U.S. Strategic Command’s Charles Richard in 2019. (DoD, Wikimedia Commons)
By Caitlin Johnstone
CaitlinJohnstone.com
U.S. Strategic Command, the branch of the U.S. military responsible for America’s nuclear arsenal, tweeted the following on Tuesday:
“The spectrum of conflict today is neither linear nor predictable. We must account for the possibility of conflict leading to conditions which could very rapidly drive an adversary to consider nuclear use as their least bad option.”
STRATCOM called it a preview of the “posture statement” it submits to U.S. Congress every year. It was a bit intense for Twitter and sparked a lot of alarmed responses. This alarm was due not to any inaccuracy in STRATCOM’s frank statement, but due to the bizarre fact that our world’s increasing risk of nuclear war barely features in mainstream discourse.
#USSTRATCOM Posture Statement Preview: The spectrum of conflict today is neither linear nor predictable. We must account for the possibility of conflict leading to conditions which could very rapidly drive an adversary to consider nuclear use as their least bad option. pic.twitter.com/4Oe7xkl05L
— US Strategic Command (@US_Stratcom) April 20, 2021
STRATCOM has been preparing not just to use its nuclear arsenal for deterrence but also to “win” a nuclear war should one arise from the (entirely U.S. -created) “conditions” which are “neither linear nor predictable.”
And it’s looking increasingly likely that one will as the prevailing orthodoxy among Western imperialists that U.S. unipolar hegemony must be preserved at all cost rushes headlong toward America’s plunge into post-primacy.
The U.S. has been ramping up aggressions with Russia in a way that has terrified experts, and it looks likely to continue doing so. These aggressions are further complicated on increasingly tense fronts like Ukraine, which is threatening to obtain nuclear weapons if it isn’t granted membership to NATO, either of which would increase the risk of conflict.
Aggressions against nuclear-armed China are escalating on what seems like a daily basis at this point, with potential flashpoints in the China Seas, Taiwan, Xinjiang, Hong Kong, India and any number of other possible fronts.
Nuclear weapon test Mike (yield 10.4 Mt) on Enewetak Atoll, Nov. 1, 1952, 07:14. This was the first hydrogen bomb tested, an experimental device not suitable for use as a weapon. (National Nuclear Security Administration via Wikimedia Commons)
STRATCOM Commander Charles Richard told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that China’s nuclear capabilities are advancing so rapidly that they’re not even bothering with intelligence vetted more than a month ago in their briefings because it’s probably already out of date, urging an upgrade in America’s nuclear infrastructure. Richard reportedly testified that a portion of China’s nuclear arsenal has been recently primed for ready use.
The fact that those in charge of U.S. nuclear weapons now see both Russia and China as a major nuclear threat, and the fact that U.S. cold warriors are escalating against both of them, is horrifying.
The fact that they’re again playing with “low-yield” nukes designed to actually be used on the battlefield makes it even more so. This is to say nothing of tensions between nuclear-armed Pakistan and nuclear-armed India, between nuclear-armed Israel and its neighbors, and between nuclear-armed North Korea and the Western empire.
While China keeps the majority of its forces in a peacetime status, increasing evidence suggests China has moved a portion of its nuclear force to a Launch on Warning (LOW) posture and are adopting a limited “high alert duty” strategy. @US_Stratcom testimony at SASC right now.
— Barbara Starr (@barbarastarrcnn) April 20, 2021
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has the 2021 Doomsday Clock at 100 seconds to midnight, citing the rising threat of nuclear war:
“Accelerating nuclear programs in multiple countries moved the world into less stable and manageable territory last year. Development of hypersonic glide vehicles, ballistic missile defenses, and weapons-delivery systems that can flexibly use conventional or nuclear warheads may raise the probability of miscalculation in times of tension. Events like the deadly assault earlier this month on the U.S. Capitol renewed legitimate concerns about national leaders who have sole control of the use of nuclear weapons. Nuclear nations, however, have ignored or undermined practical and available diplomatic and security tools for managing nuclear risks. By our estimation, the potential for the world to stumble into nuclear war — an ever-present danger over the last 75 years — increased in 2020. An extremely dangerous global failure to address existential threats — what we called ‘the new abnormal’ in 2019 — tightened its grip in the nuclear realm in the past year, increasing the likelihood of catastrophe.”
