Nuclear war probabilities are useless - counter to the nuclear gambler’s ruin

Re:Nuclear war probabilities are useless - counter to the nu... by lordnacho on Thursday March 03, 2022 @04:35PM (#30547343)

I think this take is exactly what needs to be considered.

We draw a line, it's NATO. Russia steps right up to the line by attacking Ukraine, and NATO does nothing. Is he going to believe that the line is still there? Why not test it?

In my mind it's perfectly plausible that NATO squirms out if Latvia is attacked. Then the line is "core NATO" or something like that.

At the very least if he doesn't test article 5, he can take every country that isn't in NATO, and each time the question grows about whether NATO is actually a thing.

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Re:Nuclear war probabilities are useless - counter to the nu... by krisoft on Thursday March 03, 2022 @05:18PM (#30547810)

> Why not test it?

Be our guest. Test it.

It doesn’t start with “and then Russia attacked Latvia”. They are not the Fire Nation. They need time to line up their logistics which will give time for NATO to detect their moves and amass troops in Latvia. Heck they were only lining up to attack a non-NATO country (Ukraine) and NATO sent extra troops to Latvia.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/us-nato-military-moves-send-...

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Re:Nuclear war probabilities are useless - counter to the nu... by rootusrootus on Thursday March 03, 2022 @04:37PM (#30547373)

> Why not test it?

Because it's not a thing where you say "let's test this out today." It takes months or years to get to this point. I'm hoping NATO would respond to a build-up on the Latvian border with a build-up of their own. Making it clear that there is no easy win.

There's no reason to just sit there and wait for the tanks to roll across the line.

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