Now we know what NATO is for! | 58 comments (58 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (4.00 / 2)

And it doesn't explain the missile defence in Poland class bullshit.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Mar 6th, 2015 at 11:56:31 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

It doesn't.

But first of all, that was US craziness, not NATO. And it was probably about Iran. Take a look at a globe and draw a line from Iran to important European or American targets, and that line will pass pretty close to Poland.

And secondly, there was no reason at all for Russia to care one bit, at least from a nuclear deterrence perspective. If Russia wants to nuke Europe or the US, no missile defence will help. The warheads will get through. They are pretty much impossible to shoot down, and even if you figure out how to do it, you can saturate any missile defence by just firing more missiles. This is because anti-missile missiles have costs of the same magnitude as nuclear missiles have, but the latter can carry a large number of warheads per missile. You just can't win an arms race against nuclear missiles with your own missile defence system.

Still, a missile defence system in Poland would have reduced the ability of Russia to launch conventional decapitating strikes with its world-class semi-ballistic missile systems, like Iskander. Being able to weaken that ability would have been a good and stabilizing factor in the theater.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Fri Mar 6th, 2015 at 12:13:35 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

It would also have allowed the Americans to believe that they had a first strike capability that might be fast enough to cripple the Russian command and control structures before a second strike could be launched.

The Americans would have to be insane to actually believe this. But, well... Bush.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Fri Mar 6th, 2015 at 02:49:21 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

Not really. Russia has a very credible submarine second strike capability.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Sat Mar 7th, 2015 at 07:09:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

Credible to sane people, yes.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sat Mar 7th, 2015 at 08:20:07 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

Pending nuclear annihilation tend to concentrate minds.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Sat Mar 7th, 2015 at 11:49:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (4.00 / 2)

That's the idea, yes.

However, if you are sitting in Russia and watching a regime that just started two land wars in Asia build what could even by a generous observer be mistaken for a first-strike capability right on your border...

... it's hard to blame you for becoming a little nervous.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sat Mar 7th, 2015 at 11:58:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

No one could mistake that facility for a first strike option. For the reasons I mentioned previously in the thread.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Sun Mar 8th, 2015 at 12:24:04 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 1)

Those are not arguments for why medium-range missiles on your border is not a first-strike capability, those are arguments for why nobody would want to spend money on putting a first-strike capability on your border.

The problem with the "no sane person would want to do that" line of reasoning is that that is also the reason the first world war didn't happen.

The further, more specific problem with that line of reasoning, in this context, is that the official reason for the facilities in question is not possible. So if you accept the notion that the Americans were building a missile defense system in Poland, then you are already operating under the assumption that the Americans are insane. Now we're just haggling over the flavor of insanity involved.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Mar 8th, 2015 at 01:18:29 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

I don't agree, at all. It's perfectly reasonable to think that the system was not about Russia, but about Iran. Indeed, given the mechanics involved, it looks far more likely that was the reason. Still a stupid idea though.

And really, it only looks like a system built to support a first-strike if you are ready to accept a Russian retaliatory second strike. And I see absolutely no reason why anyone would think in those terms. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you somewhere, because what you're saying is not making much sense to me.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Sun Mar 8th, 2015 at 01:53:57 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (4.00 / 3)

If Russia or Iran (or ISIS for that matter) want to send nuclear bombs into Europe or even the USA, they won't use missiles. These are expensive and relatively unreliable.

But container traffic is a reliable way of sending stuff around the world and, so long as you can plan a month or so in advance, your weapon will be delivered safe and sound right to the heart of your target.

So missile defense is doubly stupid and reflects an inability to move away from Cold War silliness

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Sat Mar 7th, 2015 at 12:51:19 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

I think you're probably right. But standard nuclear doctrine is to assume that the first strike is a decapitation attack that takes out the other side's ability to return fire, then you take out secondary targets providing infrastructure and military support, and finally - if there's anyone left to care - you take out the major political and population centres.

Nuking Washington and London with container-based H-bombs reverses that. It has the advantage that the nukees can't be sure who the enemy is - Russia, or China, or North Korea, or Iran, or India, or Pakistan, or even Israel, or even nutters on your own side.

So you can't launch a retaliatory attack without doing a lot of guessing and hoping and perhaps some hard science analysing isotope signatures and yield patterns. None of which are likely in the chaos immediately following.

