In your book, you write about nuclear deterrence being presented to the public as a “peaceful savior” that is imperative to discouraging the use of nuclear weapons. You also wrote that in the event that nuclear deterrence failed, there’s the idea of “restoring deterrence.” What does that mean?
It’s one of those military euphemisms that has shades of Catch-22. Another one is “escalate to de-escalate.” I think that these are just made-up terms where rational people are stretching to find some way to theoretically live with the reality that this is a conundrum and a paradox, it’s a Gordian knot. No one, including me, is saying that deterrence isn’t a complex subject. It has helped. We have not had a nuclear war, but everyone knows that luck should not be a strategy.
You could just say, let’s hope we don’t have a nuclear war, or let’s hope if we launch 82 nuclear warheads in response to one that no one will misinterpret what we’re doing. The most important quote at a time like this in our discussion is that of Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, when he says, “We are one misunderstanding, one miscalculation, away from nuclear annihilation.”
So restoring deterrence, doesn’t that term refer to basically amping up the pressure and doubling down and really laying it on even harder?
To get back to where we don’t harm one another. The problem with all of this is that no matter how nuclear war begins, it ends in Armageddon. Because imagine trying to “restore deterrence” by obliterating millions of people. What madness to think that the other side, the recipient of those nuclear weapons, would say, “Oh, wow, okay, now let’s get back to not using nuclear weapons, now that you’ve used them.”
People associate nuclear weapons with a tremendous blast of energy, heat, and radiation that would cause horrific death and destruction. In your scenario, however, you painted a detailed picture of more widespread impacts that would immediately sow chaos in power systems and infrastructure far from the actual blast, including critical systems that control electricity, water, nuclear power, radar, communications, and so on. You described multiple forms of the collapse of vital transportation, millions of miles of oil and gas pipelines rupturing, dams bursting, flooding, sewage spills, blocked roads, and more, all happening less than one hour after the launch of a nuclear weapon.
I think people will be astonished also to realize that this is not from [my] imagination. All of this is sourced from Defense Department documents. Department of Energy officials and others reporting the actual scientific facts of what unspools in the event of a nuclear weapon exploding and also the effects of an electromagnetic pulse of a nuclear weapon, particularly if that weapon is exploded 300 miles above the Earth, let’s say above Nebraska, giving it the ability to essentially take out all the power in the United States and then that mayhem that you described from my book is exactly what happens.
For many people, nuclear weapons and the threat of nuclear war invoke feelings of being overwhelmed, hopelessness, and a resignation that there’s nothing they can do about it. What do you say to people who feel that way?
For me, information is king or queen or both. I will cite the story of Ronald Reagan [who] came into office a nuclear hawk. He believed more nuclear weapons made America more safe. Then he watched a television movie called The Day After despite the fact that his chief of staff told him not to watch it. He wrote in his White House journal that he became greatly depressed afterwards. I believe that is the power of narrative, and I hope that my book [has] a similar impact on people.
What Reagan did as a result of those feelings was reach out to Gorbachev, and he absolutely did a U-turn in presidential thinking, which was to stop treating the USSR as the enemy in military terms. Treating the USSR — Russia — as the adversary with this idea underpinning [that you] can work with an adversary, and because of that, because of the Reykjavik talks, Reagan and Gorbachev moved the world from the all-time insanity of 70,000 nuclear warheads in 1986. Their work together is why we have approximately 12,300 nuclear warheads today.
There are many reasons why the parties need to get back on track about disarmament. I believe that is an incredibly important role of the president of the United States. You could say we created the [nuclear] problem and we could possibly fix it or at least move in that direction.
Presidents do what they want to do, but also what they think is popular. I believe the power is always in the people and that the more information you have, the better equipped you are to make decisions that impact your own self and that of your family.
So instead of burying your head in the sand, bury your head in a book.
It’s something like that, yes.
In March, you gave a presentation at the third meeting of states parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons at the United Nations. While roughly half the world’s countries have signed, ratified, or acceded to the TPNW, the nine nuclear-armed states do not recognize or engage with it. Do you think this treaty offers a meaningful path towards nuclear risk reduction and disarmament?
Absolutely it does. I have learned so much from the individuals who were responsible for working on that original treaty and who continue to work tirelessly to get other states parties to adhere to it. It is clearly an effort that is relentless. I was incredibly impressed by what I learned about what has been done in the past to get the states that are signatory to it, and that, of course, there is more work to do. These individuals doing that work are deeply committed to that, and may they continue on with such courage.
So you think it’s a worthwhile endeavor?
Absolutely. I mean, it can’t not be.
