linschn

> Mutual Assured Destruction principle is the ONLY reason for protracted peace at the global scale

you seem to derive that I think something along the line of "Equilibrium in nuclear abilities played no role in global stability during the cold war."

The answers to your rhetorical questions are of course all no. But do you truly think the huge size of our nuclear arsenals are a necessary feature for global stability nowadays ? If yes, could you explain to me why a smaller arsenal could not do the trick ?

> Mutual Assured Destruction principle is the only reason for protracted peace at the global scale

very hard to believe. Do you have any source I could read that may change my mind ? For the moment I am a proponent of global nuclear disarmament, I don't have any source in english but the argument that draw me in was can be phrased as :

During the one true nuclear crisis, the Cuba missiles, Kennedy did not send the Air Force because the chance of getting nucleary hit, even "a little", was not 0%. Still, the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction posits that one enemy must be sure to be completely destroyed.

So we have a doctrine that leads to enormous arsenals, yet the only data point we have shows it is probably not true, as a mere chance of getting a small hit was enough for Kennedy to back down.

Hence, our arsenal are, at best, far too huge. I furthermore believe that we would be better off with no nuclear weapon at all, but I wanted more info about your precise statement.