When I entered this world the USA had been a nuclear power for seven years, the Soviet Union for three. Britain would explode its first device the following month, France and China a few years later. Putting me fair and square in that first generation to grow up in the shadow of the bomb.
Central to the understanding of this nuclear age was the bleak but real comfort of MAD – mutually assured destruction. Should any power be so foolhardy as to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike on one similarly armed, MAD told us, its own destruction was as certain as that of its target. Ergo, it would not happen. Not by design it wouldn’t, though this did little to calm our nightmares of the world ending through miscalculation.
In praise of MADNESS
I wrote the above nine days before the US-Israeli attack on Iran, thirty-four before I wrote The road to WW3. Part 1. As I gather my thoughts for part 2, I offer a 17:47 video on what nuclear war in Europe might look like. I fear that despite coming close several times that we know of – and we weren’t always told – the fact it has yet to materialise has left us complacent, blasé even.
This despite the fact that in an era of tactical nukes, with the most violent nation on the planet flanked east and west by two vast sheets of water, there are those within the US ruling class who believe a nuclear war can be waged and won.
Which leads me to my second fear, that they may be right.
* * *
Given the site which produced this video……
(…..which I cannot provide because WordPress doesn’t like it)
……..known as “The Military Show” – producing “Daily videos showcasing the latest of the United States military and the world!” with titles such as:
– “Moscow will pay. Everyone in Moscow should be afraid after what US just gave Ukraine”
– “Beyond Repair. This proves it’s all over for Russia’s Navy”
– “Why Russia’s only aircraft Carrier is a Laughingstock.”
– “How Ukraine’s New OP Tactic will Win the War”
– “Why ALL Russian Weapons Suck (Tanks, Ships, Planes, Armour)”
……I cannot help a pang of nostalgia for the old UK “Protect and Survive” series. Mainly because, despite “The Military Show” production output is more sophisticated the similarities and approach is very similar.
A couple of examples occur.
Firstly, the not so subtle premise implied throughout this video of a “Russian Attack/First Strike” is undermined by the position taken that [checks notes] “ALL Russian Weapons Suck” from another of the series of blatant propaganda military snuff videos produced by this very obvious MIC linked outfit.
Secondly, key claims – of both commission and omission – in this video just don’t hold up. Okay, if the starting position is that ALL Russian weapons suck this is going to be the kind of output one would expect.
Lets take air Defence as an example.
The impression given is one of more or less parity in technological capability between the key players in The West v Russia/China. This is nonsense.
It’s nonsense because not only do the Russians posesses more effective hypersonic missile systems which are manouverable in flight for which the West has…..
A. No offensive equivilant.
B. No Air Defence System capable of stopping hypersonic missiles.
……the Russians also have systems such as the kinetic Oreshnik (not sure if that’s the correct spelling) which is just as devestating as a nuclear weapon but without the nuclear warhead.
Moreover, the latest Russian Air Defence System, the S-550……
https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/s550-new-details-s500-derivative
…..is not only more capable of intercepting incoming ballistic missiles than the S-400 and S-500 Russian systems and the “U.S. THAAD and AEGIS air defences fitted with the 3M-3 Block IIB missiles” it’s system capabilities include:
– “Advanced features including its very high degree of situational awareness,
– its 600km engagement range,
– [and] its ability to intercept hypersonic and space targets including satellites and ICBMs,”
What this tells us is that not only are Russian offensive and defensive capabilities orders of magnitude more sophisticated and effective than those of the Collective West, but also that they have other options than going nuclear.
Which begs a question which military porn from such sources do not and will not ask.
“Why have the Russians not invaded/engaged in a first strike yet? What is keeping them?
They already have the capability to defend against hypersonic missiles (which the West does not have), ICBM’s, satellites and incoming ordnance from space and their own hypersonic kinetic non-Nuclear missiles which will easily overwhelm the vastly inferior Air Defences of the West.
Certainly, the grim outcomes presented by this video are correct. However, those outcomes are based and dependent upon starting assumptions and premises which are flawed, wishful thinking, and a creating your own reality approach which bear no relation to the current contextual facts to be found in the reality based community.
Taken overall, this video seems more like a propaganda puff-piece designed to advance the notion among the European populace with that old worn out canard “The Russians are Coming! The Russians are Coming!”
I have fundamental disagreements with The Military Show. Here they don’t matter. We have grown blasé about nuclear war. Hence my posting.
“The Russians are Coming! The Russians are Coming!”
It should really be “The Humans are Coming! The Humans are Coming!”
There has been a truly frightening absence this year of insects in my garden. Usually there are a couple of hundred honeybees around the door, Butterflies, Dragonflies in the pond, etc. This year I’ve seen two or three bumble bees and inevitably quite a few midges and a couple of flies – that’s all. And despite three or four two-fifty mile trips on the last month practically nothing on the car.
Not that this is any better or worse than the ‘human’ (if you can use that word in this connection) murderous obscenities ‘happening’ in Gaza.
Sorry about the non-political nature of this, but it is pretty worrying too.
Apology unnecessary Jams. The terrifying loss of insects, worldwide, is anything but “non political”.