You Are Not Worried Enough About Nuclear Proliferation
This topic is a far cry from my typical interests and experiences. It has been a topic in my mind and in my conversations, though I feel more a student of the topic than a teacher. I am writing this article because I have not seen anyone else do so. Please convince me I am wrong.
Since the US dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, nuclear weapons have been a singular force shaping relationships between nations. The first atomic age was a race to build and stockpile nuclear weapons, with many countries choosing alliances with nuclear powers like the US in lieu of building their own. The second atomic age was characterized by disarmament because the US and USSR thought fewer weapons would reduce the chance of a civilization-ending nuclear holocaust. The USSR’s dissolution would accelerate the need for disarmament. The newly formed eastern European governments were ill-prepared to control a stockpile and were encouraged to return them to Russia or disable them. With Trump’s second electoral victory, we are entering a new atomic age: proliferation.
US citizens’ decisions have weakened the US security guarantee. The guarantee was created to try to prevent another world war. The security guarantee states that a war against one is a war against all, requiring a response of the allies’ choosing. Americans and free Europe believed such a guarantee would deter a power-hungry authoritarian like Hitler or Stalin from conquering their neighbors. To be credible, it must include potential nuclear strikes by the US against an invading force. Though still sharing security guarantees with the US, the United Kingdom and France each developed a domestic nuclear strike capability for different reasons, though the common thread is that their quantities are intended to deter an invading force rather than to completely annihilate any aggressor nation. Only the US and USSR developed that capability. The mutual defense guarantee has been a constant of US foreign policy since World War 2, regardless of the party in power. Every new president from 1946 until 2016 endorsed the mutual defense guarantee, until Trump’s first administration refused to endorse it. Trump accused the other countries of failing to meet their defense spending obligations in order to fund their generous social services i.e. freeriding on American defense spending. This accusation put a spotlight on an open secret. Allies believed the accusation was a negotiating tactic rather than a dissolution of the security guarantee, but calling it into question added uncertainty to a policy that requires certainty to work. By electing Biden in 2020, US citizens effectively chose to endorse the security guarantee, sending a message to allies that they would not be left to fend for themselves. Since then, Trump has debated going beyond de facto withdrawal from the treaty and officially withdrawing from the alliance. With his re-election, Americans have sent the opposite message. Vacillating every four years creates a strategic ambiguity of what the US would do in a conflict. This position shifts the US from an iron-clad mutual defense of the free world to “fuck around and find out”. The ambiguity of alliances returns us to a world closer to the conditions that created World Wars I and II. A rational actor should discount the guarantee, knowing Americans might not commit to deter a war but may show up late and prevent total subjugation. There are precedents: WW I, WW II, Korea, and a disastrous attempt in Vietnam. Regardless, a rational actor should work towards securing their own countries.