In a recent interview with Phoenix Media Co-op‘s Slava Zilber, Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft nuclear policy specialist Joe Cirincione described a ramp-up in weapons technology among all nuclear-armed nations in the world, the future of which he described as “bleak”:
“We right now have a global nuclear arms race. Each of the nine nuclear-armed nations are building new weapons. Some are replacing weapons that are getting old. Others are expanding their arsenals. But all of these new weapons represent new capabilities for these countries. So you’re seeing a qualitative and a quantitative arms race that is completely unchecked.
“If you look at the data that’s collected by the Federation of American Scientists, for example, you see that — since the 1980s at the height of the Cold War — we have slashed the global nuclear arsenals. We went from a world in 1986 where there were almost 70,000 nuclear weapons in the world down to where we are now where there’s just about 13,500 nuclear weapons. Tremendous progress. 85% reduction in the stockpile…
“But it’s flattened out. There really haven’t been significant reductions for years. The 2010 New START agreement was the last successful arms control agreement. That was 11 years ago. There’s been no reduction agreement since then. There’ve been no talks about new reductions agreements. Now I think the future of arms control is bleak. It’s bleak. And I see no interest really in a new round of arms control either from the United States or from Russia. So I’m pessimistic about our prospects.”
As I all too frequently find myself having to remind people, the primary risk here is not that anyone will choose to have a nuclear war, it’s that a nuke will be deployed amid heightening tensions as a result of miscommunication, miscalculation, misfire, or malfunction, as nearly happened many times during the last Cold War, thereby setting off everyone’s nukes as per Mutually Assured Destruction.
The more tense things get, the likelier such an event becomes. This New Cold War is happening along two fronts, with a bunch of proxy conflicts complicating things even further. There are so very many small moving parts, and it’s impossible to remain in control of all of them.
Thousands of Starter Buttons
People like to think every nuclear-armed country has one “The Button” with which they can consciously choose to start a nuclear war after careful deliberation, but it doesn’t work that way.
There are thousands of people in the world controlling different parts of different nuclear arsenals who could independently initiate a nuclear war. Thousands of “The Buttons.” It only takes one. The arrogance of believing anyone can control such a conflict safely, for years, is astounding.
A 2014 report published in the journal Earth’s Future found that it would only take the detonation of 100 nuclear warheads to throw 5 teragrams of black soot into the Earth’s stratosphere for decades, blocking out the sun and making the photosynthesis of plants impossible. This could easily starve every terrestrial organism to death that didn’t die of radiation or climate chaos first. China has hundreds of nuclear weapons; Russia and the United States have thousands.
This should be the main thing everyone talks about. There is literally no more urgent matter on earth than the looming possibility that everyone might die in a nuclear war.
But people don’t see it.
On a recent “Tucker Carlson Tonight” appearance, former Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard did a solid job describing the horrors of nuclear war and the very real possibility that it could be inflicted upon the U.S. due to America’s insane brinkmanship with Russia. She spoke earnestly about how “such a war would come at a cost beyond anything we can really imagine,” painting an entirely accurate picture of “hundreds of millions of people dying and suffering, seeing their flesh being burned from their bones.”
Gabbard is correct, and was right to give such a confrontational account of what we are looking at right now. But if you read the replies to Gabbard’s tweet in which she shared a clip from the interview, you’ll see a deluge of commenters accusing her of “hyperbole,” saying she’s being soft on Russian President Vladimir Putin and admonishing her for appearing on Tucker Carlson. It’s like they can’t even hear what she’s saying, how real it is, how significant it is.
Normalcy Bias & Media Malpractice
People’s failure to wrap their minds around this issue is a testament to the power of normalcy bias, a cognitive glitch which causes the U.S. to assume that because something bad hasn’t happened in the past, it won’t happen in the future. We survived the last Cold War by the skin of our teeth, entirely by sheer, dumb luck; the only reason people are around to bleat “hyperbole” is because we got lucky. There’s no reason to believe we’ll get lucky in this New Cold War environment; only normalcy bias says we will. Believing we’ll survive this Cold War just because we survived the last one is as sane as believing Russian roulette is safe because the guy passing you the gun didn’t die.
