The question “what is, or should be, the function of nuclear weapons?” for me is an easy question to answer, there should be no function for them. I find no need for nuclear weapons in the post-cold war era; they are massive genocide machines that have no use in today’s time. During the cold war I can easily find reasons for them to be used but the cold war is now over. But in reality it’s known that this is a huge dream and most likely will never be accomplished to rid the world of nuclear weapons, so in a realist point of view and for the purpose of this paper I’ll say that the only logical (yet not truly logical) means of using a nuclear weapon is through deterrence. In this paper I will talk about how I believe it should be done and what opponents to my view believe. I will also talk about how there are many complexities to nuclear strategy and it’s not as easy as just removing weapons. But the main focus on this paper is what should the function of a nuclear weapon be and that’s deterrence.
Deterrence is a military strategy in which the main purpose is to prevent an attack by the enemy or to persuade an enemy not to attack you knowing they will be equally destroyed. Luckily during the Cold War era despite a rapid increase in weapons technologies there was no large-scale strategic conflict since the Second World War. Nuclear weapons, the most destructive instrument on the planet, have played a vital role in stabilizing the relations between superpower States by making conflict illogical and unimaginably destructive and costly. There are many other reasons that States choose to develop nuclear weapons, but deterrence is the main role cited by most supporters of nuclear weapons. Some people even say that to continue the effecti...
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... more and more difficult. But with times being different and no longer a cold war there’s hope for the use of nuclear weapons for peace and to never see them being used.
In my opinion we don’t have a choice but to accept what has been handed to us, when it comes to nuclear weapons. We have created for ourselves a situation that in my mind is impossible to escape. Solutions such as disarmament or reduction in nuclear arms are extremely unrealistic as no sane leader to a state would ever put their own states security at risk. So for now the only true answer is deterrence and let’s hopes the great achievement of nuclear weapons provides peace for the world, and never leads to our own destruction. Let’s hope no matter how complex nuclear strategy is the leaders of this world will continue to seize the use of nuclear weapons and find a better use for them in the future.
In today’s society many countries and even citizens of the United States question the U.S. government’s decision to get in involved in nuclear warfare. These people deemed it unnecessary and state that the U.S. is a hypocrite that preaches peace, but causes destruction and death. Before and during World War II the U.S. was presented with a difficult decision on whether or not to develop and use the atomic bomb.
We are told, "To love thy neighbour" and "To treat." our enemies, as we would want to be treated. " If you were to look at these commandments you would see that nuclear warfare could never be justified, and if you do provoke a nuclear war, you should be punished. That brings me into the second reason why countries retain nuclear weapons and that is a threat. It is a way of protecting your country, but you will protect yourself and retaliate if provoked.
Beginning in the 1940’s, the global landscape was changing dramatically. With the start of World War II, tensions were rising among the world’s most powerful nations. Russia, Germany, Japan, Great Britain, and the United States were all trying to achieve global dominance. During World War II, the smart decision to invest in atomic energy made the United States a global superpower.
An idea that has not sunk into the politicians and generals of the nuclear powers skulls is the fact that nuclear weapons are expensive. In 1983, a missile submarine cost more than the education budgets of twenty-three 3rd world countries. A comparison for nuclear weapons would be akin to that of computers: It becomes obsolete very quickly, and the state of the art technology used is astronomically maintenance expensive. Building nuclear weapons is like dumping your money in a hole: It is not going to be coming back.
Also today is the danger that life is extinguished on earth through such a horrible weapon , not over. Many states are in possession of nuclear bombs , because that means for them power. Even dictatorships and unjust regime like China and North Korea have nuclear weapons.
The nucleus of power within a nation is self- defense and a need for global interdependence of nations. We the United States for example achieved peace by making a global alliance within countries. An alliance that took off with the four greatest super powers or what people frequently refer to as the constabulary of the United Nations and 47 other states. After the near world domination by Germany of other lands, nations agreed that a world government was necessary in society to maintain peace amongst nations to prevent future conflicts against nations. All states that denied this proposal were considered as threats to the superpowers and most importantly the US. Deterrence is the global view that the US is too strong and too powerful to go to war with so by fear of retaliation,
The Cold War was a political standoff between the Soviet Union and the United States that again created a new worldwide nuclear threat. The destructive potential of nuclear weapons has created a global sweep of fear as to what might happen if these terrible forces were unleashed again. The technology involved in building the first atomic bombs has grown into the creation of nuclear weapons that are potentially 40 times more powerful than the original bombs used. However, a military change in strategy has come to promote nuclear disarmament and prevent the usage of nuclear weapons. The technology of building the atomic bomb has spurred some useful innovations that can be applied through the use of nuclear power.
The Cold War was a time of great tension all over the world. From 1945 to 1989, the United States was the leader and nuclear power and was competing with the Soviet Union to create huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons. However, even though the Cold War ended, nuclear weapons are still a threat. Countries around the world strive to create nuclear power, and they do not promise to use it for peaceful purposes. Some examples of the struggles caused by nuclear weapons include the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and Iran’s recent nuclear weapon program. Surely, nuclear weapons have created conflict all over the world since the Cold War era.
