Which countries should be allowed to have nuclear weapons?

[Slant]

Where is the option "No country"? Can't take part in this poll like that. Sorry.

[Wildtree]

Where is the option "No country"? Can't take part in this poll like that. Sorry.

Many cast a protest vote by selecting all of them.

[OneSent]

I vote for whichever countries would be most likely to use them.

Who the fuck creates weapons of such massive, global devastation anyways and then just sits on them for decades while the rest of the world tries to reproduce their own? What good did these people honestly expect was going to come from this?

"We shall create a weapon powerful enough to destroy all life as we know it! We'll use it on our enemy to kill hundreds of thousands so that the rest of the world will forever fear us!"

Meanwhile, the rest of the world envies the result and races to produce their own nuclear weapons, hence where we are today.

These weapons belong in the hands of those who are as sick and corrupted as the men who built them. And should they ever be used by one or more of the countries that possess them, it would be no less a fitting end to such a monstrous civilization with a larger-than-life attitude and no respect for each other or the planet on which they exist.

[Deleted]

North Korea Best Korea

North Korea only real Korea.

Never saw any other Korea in Poll.

[Gothicshark]

The total abolishment of the bomb is near impossible to uphold for the time being, so none is not an option.

By being allowed to have nukes, I mean be able to keep them without any repercussions and punishment by the world community.

I clicked all of them, because I think Nuclear weapons should either be totally banned, or not restricted at all. Having a small number of Nations with them is actually going to cause more problems in the long term.

Granted if every nation had them, the odds they get used goes up, but I think at some point in the future someone needs to use one in a hostile action to remind the world why we need to find global peace.

[OneSent]

but I think at some point in the future someone needs to use one in a hostile action to remind the world why we need to find global peace.

Yeah. Because nothing says global peace like nuking the shit out of a country and killing millions! That, my friend, is called 'global fear'. It's what we've been living in since 1945.

And besides, would you be advocating the same advice if the targeted country was your own? Can't say a part of me doesn't agree with you, but certainly I don't exempt my own country from being the one made an example of. Especially if "global peace" were to be the end result.

[Gothicshark]

Yeah. Because nothing says global peace like nuking the shit out of a country and killing millions! That, my friend, is called 'global fear'. It's what we've been living in since 1945.

And besides, would you be advocating the same advice if the targeted country was your own? Can't say a part of me doesn't agree with you, but certainly I don't exempt my own country from being the one made an example of. Especially if "global peace" were to be the end result.

odds are my nation will be the next nation hit with a Nuke. I am fully aware I live in a city that could be targeted by a terrorist nuclear weapon.

[Deleted]

Let everyone have nukes so we can blow each other up

[Stelio Kontos]

But where the book shines is where his firm is relied upon: predicting relationships based on available data. And the US's main enemies in the middle of the 21st century? the alliance of a resurgent nationalist Japan and a nationalist Turkey. World War III, in his scenario, is between the US and this alliance, and lasts a couple of days and begins with the alliance's secret destruction of the US's orbital platforms from ordinance fired from the Moon.

I know it sounds ridiculous and some of it is pretty outlandish, but look at the countries he names: Japan and Turkey. And this was written a few years ago. What has happened since that time? Japan has taken a sharply more nationalist and assertive turn and Turkey's authoritarian streak has only further entrenched itself as the AKP finds itself under siege. Now is the future in the book likely to be our future? No of course not. But it does illustrate when compared to reality, how the quickly the course of a country can change. Maybe it's one new leader. Maybe it's one event. Maybe it's just a few years.

The irony of that is the US has had a hard-on for decades to favor the Turks over the neighbors (Greece, Bulgaria, etc) who've always known a resurgent, authoritarian Turkey means only one thing, neo-Ottomanism and vicious behavior towards neighboring ethnicities.

[Notchris]

odds are my nation will be the next nation hit with a Nuke. I am fully aware I live in a city that could be targeted by a terrorist nuclear weapon.

If it makes you feel better, we'd vaporize whatever launched on us. So would Russia. Then everyone else and their brother would start launching.

It wouldn't harken a push for world peace. It would beckon forth the end of mankind.

[Skroe]

The irony of that is the US has had a hard-on for decades to favor the Turks over the neighbors (Greece, Bulgaria, etc) who've always known a resurgent, authoritarian Turkey means only one thing, neo-Ottomanism and vicious behavior towards neighboring ethnicities.

Maybe. The book makes a pretty compelling case. Short version:

