[stareatgoats]

> Given the incalculable risks, one may wonder why nuclear arsenals still exist at all

Because everybody is thinking that "if we don't arm ourselves, our adversaries will, and therefore gain the upper hand". That there are risks involved doesn't count, as long as they don't prove to be real (i.e. actually happen). If they prove to be real then we'll have a moratorium of a few years until the default reasoning takes over again.

I'm sorry, but I don't think we are capable of breaking out of this "highway to hell".

[PJDK]

I think it's worth gaming out a world without nuclear weapons in the context of the Ukraine war.

It seems pretty undeniable that both Russia and NATO would be more willing to countenance a direct confrontation.

Not only that, surely by this point both sides would be dusting off plans to start construction once again. That immediately opens up the likelihood of preemptive strikes to prevent your opponent actually achieving a new nuclear weapon.

[gambiting]

>>I think it's worth gaming out a world without nuclear weapons in the context of the Ukraine war.

I'm not so sure - someone else might equally argue that if Ukraine had nuclear weapons it wouldn't have been attacked in the first place, so maybe that's the path that it should have taken.

And equally - "both Russia and NATO would be more willing to countenance a direct confrontation."

Maybe. Or maybe it's posturing. I think EU's support for Ukraine is huge and populations of many countries still support sending them weapons and supplies, but if they had to send their men and women to die in Ukraine the discussion would be different. Not saying they wouldn't, just that it's easy to say "oh if only Russia didn't have nuclear weapons we'd definitely go and fight them". It's theoretical.

[mr_00ff00]

I think you vastly overestimate how much old politicians care about sending other people to die.

[dragonwriter]

> It seems pretty undeniable that both Russia and NATO would be more willing to countenance a direct confrontation.

The only reason Russia is willing to engage in a direct conflict with Ukraine is their nuclear weapons make them feel secure that that won’t evolve into a direct conflict with NATO, which, without nuclear weapons, would be immediate ruin for Russia.

Nuclear weapons enable direct aggression by nuclear powers against anyone except other nuclear powers.

[littlestymaar]

> It seems pretty undeniable that both Russia and NATO would be more willing to countenance a direct confrontation.

Without nuclear weapons, Russia would likely not have invaded in the first place, because a NATO intervention would have been likely and would have ended in the annihilation of the Russian military in just a few weeks.

[Gibbon1]

I wrote a research paper on nuclear weapons back around 80.

The amount of nuclear weapons the US and especially the Soviet Union built was absolutely nutter loony Cocoa Puffs insane. Part of that was a disturbing fact that they are the cheapest way to kill people as long as you don't mind killing hapless schmucks indiscriminately. And you want to make sure you get them all. Flip side is enormous amounts of resources needed to create arsenals the size the US and the Soviets had.

[Clubber]

Also, keep in mind we haven't had a massive casualty war like WW1 or WW2 in nearly 80 years. I believe M.A.D. and nuclear deterrent has a lot to do with that.

[Simulacra]

I think also because the launch a nuclear weapons is not a simple task. There is no big button on the desk. Furthermore, it is highly questionable, if antagonistic nations even have the capability to use their nuclear weapons. There is a school of thought that the nuclear weapons of countries, like Russia have deteriorated so much, that even launch one would be a considerable, and noticeable effort.

As for tactical nuclear weapons, I think we are still looking at a major hurdle to put that theater and launch.

[gambiting]

>>There is a school of thought that the nuclear weapons of countries, like Russia have deteriorated so much, that even launch one would be a considerable, and noticeable effort.

I don't know why this keeps being repeated though - it sounds more like something people wish for rather than something than experts actually believe. The problem with Russian nuclear weapons is that as part of various treaties they had to let other countries, including US, inspect their facilities missiles and core storage, to make sure it's all in tip top condition and nuclear arms aren't being kept in an unsafe way and maybe getting stolen/sold off. So paradoxically we have made sure that Russian nuclear forces are probably the most well kept, inspected and funded out of all of Russian departments, because they had to allow international inspections regularly.