It’s also a testament to the power of plain old psychological compartmentalization. People can’t handle the idea of everything ending, of everyone they know and love dying, of watching their loved ones die in flames or from radiation poisoning right in front of them, all because someone made a mistake at the wrong time after a bunch of imperialists decided that U.S. planetary domination was worth putting every terrestrial organism at risk.
But mostly it’s testament to the ubiquitous malpractice of the Western media. It’s inconvenient to the agendas of the imperial war machine to have people protesting these insane Cold War games of nuclear brinkmanship, so their media stenographers barely touch on this issue. If mainstream journalism actually existed, this flirtation with nuclear war would be front and center in everyone’s awareness and people would be flooding the streets in protest against their lives being toyed with as casino chips in an insane all-or-nothing gamble.
This is so much bigger than any of the petty little things we spend our mental energy on from day to day. It’s bigger than whatever your No. 1 pet issue may be. It’s bigger than your disdain for Moscow or Beijing. It’s bigger than my disdain for the U.S. empire. It’s bigger than our political opinions. It’s bigger than whatever argument we might be having on the internet. It’s bigger than whether or not we’ve got a problem with Tulsi Gabbard appearing on Tucker Carlson.
Because once the nukes start flying, none of that will matter. None of it. All that will matter is the fact that this is all ending. If you open the door and see a mushroom cloud growing on the horizon, all of your mental priorities will rearrange themselves real quick.
We should not be in this situation. There is no good reason governments should be playing these games with these weapons. There is no good reason we can’t just get along with each other and collaborate toward a healthy world together. Only the psychopathic agendas of power-hungry imperialists perpetuate this insane balancing act, and it benefits none of U.S. ordinary people in any way.
The rising threat of nuclear war is the most urgent matter in the world and it’s absolute madness that we’re not talking about it all the time.
Caitlin Johnstone is a rogue journalist, poet, and utopia prepper who publishes regularly at Medium. Her work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking her on Facebook, following her antics on Twitter, checking out her podcast on either Youtube, soundcloud, Apple podcasts or Spotify, following her on Steemit, throwing some money into her tip jar on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of her sweet merchandise, buying her books Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix, Rogue Nation: Psychonautical Adventures With Caitlin Johnstone and Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers.
This article was re-published with permission.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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Nearly 50 US universities are involved with some aspect of nuclear weapons.
You can see the full list on the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons website.
Hard to evaluate the impact of “tactical” nukes and the effect on the psyche of combatants. Remember being alarmed when Obama announced their expansion, perhaps their initiation I don’t recall. Just a little surgical strike and the enemy will be brought to its knees. It would be too late for the world if that would be the decision of our generals, who historically have among them such men who think that way. MacArthur at the Yalu and aforementioned Doolittle com to mind.
Putins recent State of the Union, Redlines speech left no ambiguity into what would happen if the deranged American Empire even attempted to launch a Nuclear attack on Russia? Washington & its major American Cities would be obliterated within 10 mins! Putin’s veiled threat was designed to piece through the thick grey matter of these stupid, delusional & arrogant Washington elites who believe they can win a Nuclear conflict? The Biden Administration stated that America is back? Back to Warmongering & back to threatening any Competition to US Hegemony? There can be no doubt about that with the massive, gaslighting, propaganda campaigns against China & Russia & the World has suddenly become a more dangerous place to live in!
FYI Caitlin See Beau of the fifth Column News April 20, 2021 titled “Let’s talk about reaching your right wing family and posture statements”.
Watch this and think about my recent post here if it gets put up.
Nuclear Blackmail – the right winger Biden full filling his role his owners elected him to fill.
My advice watch that video and get Josiah Thompson’s book “Last second in Dallas” –
The murder of JFK was not only an act of individuals who feared losing their venue but an act of Executive
Action with extreme prejudice green lighted by CIA. A scare tactic and it worked congress and everyone else.
How and why do I think might I be onto something? We all know JFK did not approve of this action.
Keep up the great work!
Thanks CN
PEACE
I read the article and I injoyed reading it I think everyone should read this at least once
More Nuclear black mail from “DEEP STATE INTERNATIONAL” (DSI). Kids this world did not get this F’ed up overnight.
