Nuclear musing

I make no pretense of deep knowledge of military strategy or history, but it seem to me that during much of the Cold War there was an assumption that if any country actually attacked a major nuclear power with conventional weapons, they would likely face devastating nuclear retaliation. World War I and II style battlefield warfare seemed to have passed into history, because the nuclear threat made it unthinkable. There were incursions and proxy wars on the periphery, and Russia in 1956 and 1968 tested the theory that the West would treat its subjugation of its "satellites" as essentially "internal affairs," to which they would offer no response other than bleating about it. 

Even the wars in the Balkans were kept beneath a certain threshold... no one actually attacked a major nuclear power. Taiwan simmered away but didn't boil over. 

But Ukraine has changed things. While NATO has been careful not to actually attack Russia, Ukraine itself is now doing so every day, and relying on the concept that nuclear war is unthinkable to the extent that they, without much restraint, have eliminated Russia's ability to conduct naval operations in the Black Sea and are systematically destroying its oil refining, storage and transport infrastructures. (Remember that oil and gas are a very large part of Russia's overall economy, and an even larger part of its foreign trade economy; also that its ability to produce and deliver fuel over truly vast distances is critical to its ability to project military strength against its former satellites and breakaway regions, such as Ukraine). 

We are testing the theory that even a cornered giant, with a compromised economy, ageing infrastructure and military equipment, but the largest stockpile of strategic nuclear weapons in the world, will not be suicidal. Will not be the first to step up to strategic nuclear war. I embrace the view that Russia has put itself in this position by invading Ukraine. But I cannot pretend to be confident that, if pushed into a corner, Putin will not decide at some point to use nuclear weapons. And if he does, I am not sure our civilization can survive that. Our species would probably survive, and after a long long time of rebuilding might be able to attain current levels of technology again, but it would be a historic setback comparable to the Fall of Rome in some ways. 

There, something to daydream about on a lazy cold winter morning. 

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Silence is complicity. Americans who believe in democracy MUST RESIST. 

"If the freedom of speech is taken away-- then dumb and silent, we may be led like sheep to the slaughter."

                       --George Washington, 1783