Probably the strongest argument against the death penalty in general.

Not really. It's the same argument for making any punishment proportional to the crime.

> Not really

Really. It's a threshold problem. If the penalty for shoplifting is death, and the penalty for a massacre is death, a good number of sociopathic shoplifters will gamble for freedom via massacre. (It's rational.)

It's why dictatorships consistently flame out. If there is no peaceful transition of power, losing power means death. That incentivises a dictator on the edge to take risks that otherwise make no sense because even a minute chance of success is worth it.

In the context of a Russian revolution, this animates concerns around our species' first nuclear civil war.

Or the death penalty for sexual crimes. It only leads to an escalation of violence by the perpetrator knowing that there is no way out.