[scottLobster]

Well now we're getting somewhere. Specifics are much nicer. Maybe you were using some rarified academic terminology where terms like "coercion" "competitor countries" and "serves the US National Interest" have much more specific meanings than standard English would imply, although I'm not sure how specific you could get with such broad terms even in an academic setting. If anything I'd expect more acronyms and nitpicky details.

But in any case, we've clearly never followed through on the threat of a nuclear first strike, and according to this page we haven't issued one since the 1950s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_blackmail

I was especially shocked to hear we threatened Iraq with one in the run up to 2003... I just googled around to be sure and while there was tons of rhetoric about "pre-emptive strikes" it was always in a conventional context.

Where are you getting your information exactly?

Also that "rambling" was me poiting out scenarios where a nuclear reponse would be reasonable under your terminology, or at least understandable when taken in context. It wasn't meant as a question.