that need to be hit, how many warheads it takes to take out each target, miss rates, reliability rates, losses in the initial exchange (unless you plan on launching on warning), what you need to keep in reserve, and how many you need to ensure that number? Did you consider duds, systemic problems like the W80 and W76 had, etc.? Or are you going with that old saw, "ZOMG if one nuke gets launched the world will 'splode so we've already lost"? There may not being any "winners" in a nuclear war but there are certainly varying degrees of how much you lost.

[C.Puffs]

Why would a reduction in nuclear bombs be considered a bad thing. No sane US president will consider using such a device against another country, unless they are in the most extreme of circumstances, which is something that is not likely to take place for the near future, and beyond. Even during the cold war, the Soviets had a direct line to the white house to ensure that there were no misjudgements taking place on either side of the fence that could tip both countries to unleash nuclear bombs on each other. It looks like a very good decision on the part of Pres. Obama, and probably a Republican president would do the same.

I take it you've made billions in the stock market with your skills in precognition?

[Nyusu]

And you base this on? Did you base this on things like the number of targets that need to be hit, how many warheads it takes to take out each target, miss rates, reliability rates, losses in the initial exchange (unless you plan on launching on warning), what you need to keep in reserve, and how many you need to ensure that number? Did you consider duds, systemic problems like the W80 and W76 had, etc.? Or are you going with that old saw, "ZOMG if one nuke gets launched the world will 'splode so we've already lost"? There may not being any "winners" in a nuclear war but there are certainly varying degrees of how much you lost.

You seems to know it better then MoD and all generals!

[Rattfink]

Thats not even close to being true. 300 nukes is nowhere near enough to "destroy the earth" or "destroy humanity". You couldnt even kill 100 million people with that, much less 7 billion. Sure, thats a sh|tload and lets hope it never happens, but dont over-state the destructiveness of a nuclear warhead.

But you don't need to destroy humanity to have effective deterrence. You only need more bombs than a country is willing to risk absorbing which so far, is two. 300 is probably plenty.

[C.Puffs]

You seems to know it better then MoD and all generals!

You mean those who are against reducing the number of nuclear weapons? Those generals?

[[WDW]Megaraptor]

But you don't need to destroy humanity to have effective deterrence. You only need more bombs than a country is willing to risk absorbing which so far, is two. 300 is probably plenty.

Is it? Mao said China could afford to lose 500 million and still come out better than the USA or USSR in a nuclear war...

[C.Puffs]

But you don't need to destroy humanity to have effective deterrence. You only need more bombs than a country is willing to risk absorbing which so far, is two. 300 is probably plenty.

Assuming the other guy will always be rational, and will never miscalculate, is a good way to end up dead.

[Rattfink]

Is it? Mao said China could afford to lose 500 million and still come out better than the USA or USSR in a nuclear war...

And Saddam said the Gulf War would be the "Mother of all battles." People say all kinds of things. I wonder what he would say after ONE drops in Peking.

[Rattfink]

Assuming the other guy will always be rational, and will never miscalculate, is a good way to end up dead.

Just out of curiosity, what world leader do you feel will risk becoming the target of 300 nuclear weapons? North Korea? Iran? China? Russia?

[gresh]

I think C. Puffs is 100% correct. Reducing the number of deployed warheads we have to the same number as Pakistan or something is just dumb. We've already reduced the number substantially, I think it's time for other parties to reduce theirs some more before we do anything.

Giving up our current strategic balance is suicide.

[C.Puffs]

Just out of curiosity, what world leader do you feel will risk becoming the target of 300 nuclear weapons? North Korea? Iran? China? Russia?

Who can say? Do you honestly believe Saddam expected over half a million troops and thousands of planes to come knocking at his door when he invaded Kuwait? Secondly, you seem to think if we had 300 nukes that that's how many targets would be hit. All things considered you'd be lucky to get 50 of them to detonate on a target.