09-08-2017, 12:41 PM
(09-07-2017, 09:34 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: > Perhaps, though Italy has no nuclear weapons. I think France
> would also have regretted the loss of Paris for a long time, but
> perhaps that's what crisis wars are like.
> Still, would they have started the conventional war over refugees
> and oil knowing that was a reasonably likely outcome? Do you
> think nuclear weapons have no deterrent effect?
Italy and France are members of Nato. The no-fly operation was
a Nato operation, and the retaliation for a nuclear strike would
be a Nato operation.
One problem is that we're making contrafactual assumptions and
guessing what might happen, and conclusions could easily be
affected by the assumptions.
One assumption that I'm making is that even if Gaddafi had nuclear
weapons, he wouldn't have had a delivery system, which means that the
only way he could deliver a nuclear weapon is by launching it out of a
warplane, and that could be intercepted over the Mediterranean. He
could, however, have easily delivered it to Benghazi or Cairo.
In any event, Nato would not have tolerated Gaddafi for long having a
nuclear arsenal threatening Europe.
> Do you think nuclear weapons have no deterrent effect?
Well, we can look at history for examples.
The Soviet Union/Russia has nuclear weapons, but instead of
bombing Russia we adopted the famous MAD policy.
Iraq was developing nuclear weapons, and Israel bombed their
facility.
Syria has been developing chemical weapons, and Israel bombed their
factory yesterday, while the US bombed their airbase in April.
Iraq was thought to be developing WMDs, and we invaded Iraq
in 2003.
Libya was developing WMDs, but gave them up when Pres Bush pointed out
that we invaded Iraq because of its WMDs, and hinted that we might do
the same in Libya. At any rate, Libya did not give up WMDs to prove
he was a nice guy. He felt threatened, and rightly so.
Iran threatened to develop nuclear weapons, and we imposed sanctions
and then signed a highly questionable deal.
So in answer to your question, I would say that in the vast majority
of the cases, nuclear weapons have the OPPOSITE of a deterrent effect
-- they INCREASE the chances of a missile strike or invasion to
eliminate the threat. That's why Putin is completely full of shit.
He lies about the "lessons learned" from Iraq and Libya, and uses it
to encourage North Korea to continue developing nuclear missiles.
Putin wants a war between the US and North Korea, because in his
delusional mind, that will benefit him and Russia.
So will we do something militarily to stop North Korea's nuclear
missile development? I would say that history answers emphatically
YES.
(09-07-2017, 09:52 PM)Cynic Hero 86 Wrote: > Yeah if Qaddafi kept his WMDs and his military arsenals his regime
> would have still been in power in Libya. NATO would not have
> intervened precisely because it would have led to the full-scale
> war scenario that was being discussed in the last few posts.
>
See my response to Warren.
There were hundreds of thousands of Libyan refugees pouring into
neighboring countries, with many headed for Europe. Gaddafi was
threatening to exterminate then in Benghazi. So Libya was already at
war.
The Arab League would not have tolerated Libya in chaos with a nuclear
weapon. Nor would Nato.
