Is a Non-Nuclear World War Possible?

[Smitty-48]

Now, thing is, that's a quiet day, two gunfighters in the street, only one vector, the whole town has come out to see, they are only focused on one pearl handle and hammer, and they can still call it off, somebody's wife can still come a running and say get back in the house right now you crazy bastard...

...but, throw a conventional war into the mix? OK, now people are shooting at them from all directions, they're taking fire from all over the place, it's Gunfight at the OK Corral now, total chaos... not so easy to control it then, somebody is likely to draw, when they get hit, whether that was the other gunfighter shooting at them or not, just on reflex.

[kybkh]

Smitty ain't saying there can't be no "non-nuclear world war" though. He is just sayin' that it would be a battle during the larger "nuclear war". Like Vietnam and Af/PK were battles during the Cold War.

Smitty should really try to publish some stuff. That shit was great and I'd send it to the newspaper editorial desk if he'd let me.

I can't pretend to imagine how much pull the nuclear trigger has on it. I'd like to believe there is a considerable amount. I am concerned about the Generals though.

I am concerned they are gonna do something in NoK and the main reason they put Gen Kelly in his position was to prepare for it.

[kybkh]

Now, thing is, that's a quiet day, two gunfighters in the street, only one vector, the whole town has come out to see, they are only focused on one pearl handle and hammer, and they can still call it off, somebody's wife can still come a running and say get back in the house right now you crazy bastard...

...but, throw a conventional war into the mix? OK, now people are shooting at them from all directions, they're taking fire from all over the place, it's Gunfight at the OK Corral now, total chaos... not so easy to control it then, somebody is likely to draw, when they get hit, whether that was the other gunfighter shooting at them or not, just on reflex.

What would the order to the subs be if a skirmish involving a dozen planes happened in Syria?

[Smitty-48]

What I'm saying is, the nuclear war is already on, the nuclear war is already in progress, you wouldn't be fighting this conventional war without a nuclear war going on, you would simply be adding the chaotic instability of a fast moving conventional war, to a comparitively stable and slow moving nuclear war, which is already happening right now, and is happening all day every day, permanently.

You can't fight a conventional war without the nuclear war, because the nuclear war is ever present, that war never goes away, all you would do is inject instability into the nuclear war, by opening up an exponential set of conventional vectors on top.

[kybkh]

Yeah, I hear ya. Look, I can't speak from authority so I can only ask of your certainty that the trigger is that loose? Where it is all based on what the submarines do.

The question then is what level of chaos would RU accept before drawing? If all we are doing is waiting on them and their actions are determined by ours, what would it take?

Tell you one thing that bothers me about our media a lot is the opinion Russians are forming towards America right now. Being spoken of like untermensch on every American news outlet.

[Smitty-48]

What would the order to the subs be if a skirmish involving a dozen planes happened in Syria?

Skirmish with the Russians? I'd say TACAMO sends DEFCON 4 as soon as any sort of skirmishing with the Russians kicks off, if it persists beyond a few hours, they go to DEFCON 3, on the submarine, they just stay quiet in the baffles, but prolly start running drills to shoot torpedoes with a bit more alacrity, continously updating their fire solutions for a snap shot if necessary, basically they start psyching themselves up, moustaches off, warpaint on.

[kybkh]

I'll just leave this here...

"It's Time To Retaliate": Putin Expels 755 U.S. Diplomats

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-07-3 ... -diplomats

Speaking late on Sunday, the Russian president said that the time for retaliation has come: "we've been waiting for quite a long time that maybe something would change for the better, we had hopes that the situation would change. But it looks like, it's not going to change in the near future... I decided that it is time for us to show that we will not leave anything unanswered."

Putin added that "the personnel of the US diplomatic missions in Russia will be cut by 755 people and will now equal the number of the Russian diplomatic personnel in the United States, 455 people on each side" Putin said, adding that "because over a thousand employees, diplomats and technical personnel have been working and are still working in Russia, and 755 of them will have to cease their work in the Russian Federation. It’s considerable."

