Your kernel has no external library dependencies.

Relaxing library requirements can introduce security issues when the dependency behaviour changes, so I'm not sure what the argument is.

If your bgp is bugged, yeah it sucks, but it's recoverable. We're using encrypted traffic these days to ensure that even captured traffic is safe.

The difference here is that data corruption is not recoverable.

Linux uses at least libc

Linux kernel doesn't use libc. Libc provides the interface for userspace to call the kernel.

It does includes its headers (stdlib.h, at least), in various subsystems.

In user space tools and tests only. The kernel part does not include stdlib.h anywhere. Nowhere where it matters in the context of "And if my kernel crashes?"

You are right, thank you for the insight