[r0b1n]

Foreign inspectors might warn the Russians about the risk of theft, accidents and so on. But would they warn them if they noticed that the weapons were degraded or nonfunctional, unbeknownst to the Russians?

[gambiting]

No, and that's kind of hard to assess - but if they are inspecting facilities for maintainance of nuclear weapons and they appear to be in good order, then it would be weird for those facilities to not be actually used for their stated purpose of weapon maintenance. No one, not even the russians, is pouring billions into keeping those facilities operational and up to scratch and then not actually using them - I think it would be very unreasonable to assume so.

[r0b1n]

It is hard to assess, so this is just speculation, but I would guess that it is far easier to keep a facility in good working order, shining, nice and presentable when you don't actually use it but just pretend.

Also, the Soviet Union as well as Russia do have a culture of corruption, plan-fulfillment-only-on-paper, diversion of public funds and organized inefficiency on the job. E.g. from the current Ukraine-Russian war, there are reports (to be taken with a grain of salt of course, but there are dozens of confirmed, similar stories from Soviet times) of food shipments containing just canned water instead of canned meat/vegetables because somebody embezzled the money and shipped water to cover it up. I can't really decide either way: maybe all this is even easier, given the secrecy surrounding everything military and nuclear. Yet maybe it is harder, given the increased scrutiny around all things nuclear.

[Simulacra]

You mean like Wired magazine? How about the Wall Street Journal?

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/nuclear-weapons-testing https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-russias-tactical-nuclear-we...

Wait, how about the New York Times? https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/03/us/politics/russia-nuclea...

Paradoxically a google search would have helped.

[gambiting]

Wired literally has a quote from someone competent who says exactly what I said:

"Provided you make the effort to maintain warheads properly, though, they ought to work. “Russia has a robust nuclear capacity. They refurbish their warheads often,” says Amy Woolf, a US specialist in nuclear weapons policy. Schneider, too, is confident that Russia’s nukes are serviceable. It would be unwise to assume otherwise. "

I can't read the WSJ or NYT articles without subscription so I cannot comment on those.

[actionfromafar]

You only need 5% of the ICBMs and submarine launched ones to work to cause problems you couldn’t even imagine.

[darkwraithcov]

I read somewhere that even a single small nuclear exchange between countries across the planet from us would cause a Nuclear Winter, which would kill much of the flora and fauna on Earth.

[r0b1n]

No, it wouldn't. Nuclear winter from a small-scale exchange was a simulation result many decades ago, to be disproven only a few years later by more advanced simulations and observation results from volcanoes, forest and oil fires. Larger exchanges will have a noticable effect, but how large is up for debate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter has a fairly detailed elaboration on the various points of view and their history.

[darkwraithcov]

I’m talking just 100 warheads. https://youtu.be/CxkvsrSUyOU Kyle Hill talks about it on this video at 7:25.

[ajmurmann]

How small is small? We've had hundreds of above-ground nuclear tests over the years

[darkwraithcov]

100 warheads. https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/devastating-effects-of-nu...

[actionfromafar]

On city centers? Not saying it would cause nuclear winter, but economic disaster. (Hunger, disease, wars.)

[mistrial9]

The Fate of the Earth: Schell, Jonathan

[AnimalMuppet]

> There is a school of thought that the nuclear weapons of countries, like Russia have deteriorated so much, that even launch one would be a considerable, and noticeable effort.

I would like to think that is true. I would hate to have to find out.

[dgroshev]

It's not just that, but also nuclear use would get more probable with less warheads before it gets impossible because there are none. Imagine there are only three nuclear warheads in the world, is the chance of their use higher or lower than when there are thousands between adversaries?

Actually, you don't need to imagine.

[me_me_me]

well, all theories and calculations are fine.

But we have a concrete example nowadays.

Ukraine gave up their nukes after ussr fell apart, with a territorial independence guarantees from russia... we all see how that ended for side that gave up nukes.