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Nuclear Deterrence and the Superpower Arms Race
War and Global Conflict in the Contemporary Era
The nuclear peace?
Massive nuclear arsenals: 70,000 nukes by late 1980s
End of civilisation w/ over one billion dead
No nuclear use since 1945
Key themes
Explaining the build-up
Civil-military differences
Nuclear strategy
Reaction to the bomb
Mixture of “awe and apprehension.”
Hiroshima and Nagasaki blown off the map killing up to 140,000
Press censorship of destruction
Prompt surrender of Japan
Hiroshima: clinical destruction
Hiroshima: clinical destruction
Hiroshima: the hidden suffering
Reaction to the bomb
Mixture of “awe and apprehension.”
Hiroshima and Nagasaki blown off the map killing up to 140,000
Press censorship of destruction
Prompt surrender of Japan
Race from the start
US atomic bomb: 1945 Soviet A-bomb: 1949
US hydrogen bomb: 1952 Soviet H-bomb: 1955
Mike test
10 megaton = 500 Hiroshimas
Cloud: 30 x 27 miles
Crater: mile wide and 200 ft deep
End of “Duck and Cover”
Superpower nuclear arsenals
Massive size
Complexity
Overkill
Explaining the arms build-up
External: arms race
Internal: domestic politics
Arms racing
Explains ‘why’ but not ‘how’
Tit-for-tat dynamics
Origins of Soviet programme
Failure of 1946 Baruch Plan
Limitations?
Domestic politics
Bureaucratic interests, election politics, and the MIC
Origins of the US build-up
Undermining alternatives
Windows of vulnerability
Civilian perspectives
Special weapons of last resort
Nuclear taboo: public opinion and personal conviction
Truman and AEC
Eisenhower and Korea
LBJ and Vietnam
Can war be left to the generals?
Mr. Atom Bomb
Military perspectives
WWII bombing campaigns & SAC
Emergency War Plan 1-49
“smoking radiating ruin at the end of two hours.”
Circumventing civilian control
Nuclear nutters
Peace through strength
Golden age of nuclear strategy
MAD v nuclear war-fighting
Can nuclear war be fought?
How easy is deterrence?
Objective: denial or punishment?
(Gray v Howard)
Cuban Missile Crisis
United Nations Security Council
CMC: Soviet motives
Deter US invasion
Redress strategic imbalance
Counter Turkey deployment
EXCOMM
CMC: US options
Naval quarantine
Air strike
Invasion
Public alarm
Enforcing the blockade
Clashes in the Caribbean
Shooting down US spy-plane
Crisis resolution
Trollope Ploy
Secret trade
Back channel
Credit for Kennedy?
Necessity for crisis
Firm resolve
Cold War record
Threat of nuclear war
Deliberate war- Soviet fears- JFK measures
Accidental war- “Falling leaves” EWS- SAC provocation
The Deterrence Paradigm
Central v extended deterrence
Immediate v general deterrence
Longevity- robust w/out reckless- best of a bad job- reflected institutional inertia
US nuclear strategy
Declaratory policy (MAD v NWF)
Employment policy (more choice)
War plan (SIOP)
NSTDB
1960: 4,100 1974: 25,000 1980: 40,000 1982: 50,000
The nuclear peace: a close call
Imperative: sufficient damage to target base
US early warning system failures: 1962, 1968, 1973, 1979, 1980
LOW: pre-delegating launch authority