So the downside is that it's not actually a decapitation. Someone nukes ten US cities with containers, what's left of the US military assumes it was Russia and/or China because why not, eh, and off it all goes.

Fallout and nuclear winter kill almost everyone, and it's not exactly a scenario made of win.

The US establishment is worried about all of this. Obama has been enthusiastically replacing nuclear command officers, for reasons that aren't entirely public.

I think it doesn't even need nukes. A massive cyber-attack is enough to take down the Internet and the utility grid in most Western countries. It's a much more immediate threat because it can be done selectively and surgically and made to look like a lot of unfortunate coincidences rather than one big ham-fisted slap down.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sun Mar 8th, 2015 at 07:21:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 1)

I will await the opinion of those more familiar than I with the ease with which ALL characteristic radiation from such a weapon could be stopped sufficiently that it would only be detectable by opening the container. I really don't know. But the possibility could raise some counter uncertainties by the senders. Presumably, they wouldn't do it if they thought there was ANY chance that one would be found before it or any of them went off. With the device in hand the sender becomes more likely to be identifiable to a reasonable certainty.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sun Mar 8th, 2015 at 06:12:13 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 1)

You can, but then you can't tell the bomb to blow up by remote control - which you want, because container shipping lines keep anything from 60 to 90 % schedule reliability.

But actually, the question you should be asking is "are shipping containers routinely monitored for radioactivity?"

To which the answer is "no, and building that capability would be expensive."

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Mon Mar 9th, 2015 at 02:23:29 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

About what I thought. I recall reading of systems that could detect such radiation but that they were not widely deployed, not terribly portable and were a budget line concern. Detecting neutrons, neutrinos and the products of their decay is not for something that you plug into your smartphone for a walk amongst the containers. It may be possible to fit such a detector on the back of a truck and drive through the isles of stack containers in a port or sweep across the stacks of containers on a ship entering port. Knowledge that such a system existed in a given port would raise doubts by a potential state sponsor, even if the chance of it being used was low.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Mon Mar 9th, 2015 at 08:33:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

You could probably catch most containers by monitoring the baker's dozen biggest transshipment hubs for each of the major carriers.

But detection is not the biggest problem with using commercial container shipping as deployment mode for an atomic first strike. The biggest problem is that commercial container shipping needs to still be serving your country by the time you decide that you would like New York to go away.

Which means you can only really use this deployment mode if you make your first strike completely out of the blue.

This is not what most people want to use nukes for. Most people who would like to have nukes want them in order to use them as back-stop of their conventional power plays - to provide an ultimate step on the escalation ladder that cannot be challenged.

And the kind of people who would use atomic weapons for out-of-the-blue first strikes are not the kind of people who can afford to buy atomic weapons. Nevermind setting up and maintaining the advanced industrial engineering infrastructure required to produce them.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue Mar 10th, 2015 at 12:07:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 0)

You don't need actual containers on actual container ships, so there's no need to pass the cargo through the usual channels. Any other kind of merchant ship will do - even a large hired fishing vessel owned by a dumb captain who thinks he's being paid not to ask questions.

Modern warheads are incredibly small, so the container is optional. I suspect it's perfectly possible to transport a warhead on a small yacht or cruiser. It's certainly possible on those floating palaces oligarchs like to flaunt.

Security on the Thames in London is practically non-existent. I don't know what it's like in Washington. But I do know the Pentagon has a nearby marina, so it's probably not that high.

Which means you can only really use this deployment mode if you make your first strike completely out of the blue.

I'm guessing that would be the aim - a completely unexpected decapitation strike of unknown origin.

The point is the old Cold War machinery seems completely defenceless against a sneak attack. TSA shoe-pantomimes impress me a lot less than some hint that someone has taken the possibility seriously and set up credible defences against it.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Tue Mar 10th, 2015 at 05:33:01 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Now we know what NATO is for! (none / 1)

That kind of out-of-the-blue decapitation first strikes are not prevented by security measures. There simply is no way you can secure any halfway open society against an out-of-the-blue atomic attack. In the same way you might as well abandon any thought of securing your society against political assassins going after soft targets like newspapers or airports.

The thing that prevents this from happening is that most people with access to atomic weapons have a strong vested interest in the continued survival of industrial civilization.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue Mar 10th, 2015 at 02:11:30 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Now we know what NATO is for! | 58 comments (58 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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