'Nuclear weapons protect our country. The very fact we have them means no-one will ever use them' In this account, I am going to discuss the diverse arguments which concern the issue of nuclear weapons, and whether or not their ownership actually voids use. Exploring both contrasting arguments, I will discuss both sides to the subject; arguments which support this statement contrast a great deal to those who rebut it, yet both sides have their valid reasons to their case; those who favour the statement believe that the weapons are somewhat of a taboo, however, those who support the opposing view look at the matter a lot more practically, after all nuclear weapons are extremely destructive. Supporting arguments have a legitimate cause to believe that their theory is right; there is a profound degree of responsibility which goes in hand with owning a weapon of this calibre, which taking into account the potential destruction they can cause extinguishes any possibility of usage. In support of this is a substantial measure of evidence, the cold war, for example.
Since its origin in 1948, North Korea has been isolated and heavily armed, with hostile relations with South Korea and Western countries. It has developed a capability to produce short- and medium-range missiles, chemical weapons, and possibly biological and nuclear weapons. In December 2002, Pyongyang lifted the freeze on its plutonium-based nuclear weapons program and expelled IAEA inspectors who had been monitoring the freeze under the Agreed Framework of October 1994. As the Bush administration was arguing its case at the United Nations for disarming Iraq, the world has been hit with alarming news of a more menacing threat: North Korea has an advanced nuclear weapons program that, U.S. officials believe, has already produced one or two nuclear bombs. As the most recent standoff with North Korea over nuclear missile-testing approaches the decompression point, the United States needs to own up to a central truth: The region of Northeast Asia will never be fully secure until the communist dictatorship of North Korea passes from the scene. After threatening to test a new, long-range missile, Pyongyang says it is willing to negotiate with "the hostile nations" opposing it. But whether the North will actually forgo its test launch is anyone's guess. North Korea first became embroiled with nuclear politics during the Korean War. Although nuclear weapons were never used in Korea, American political leaders and military commanders threatened to use nuclear weapons to end the Korean War on terms favorable to the United States. In 1958, the United States deployed nuclear weapons to South Korea for the first time, and the weapons remained there until President George Bush ordered their withdrawal in 1991. North Korean government stateme...
The mental image of a nuclear war is a terrifying picture. Absolute devastation and chaos; it sounds like the Book of Revelations in the Bible. As a little kid, I thought that surely such a thing was impossible. There was no way anyone could be foolish enough to start one. As I grew older, I learned the horrifying truth of just how close the world came to the brink of nuclear disaster during the Cold War.
The cold war, spanning 44 years and involving the two greatest military powers the world had ever seen, was directly responsible for merely a few hundred deaths total. This limited destruction is thanks to the nature of Strategic Stability or the popularly coined phrase, mutually assured destruction or “MAD” which is the balance provided by nuclear parity. The cold war was much like the children’s toy the “Weeble Wobble”, a small egg-shaped plastic object that was impossible to knock over. One can push, flick punch or kick this little toy and no matter what, it lands right side up after some wobbling back and forth. In the cold war, the nuclear deterrent like the extremely low center of gravity of the “Weeble Wobble”, bringing things back to
The nuclear arms race was a competition for supremacy in nuclear warfare between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies during the Cold War.(Nuclear Arms Race, Wikipedia)
Scott D. Sagan, the author of chapter two of “More Will Be Worse”, looks back on the deep political hostilities, numerous crises, and a prolonged arms race in of the cold war, and questions “Why should we expect that the experience of future nuclear powers will be any different?” The author talks about counter arguments among scholars on the subject that the world is better off without nuclear weapons. In this chapter a scholar named Kenneth Waltz argues that “The further spread of nuclear weapons may well be a stabilizing factor in international relations.” He believes that the spread of nuclear weapons will have a positive implications in which the likely-hood of war decreases and deterrent and defensive capabilities increase. Although there
Deterrence is a theory of International relations based in Realism. Essentially, it tries to explain the situation of when two or more states threaten retaliation if attacked, in order to deter the attack. It is therefore possible to very simply state deterrence as "You hit me, I hit you." For this essay, two main questions have to be addressed, ‘Has it worked?’ and ‘Does it make sense?’ To answer these questions, I will firstly define what deterrence is, I will then examine some of the main arguments for and against it, in theory and in reality; finally, I will show some of the consequences of states following such a policy. Deterrence, as already stated, can concern itself with any form of threatened counter-attack, however, for this essay, I shall be concentrating on Nuclear deterrence, using examples from the cold war, therefore, when the word ‘deterrence’ is used, it should be taken as ‘nuclear deterrence’. Hedley Bull describes deterrence as follows: "To say that country A deters country B from doing something is to imply the following: (i) That Country A conveys to Country B a threat to inflict punishment or deprivation of values if it embarks on a certain course of action; (ii) That Country B might otherwise embark on that course of action; (iii) That Country B believes that Country A has the capacity and the will to carry out the threat, and decides for this reason that the course of action is not worthwhile." Therefore, for deterrence to occur, a state must convey a message to another state, usually "these will be the public an authoritative utterances of government officials." Secondly, to use Hedley Bulls’ language, country B would consider following a course of action which Country A does not wish and does not because of the threat - not because it has no interest to. Thirdly, Country A must be able to convince Country B that it is capable of carrying out its deterrence threat and is prepared to use it. Mutual deterrence is where two or more states deter each other from following a set of actions - effectively a stand off or a stalemate between the actors. The concept of deterrence can be seen easily in public statements, for example, Churchill told Parliament on Britains hydrogen bomb was, "the deterrent upon the Soviet union by putting her....on an equality or near equality of vulnerability," a soviet ...