The nuclear question lies in the shadow of every major world crisis from the 1950s into the 1980s, that I can think of, including Korea (1950), Suez (1956), Laos and Berlin (1961), Vietnam (in 1968), the Arab-Israeli wars (especially 1973), India-Pakistan from the 1970s, and the war in Angola in the 1980s, when Cuban troops were approaching the Namibian frontier, facing the possibility that South Africa might use the bomb – it had six – to stop their advance. The nuclear question was on the mind of Lyndon Johnson on the day John F. Kennedy was killed – on the flight back from Dallas, staring out the window, he remarked to Bill Moyers, “I wonder if the missiles are flying.” He meant American missiles, for he knew that in late 1963 there was still no Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile force to speak of.
With Cuba (1962) as the greatest exception, the role played by the nuclear question usually remained in the shadows for decades, to be discussed quietly when documents are declassified and the surviving participants are old. This leaves the impression that the danger was remote, and the world more stable, than was the case.
During the Cold War, the doctrine of “Mutual Assured Destruction” added a false sense of security. MAD was supposed to ensure, for fear of certain destruction, that neither side would attack the other. In fact, the United States sought constantly for an advantage that would give a first-strike opportunity – the Minuteman, MIRVs, and “Star Wars” being examples. The possibility of a false warning also created a constant danger of fatal error on either side. The “hot line” – created between Moscow and Washington after the Cuban crisis – provided some reassurance, on condition that the messages coming across could be trusted. To build and maintain trust between potential adversaries was therefore a serious obligation on both sides.
Nuclear restraint has on numerous occasions relied on the determined action of one or two key persons, civilian or military. In the US case, whatever one may think of them on other grounds, two such people in the 1960s were Robert S. McNamara and Walt W. Rostow – both men, and the essence of their stories, known to me personally. In 1962, it was McNamara’s caution (along with Kennedy’s) that averted a US invasion of Cuba that would have been met by Soviet tactical nuclear weapons, of whose existence the US was unaware. In 1968, Rostow went to Johnson on two occasions to countermand General Westmoreland’s orders to send tactical nuclear weapons to Vietnam for use at Khe Sanh. On the Soviet side, we know of several military officers whose sound judgment, alone, on several occasions, averted disaster.
The structures of postwar international law were built, from 1945, in the shadows of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and with the nuclear threat in view. Those structures, mainly the United Nations but also the IAEA and the Non-Proliferation Treaty, contributed to forestalling the use of nuclear weapons until now. They provided channels for diplomacy, knowledge of each country’s capabilities, and a supervised pathway to the peaceful uses of nuclear power for non-nuclear weapons states. Such elements of global nuclear security no longer exist. With respect to Iran, they were all demolished within the last few days.
Projection is characteristic of nuclear strategists, second-rate thinkers (in many cases) who assume symmetrical objectives and attribute their own mentalities and motives to the other side. This overlooks the fact that some countries have aggressive histories and cultures, while others are primarily defensive and self-contained. Where one adversary is aggressive and the other defensive, there are two dangers. The aggressive side may attribute its own motives to the other, justifying preemptive action – this was a danger facing the USSR from the United States. And the defensive side, projecting its attitudes in turn, may underestimate the danger it is in.
In this connection, note that Sec. Hegseth used the phrase “nuclear blackmail” to help justify the “preemptive” attack on Iran. Possibly, this phrase was plucked from thin air. It is also possible that it is a revealing case of projection. Nuclear blackmail is by definition the sole province of a nuclear weapons state. In this conflict, there are two nuclear weapons states. Did one blackmail the other? That would be consistent with the words of Sec. Rubio, who stated on March 2 that the United States joined the attack because otherwise Israel would have done it alone. Israel’s conventional forces, taken alone, were (and are) far weaker than the combined forces of Israel and the United States.
Today, projection is predominant, negotiations have been discredited by deceit, and there are no multilateral restraints. With no off-ramp in view, no trustworthy basis for talks, Iranian command-and-control decentralized, and Trump calling for “unconditional surrender,” the war seems likely to progress until there is a military resolution.
Iran cannot be destroyed by conventional methods, and the evident strategic objective, which was to provoke the overthrow of the government, has evidently failed. But with precision conventional missiles and drones and an advanced, fragile infrastructure, the possibility of state destruction for Israel exists below the nuclear threshold. The line between conventional and nuclear conflict is therefore somewhat blurred, which means that escalation from one to the other may be psychologically easier than was the case between the great powers during the Cold War.
Three military outcomes now appear possible. They are (a) depletion and destruction of Iran’s military power and of the Islamic Republic, which are the stated objectives of the United States and Israel, respectively; (b) demolition of the US presence in the Middle East, which is the stated objective of the IRGC, leading to the collapse of Israeli power; and (c) escalation to nuclear attack. I would rate those in reverse order of likelihood: c>b>a. But they are not mutually exclusive. In fact, (c) would entail both (b) and (a).
We are left to hope that when the moment comes, there will be sensible and determined persons, civilian or military, in the right place at the right time. So far as I am aware, the United States military still has leadership that is not eager to use nuclear weapons, absent a direct nuclear attack on the United States, which of course could not come from Iran. A seasoned observer and colleague, whose views I respect, tells me that even in present-day Israel such people probably exist. I hope he is right. It seems a very thin reed.
Dim. Konstantakopoulos
