As speculation mounts that Kim Jong-un and Trump could meet this month, analysts say Pyongyang will continue to see nuclear weapons as a matter of survival
North Korea’s launch last week of a missile from a naval destroyer elicited an uncharacteristically prosaic analysis from the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un. The launch was proof, he said, that arming ships with nuclear weapons was “making satisfactory progress”.
But the test, and Kim’s mildly upbeat appraisal, were designed to reverberate well beyond the deck of the 5,000-tonne destroyer-class vessel the Choe Hyon – the biggest warship in the North Korean fleet.
His pointed reference to nuclear weapons was made as the US and Israel continued their air bombardment of Iran – a regime Donald Trump had warned, without offering evidence, was only weeks away from having a nuclear weapon.
They only prevent conflict if you have enough to annihilate your enemy. We have a full nuclear umbrella over the globe so no matter how many nukes you throw at us we are still going to be around to throw them back at you. 3 nukes won’t save you. 3,000 might?
There’s still a significant deterrent effect even if you’d “only” lose a few major cities worth while others stay around. There’s also potential for extended responses by other nuclear weapons states that further increase deterrence for such a scenario.
I’m trying to think of how Ukraine acquiring nukes would work with Russia? Do you think Ukraine having a nuke would deter Russia or would it make them an existential threat and have Russia nuke them? Let’s look at this from two different countries stand points and take the USA out of it for a second.
That would depend on the details of the hypothetical. Certainly if Ukraine was able to develop a credible threat with first strike survivability before Russia became aware I would expect Russia to be forced to move towards de-escalation and diplomacy because their major cities like Moscow and St. Petersburg which Putin has tried to shield completely from all effects of the war would be in danger.
Lacking that and with a credible ability to eliminate the nuclear weapon completely with a pre-emptive strike Russia would probably do it even if it meant nuclear strikes against Ukraine.
That’s basically how I have it gamed out, although I think the situation would be wildly unpredictable. Throw some bad intel and paranoia into the mix and it gets quite messy. I’m obviously just some dude from America, but if I was Ukrainian I would be really nervous about the results of going nuclear. Personally I’d like my country to get rid of more nukes and stop encouraging the world to build more. I understand the perspective, but I think it’s short sighted and dangerous. I hope the people freely advocating for it on the Internet, have thought through it as much as you have.