[Smitty-48]

Totally expelling the diplomatic mission would be lifting the other foot off the boardwalk on its way to the mud, but I don't think they're actually cutting off all channels, if they did actually cut off all channels, that's both boots in the mud, if they don't answer the Red Phone, that's heading for the middle of the street, if a Boomer shakes it tail, that's turning to face, if all the Boomers try to dump their tails at once, that's pearl handles, if they go under the ice to do it, that's hammers cocked...

... Ivan with one boat under the ice, that's just failsafe, but Crazy Ivan surging all his boats to sea, to go up under the ice? Now that, would be bad ju-ju.

[Smitty-48]

I can't pretend to imagine how much pull the nuclear trigger has on it. I'd like to believe there is a considerable amount. I am concerned about the Generals though.

The problem is this, in the Cold War, in order to make the nuclear trigger convincing, in order to make the other guy believe that it could be pulled, a significant amount of play had to be built into the trigger, to allow it to pull itself, of course they don't believe that you would pull the trigger if you had time and space to think about it, to talk about it, to negotiate about it, but then the nuclear deterent is blunted.

You, having time and space to think, talk, and negotiate about it, makes the nuclear deterent exponentially less covicincing, which then opens up time and space for the adversary to try to leverage you, basically by nuclear blackmail.

So, to stave off nuclear blackmail, both sides built the system to fight autonomously if it has to, the system will decide when it has reached the event horizon, and then it's not a question of you pulling the trigger, it's more like you trying to hold the trigger back with all your might, just to keep it from pulling itself.

The whole Balance of Terror is weighted to the shoot first ask questions later side of things, to make it that much more scary, because if it's not shit your pants and hug your kids goodbye scary as all fucking existential hell, they're not gonna be detered by it, because they know that everybody is a coward at heart, only the machine really has the balls to pull a trigger this big and existential, so in order to make it convincing, 99% of the decision was handed off to the machine, with just 1% being you trying to hold it back, before it decided that it was go time all on its own and just took the shot if nobody stopped it from doing so.

The POTUS has total control of the launch of nuclear weapons? Get real, he barely has any control at all, these trains are built to run on time, and if you didn't head them off at the pass, with all your might, they would roll out of the station, all on their own.

The way it really works, is that if a certain set of conditions are met, the deterent will recommend that it launches itself, in order to stop that, you have to run around at all levels calling it off, with direct intervention, but it will keep trying to launch itself so long as the conditions are met, it's like an attack dog, dragging you behind it hanging on to the leash for dear life, so that the neighbours will sufficiently frightened by it. You, with the attack dog under total control; reality is; that's just not scary enough to be effective, in order to make the attack dog scary enough to be effective, you cannot be in total control of it, baked right into the cake.

[KerningChameleon]

The Iraq War, Libyan Topple, and Crimean Annexation have revealed to the world "non-proliferation" has one big con all along, pushed by the Nuclear Club to stop the little nations from getting the guns they need to stop the big boys from kicking over their sandcastles. Iraw didn't have WMDs, bye bye tin pot dictator. Libya gave up their WMDs to join the international community? Lol, have fun dealing with a revolt while we enforce a no-fly, bitch. Ukraine gave up their nukes during the breakup? Sucker, now Russia can just take Crimea and NATO won't do jack cause Russia has nukes and you didn't, that treaty is toilet paper.

So, the arms race is back on, for everybody this time. Dictators gotta stave off the Big Boys, and the liberal democracies gotta have a little insurance don't ya know. Can't stop it anymore, an uranium in every centrifuge, and an ICBM in every silo, that's the future we're heading for.

So, Smitty, since you've got this whole chess game figured out, how's about you win us the lottery and answer the million dollah question: Is the draw inevitable? Is it truly a matter of when, not if?