The use of military force is justified to prevent the proliferation of WMD's

I will mostly focus on expanding on the points already made in the last round and responding to Pro's Round 3. I. CLEARING THE TOPIC(Round 3, Points 1, 2, 3)I agree with pro that the scope of this debate is NOT about the right to own weapons by nations. While I don't believe that it is an unjust endeavor to arm oneself, that does not win me this debate alone. However, I would also remind the reader that this is a debate on the ethical descision of using military force. Although I concede to Pro that there is more efficacy in using military force than economic or political sanctions, this does not make military action ethically justified. My argument is that even though invading a foreign nation and taking control of it is likely one of the most reliable ways to ensure safety, it is still not the BEST way because it is unconscionable and, more importantly, places such choices at the discretion of the dominant nation. Although sanctions are not always effective, they are much more controlled and managable by the imposers. Whenever taking the life of innocents is at risk(And for the record, even in targeted military strikes, there ARE civilian casualties[1]), there must be a higher standard of justification. II. RISK OF DEMAGOGUERY(Round 2, Points 1, 2, 5)Demagoguery involves political manipulation by leaders appealing to fear and prejudice. This comes into play is when we allow nations to make arbitrary judgements on who is or is not "dangerous" and permissible to attack. If we allow nations to independently make judgements on who is or is not a threat to national security, powerful governments will abuse this power to justify invasions of lesser nations for economic benefit. As I mentioned in round 2, this is already a proven phenomenon, as the US applied this strategy in order to break Middle-Eastern monopolies on oil. Under Pro's view, a nation should preemptively attack if an opposing nation is capable of arming themselves with a WMD and is not friendly, and therefore has the possibility of attacking in the near or distant future. However, the US and Russia are known political rivals and have been for decades. While nuclear stockpiles have been reduced, both of these nations still have large enough arsenals to wipe out ALL life on Earth[2]. If Pro's view holds, both these nations should be obligated to attack one another, as there is motivation on both sides to harm the other and both are capable of causing nuclear armageddon. This is of course, a terrible idea, as it would cause World War III, precisely what is supposed to be avoided by this. Hence, I believe Pro's position to be self contradictory. Pro gives a metaphor of a man threatening to shoot a child. I do not believe this is an accurate representation of the situation. WMD proliferation is not the targeting of any nation with a weapon, it is the acquisition of the weapon itself. This is more akin to shooting a man in a gun store when he tries to buy a gun, because you assume he will use it to shoot an innocent bystander. Without substatiation of that intent, you are not protected under "self defense". If you DID have evidence that said man was plotting to murder someone, then you could charge him with that, however, that is independent of buying the gun. Similarly, when attacking a nation in self defence, the intelligence leads you to believe the target nation is hostile would be your justification, not the attempt to get the weapon itself. III. THE INHERENT THREATS OF WMD PROLIFERATION(Round 3, Points 1, 4, 6) I appreciate the clarification in point 6, I understand the meaning now. Pro makes two points that I think are interesting, concerning the threats of WMD simply by existing. One is the hazards of such weapons existance and the associated risks, such as fallout from nuclear tests or risks of biological agents being accidently released into the public. The other is the elevated risk of non-military personell being able to manufacture such technology independently as it becomes more widely available worldwide. To this first point, the same concerns that apply to these weapons apply to their non-weaponized counterparts. I pointed out early in the debate that the same technologies used to develop WMDs are used in energy and medical research. Nuclear power plants have to contain radiation and disease control researchers work with isolated strains of deadly viruses. The fact that we allow scientists to handle concentrated smallpox should demonstrate the faith we have in these safeguards to prevent most serious accidents. Mistakes do happen, but they are incredibly rare considering the amount of testing we do. Nations have a vested interest in ensuring that the best safeguards are applied to weapons development, as any mistakes will only hurt the nation in question, not any of its rivals. I do not believe such tests therefore are unreasonable. To answer the question posed, no, I do not think it was fair that the UN imposed sanctions on North Korea, at least not for the nuclear tests. However, that falls under my views of whether possession of WMDs is acceptable, and as has been pointed out, that is not part of this debate. As to the second, point, I concede that it is indeed possible for foreign nation will have radical elements which may attempt to harm foreign nations. Additionally, I admit the risk that almost anyone in the world could self manufacture deadly weapons given enough time and initiative. These are the responsibilites of the host nation, however. The jurisdiction of one nation does not allow it to interfere in the enforcement of internal laws of another sovereign nation. This is why we have, for example, extradition treaties. To use a recent example, the hacker Edward Snowden was labelled a traitor and a risk to national security by the US, however, after fleeing to China and then Russia, the States made no direct attempt to pursue and capture him, even knowing exactly where he was. This is because Snowden was in foreign territory, and it was the job of Chinese or Russian officials to detain him if he violated any laws. For the US to go into foreign territory to arrest Snowden, even when he was CONCLUSIVELY GUILTY of espionage, would be to undermine the sovereignity of the nation he was in. It is the responsibility of whatever nation said potential terrorists are in to prevent acquisition of WMDs. A nation wishing to protect itself from such attacks can ONLY act within its borders to stop potential terrorists from moving said weapons across national borders. IV. HYPERBOLIC ASSUMPTIONSPro has cited the potential for mass death and the harmlessness of surgical military strikes as reason for why it is justifiable. However, this is fallacious because Pro is looking at only the worst possible outcome of WMD proliferation and the best possible outcome of a military strike in his hypothetical. He presents nations which would seek such weapons as "more irrational" and liable to carry out a strike uprovoked, while maintaining that miliary options not only are capable of stopping WMD proliferation, but can do so without any civilian casualites. This would be a convincing case, however, realistically it is not how the situation would be. In my source 1, it is seen that even in targeted drone strikes intended to isolate only terrorists, there are mistakes often made, leading to thousands of innocent deaths. In my source 2, I show that there are multiple nations taking the initiative to obtain nuclear stockpiles, but none have shown to be so erratic as to fire or even threaten to start a nuclear war. While the risk Pro presents of a tragic WMD strike is indeed real, he is not taking into account here the more probable outcome of no attacks taking place and zero deaths occuring, and that military strikes can be chaotic and spark international conflict. V. INTERNATIONAL ENTANGLEMENTAs an explanation of why detterence is effective in the modern age, lets look at the First World War[3]. The political climate of the early 1900s was attributed to the alliance system where groups of nations formed coallitions to protect one another, ensuring that the greater powers such as Germany and Brittain would not be able to take on any given nation on their own. This led to the two massive coallitions of the Allies and the Central powers. When Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, what started as a minor conflict between two lesser nations quickly expanded to include all of Europe. While the Central Powers were defeated, the coalition system remained, and similar factions reappeared in the Allies and Axis powers of WWII. So we can see that the idea of interdependent nations being obligated to defend one another extended beyond that one point in time. Jump ahead to today and we see that we have three major world powers today, China, Russia, and the US maintaining similar coalitions with the lesser nations. While they do not directly get involved with conflict, we see "proxy wars", where the larger nations ally themselves with opposing factions of smaller conflicts to undermine eachother. This occurs frequently in the middle east, for example in the Soviet War in Afghanistan[4]. So what does have to do with anything? It means that larger nations view smaller ones under their protection as tokens of power, and will vigorously defend their influence over a region. While China does not agree with the harsh policies of North Korea, it will not abide by its political rival the US asserting its will over the area, and will side with Korea even if it leads to conflict. With WMD enabled superpowers on both sides of any conflict, neither will risk using such a weapon.1. . http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com... 2. . http://www.ploughshares.org...3. . http://www.firstworldwar.com... 4. . http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk...