Nuclear Deterrence and the Superpower Arms Race

War and Global Conflict in the Contemporary Era

The nuclear peace?

Massive nuclear arsenals: 70,000 nukes by late 1980s

End of civilisation w/ over one billion dead

No nuclear use since 1945

Key themes

Explaining the build-up

Civil-military differences

Nuclear strategy

Reaction to the bomb

Mixture of “awe and apprehension.”

Hiroshima and Nagasaki blown off the map killing up to 140,000

Press censorship of destruction

Prompt surrender of Japan

Hiroshima: clinical destruction

Hiroshima: clinical destruction

Hiroshima: the hidden suffering

Reaction to the bomb

Mixture of “awe and apprehension.”

Hiroshima and Nagasaki blown off the map killing up to 140,000

Press censorship of destruction

Prompt surrender of Japan

Race from the start

US atomic bomb: 1945 Soviet A-bomb: 1949

US hydrogen bomb: 1952 Soviet H-bomb: 1955

Mike test

10 megaton = 500 Hiroshimas

Cloud: 30 x 27 miles

Crater: mile wide and 200 ft deep

End of “Duck and Cover”

Superpower nuclear arsenals

Massive size

Complexity

Overkill

Explaining the arms build-up

External: arms race

Internal: domestic politics

Arms racing

Explains ‘why’ but not ‘how’

Tit-for-tat dynamics

Origins of Soviet programme

Failure of 1946 Baruch Plan

Limitations?

Domestic politics

Bureaucratic interests, election politics, and the MIC

Origins of the US build-up

Undermining alternatives

Windows of vulnerability

Civilian perspectives

Special weapons of last resort

Nuclear taboo: public opinion and personal conviction

Truman and AEC

Eisenhower and Korea

LBJ and Vietnam

Can war be left to the generals?

Mr. Atom Bomb

Military perspectives

WWII bombing campaigns & SAC

Emergency War Plan 1-49

“smoking radiating ruin at the end of two hours.”

Circumventing civilian control

Nuclear nutters

Peace through strength

Golden age of nuclear strategy

MAD v nuclear war-fighting

Can nuclear war be fought?

How easy is deterrence?

Objective: denial or punishment?

(Gray v Howard)

Cuban Missile Crisis

United Nations Security Council

CMC: Soviet motives

Deter US invasion

Redress strategic imbalance

Counter Turkey deployment

EXCOMM

CMC: US options

Naval quarantine

Air strike

Invasion

Public alarm

Enforcing the blockade

Clashes in the Caribbean

Shooting down US spy-plane

Crisis resolution

Trollope Ploy

Secret trade

Back channel

Credit for Kennedy?

Necessity for crisis

Firm resolve

Cold War record

Threat of nuclear war

Deliberate war- Soviet fears- JFK measures

Accidental war- “Falling leaves” EWS- SAC provocation

The Deterrence Paradigm

Central v extended deterrence

Immediate v general deterrence

Longevity- robust w/out reckless- best of a bad job- reflected institutional inertia

US nuclear strategy

Declaratory policy (MAD v NWF)

Employment policy (more choice)

War plan (SIOP)

NSTDB

1960: 4,100 1974: 25,000 1980: 40,000 1982: 50,000

The nuclear peace: a close call

Imperative: sufficient damage to target base

US early warning system failures: 1962, 1968, 1973, 1979, 1980

LOW: pre-delegating launch authority