From: Dan Sorenson <viking@iastate.edu>
Subject: Re: The Argument For Tac Nukes
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 17:23:37 GMT


From Dan Sorenson <viking@iastate.edu>

portal!cup.portal.com!mmm@uunet.uu.net writes:

>Now that it appears that use of a nuclear weapon no longer poses the threat
>of provoking a full-scale nuclear exchange, is there a difference in the
>attitude we should take towards tactical nuclear weapons?

	This is going to stray from the charter a bit, but I hope not so far
that it will be rejected.  Anyway, conventional weapons are military in
nature, and nuclear weapons political in nature.  So, let's assume that we
were going to war against Iraq again.  Let's also assume that Pres. Bush
is at his finest on the telephone and lets all the other powers know what
he is planning and for them not to be worried.  Let us also assume that
they go along with it and don't do something silly.  Finally, after all
this meandering, we drop the bomb and detonate it over Iraq at 50K feet.

	Effects?  A bright light that shuts down some electrical power
in Iraq.  Hundreds of nations griping in the U.N. about our blatant
misuse of nuclear weapons (the words "imperialistic" and "environment"
should play heavily here, and be used in at least every other sentence).

	Alright, let's forget the U.N. and get back to effects.  We have
created a nifty cloud that poses little threat to anybody, and certainly
little threat to Iraq.  So what was the point?  A nuclear weapon has to
be *USED*, just like any other, for it to make an impression.  Iraq is
hardly going to be impressed by our frying pigeons or geese when we have
not harmed Iraq in the least.  We just as well have mailed some film
clips of a Nevada test to them for all the impact it will have.  In WWII
we nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki; what would have been the response had
we nuked some island off the coast and then pressed for surrender?  I
thing the important point here is to remember that a weapon is useless
if you aren't willing to use it on your enemy, and in the case you
mentioned we weren't willing, just posturing.

	No, if you have to use a nuke you had best use it where it will
hurt.  They are not for waving about -- they are there to inspire fear,
and we just proved we won't use them.  Now we're back to conventional
warfare, just as if we hadn't used it in the first place.

	In my opinion, a far better alternative is a Tomahawk strike on
a military building, say their version of the Pentagon.  Give them some
warning, fly it through a window, and then say you are willing to open
negotiations.  The nuke only showed you are unwilling to kill people and
cities; the Tomahawk showed that you are willing, can do it, and one
political aspect is that the U.S. won't get the berating in the U.N.
over the Tomahawk that it would over the nuke so there is no hope of
international pressure saving the day there.  Iraq now has to decide
if they will continue to put up with missiles flying into their
buildings or send people to the negotiating table.

	It is not the usage of nukes that keep nations in line, it is
the threat of them being used.  Once you nullify that threat by actually
using them and not causing any damage, you've just played your trump
card and been found lacking.  Expect a war on both military and
diplomatic fronts if this happens.

	Sorry to interject politics, but warfare has always been just
as much a political as a military process, and this fact is quite
a bit more relevant to nuclear than conventional weapons.

< Dan Sorenson, DoD #1066 z1dan@exnet.iastate.edu viking@iastate.edu >
<  ISU only censors what I read, not what I say.  Don't blame them.  >
<  "This isn't an answer, it's a pagan dance around a midnight fire  >
<   written in intellectual runes." -- Rich Young                    >



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