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A comment on There Were BGP Anomalies During the Venezuela Blackout. Parent comment

Re:There Were BGP Anomalies During the Venezuela Blackout by esseph on Monday January 05, 2026 @07:14PM (#46507088)
You still have to be willing to use the nukes. The threat has to be real or it doesn't work as a deterrent.

I think this is a situation where even if Venezuela had nukes, this still would have happened.

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Re:There Were BGP Anomalies During the Venezuela Blackout by JumpCrisscross on Monday January 05, 2026 @07:41PM (#46507295)
> even if Venezuela had nukes, this still would have happened

Maduro would have personally had the launch codes. At that point, Mar-a-Lago is in range of Pakistan- or Iran-style ballistic missiles. That's a clear threat he would have been able to articulate that would have probably ended any conversation of an invasion.

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Re:There Were BGP Anomalies During the Venezuela Blackout by mr_toad on Monday January 05, 2026 @08:37PM (#46507712)
The choice is basically:

a. Don’t use nukes, everyone moves one rung up the ladder. b. Use nukes. Ladder is destroyed, everyone dies horribly.

Using nukes only makes sense if everyone is going to die horribly anyway. It’s an empty threat otherwise.

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Re:There Were BGP Anomalies During the Venezuela Blackout by esseph on Tuesday January 06, 2026 @02:04AM (#46509516)
Not exactly true.

Our systems are designed around ICBM detection.

A tactical/suitecase nuke like the old US Army Green Light teams wouldn't trigger that. In fact, it would likely take awhile to trace. The "limited nuclear war" concept.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Light_teams

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