- China's demographic squeeze and hollowness of their internal economy catch up with them badly in the mid 2020s. They're democratic by the 2050s... basically a bigger version of what India is today.
- The US faces an epic economic (bigger than 2007) catastrophe in the 2030s that sidelines it for most the decade, but recovers by the 2040s.
- Russia further disintegrates in the late 2020s. More middle eastern countries disintegrate along sectarian lines (sound familiar)
- Turkey, with it's doorway to the EU closed for good, fills the regional power void left with the disintegration of Russia and expands its territory (while the US is quasi-isolationist in the 2030s).
- Japan does the same with the decline of China and the US pullback from east Asia that happens as a result, and builds a new East-Asian Co-Prosperty sphere. They nuclearize.
- The European Union becomes mostly irrelevant to global affairs... mostly supporting the US in the few things the US gets involved in.
- By the late 2040s Defense ideas entirely changes. The US has only a Navy for coastal defense. The Army is tiny: several thousand soldiers in armored power suits that are highly dependent on the electrical grid in the country being fought in, in order to be combat capable. The Air Force is mostly a space force, with three manned orbital weapons platforms with a fourth under secret construction. Drones are everywhere.
- The US and Japan are the two key space powers, with both having bases on the moon. Japan launches it's first strike (in World War III) using ordinate disguised as small meterorids to destroy the 3 known orbital weapons platforms.
- US "Iron Men" fight in Japan and Turkey but have limited effectiveness, until the US gets men to the unfinished orbital weapons platform a couple days later and demands Japan and Turkey's's strategic surrender. Turkey and Japan militarily disarmed.
- By 2075, the key superpower rivalry is between the US - in it's best shape in a hundred years - and, surprisingly, a resurgent Mexico, that has gotten it's act together.


There's a lot more in it, but it's an entertaining read with some very interesting ideas. Some of it is unlikely. I think it's unlikely any country will have military bases on the moon by 2050. I'm more suspect than the author is about the reality of the 500,000 man US Army being replaced with 3500 Iron Men (he dodges the power issue by saying that the armor would plug into the grid of any invaded country between combat usages, so power grids would become the world's key strategic resource). I do think a situation where Russia further disintegrates and China declines, changing the global strategic landscape (and making many treaties moot) will invite the US to build orbital weapons platforms though. It's really the only effective way to do "Prompt Global Strike" without a ballistic missile. I do think China will precipitously decline. I do not think Russia will break up though, unless a post-Putin era becomes meta-Ukranian-level truly chaotic.

That's the problem again, with the hypothetical none argument. It assumes a global situation of unchanging state and hopes no one will decide to cheat the second they think it is beneficial to.

[Quether]

None. Why isn't that an option on your poll?

[Deleted]

I'd give none, or all tbh but I prefer if none had any.

Nuclear weapons are too dangerous for this world.

[MrHappy]

no body. Change weapons to power/electricity....everyone

[Gothicshark]

If it makes you feel better, we'd vaporize whatever launched on us. So would Russia. Then everyone else and their brother would start launching.

It wouldn't harken a push for world peace. It would beckon forth the end of mankind.

I hate to inform you that that is a mythology, the reality is if every Nuclear weapon was used today, only the large cities would be destroyed, the radiation would pass in a year or two, cancer would be more common, and life would suck for 100 years. But most things would survive, Humans would continue, plants and animals would continue.

here is my rational.

there are approximately 23,000 nuclear warheads in the world today, unless they are maintained every 5 years the weapon is nothing more than a dirty c4 bomb. So cut that number by half since very few nations can afford to actually maintain a nuclear weapon, making them is easy maintenance is hard.

Now that still leaves us with 11,500 warheads, each with an average of 150kt, which in an airburst has an effective destruction radius of 450m or 0.28miles. Each of the 23,000 weapons is either aimed at capital cities or military bases. Which means if you live in an unimportant city you are not targeted. the fall out radiation does not last as long as media claims. only in the directly effected areas will radiation last. Which means big cities and capitals will be craters filled with radiation. and yes the holes will be large since only about 100 cities in the world are actually targeted, making it about 115 bombs going off in each location. I would hazard a guess that each of those points would be rendered lifeless for a long time. However after the first year all the fallout radiation will be gone from the earth. and as long as people stay away from the lost cities they will be fine.

What a nuclear war will do is drop the global population by 2/3rds. It will destroy all governments, and most militarizes, it will create about 100 dead areas which use to be cities, and leukemia will become a common sickness. Seafood will be unhealthy to eat for about 100 years, however cattle will be fine, since most of the destroyed locations will be in the northern hemisphere the geopolitical map will switch to a southern hemisphere focus. Europe and Japan will be the hardest hit region since most of the population lives near capital cities, and the land mass is actually quiet small. Russia, USA, and China will survive as nations, but most of the power they held will be gone. India and Pakistan will have small points of nuclear destruction near their boarders, but the all out war that follows will change the region more. Mecca will be gone, as will as Tel Aviv, however the all out war that follows will change the middle east more, since neither Arab or the Jewish force will quite.

100 years afterwards, the world will be just fine. But it will not be the same as it is now.







http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/

[Wixwix]

Either no one has them or any country who feels like having them gets to have them.

[Deleted]

either none or all

if only one has them were all fucked

[obdigore]

Whichever country manages to colonize another planet/asteroid first.

Someone has to defeat the aliens before they make it to us and start harvesting our life force to power their battle droids!

[runedhill]

The total abolishment of the bomb is near impossible to uphold for the time being, so none is not an option.

By being allowed to have nukes, I mean be able to keep them without any repercussions and punishment by the world community.

Only America, Russia and the UK should own nuclear weaponry, purely as a deterrent to lesser nations (third world) from acquiring them.

[Airwaves]

Um none... There is zero reason for ANY country to have nuclear weapons. Hell when you think about it there zero reason for anyone to have any weapons if we can just manage to stop killing each other.