See the story of the “British Cabal Behind the Gulf Dictatorship” now think about this. 1972, The Safari Club, the BCCI Bank, G. W. H. Bush and the CIA. See the U.S. governments theft of William Hamilton’s PROMIS software and the related INSLAW scandal.
Any and every time the common man/women finds a cause to get behind those efforts are suppressed. Why? Because any world wide cause and it’s organization is viewed as a thread by these evil doers. A threat to the total control they seem to enjoy presently.
The world wide effort to successfully solve the climate problem, one would think, is something the DSI would get behind and support. A challenge common to every human being on the planet, except the deluded SWETS. Those who fear the masses will overwhelm them. Apparently this effort will not happen until the common man, and women of our species is whittled down ion size.
The individuals involved, the” super wealthy elites”, (SWETS) seem to feel they have everything they need to survive. Fool hardy beliefs by a very deluded cadre of Super Wealthy Elitists. But why?
This group controls the large majority of world wide intelligence organizations and exercise their power through holding the purse strings of the International Monetary Fund while manipulating markets world wide, established Dec 27, 1947 as part of Bretton Woods exchange agreement in 1944, this is from the IMF wiki.
What could go wrong?
Quite a lot has changed since then, the reality of world economics now being that the smallest number of wealthy individuals control the greatest amount of world wealth in the history of the planet.
My suspicions are that the off shore illegal baking industry was tailored especially to fast track certain individual organizations, (SEE CIA) wealth accumulation and it worked very well.
Our only hope may be that these greedy sons a bitches at some point in time understand that they stand to be the largest losers in a nuclear conflict.
In the mean time go listen to Jeff Beck’s 1989 hit from his “Guitar Shop” album “A Day In the House”, and realize one thing has not changed, to quote his song, ” . . . everyone is talking but nothing is being done . . . “.
Thanks CN
PEACE
Nuclear weapons typically contain 93 percent or more plutonium-239, less than 7 percent plutonium-240, and very small quantities of other plutonium isotopes. Plutonium 239 has a half life of 24,100 years and if it is ingested or breathed in as dust it is very dangerous and carcinogenic.
Everyone should read “American Ground Zero, The Secret Nuclear War”.
hXXps://www.atomicheritage.org/history/nevada-test-site-downwinders
Deadly assault on the capital “really’ that’s hyperbole and I think you know it, and it does no one any good at reading overblown charges. one might think the British were coming to burn Washington down.
The certainty of nuclear use and war, ironically, is the best deterrance that one can imagine to exist in the present times. Sadly, even the prior deterrance, i.e. MAD, that held for a lengthy period was not found sufficient to reign-in the periodically reemerging imperial temptations that often animate some great powers.
The consequent various implausible moves to usher in tactical nukes, debut of hypersonic missiles, the planned AI-ed arraying of various offensive systems, the elite investments in private deep-bunkered safe sanctuaries, their earnest ventures into outerspace activities, including building orbital sanctuaries, rival colonizations of the moon, launching artificial suns and further down the line perhaps hunting for alternative exoplanets etc. and the provisioning of strategic banks for seeds and various feedstocks deep in Earth itself, all may together point to the certainty of prospective nuclear use, if not also full-fledged war, at some point in the future.
In the rising climate of increasing mistrust between the major powers, the idea of nuclear disarmament has been effectively thrown out of the window by all sane geo-strategicians and the relatively new doctrine of “Nuclear Primacy” is the latest logical manifestation of the same trend, I am afraid !
Thank you for the journalism Caitlin. We have two elephants in the room. On top of the war and pestilence, space shots and orgasm, the big kahunas staring us in the face by candlelight are ours, too. One is entropic probability with much copy about how we cook. The human possibility of that we cook is the larger of the two and I think male.
The gallows humor is tiring. Depression underwritten. Helplessness fated if to an existence. The ideologues are scarier than I know. We’re it not for the submarine commander I might not be.
The congresswoman and commander are compelling. Plowshares in jail. Loose nukes too close to midnight and singularity with a dose of evangelism. I’m sure the human animal can back out of this one. The handler will blow the whistle. Should we all. Si se puede.
A great article. Introspection is very important, but let’s not forget the attitude of the other side. The elites within Russia and China are just as bad and are more than capable of starting something themselves. In the absence of a moral compass it all comes down to game theory and mathematical regression. The Japanese launched their war against the British and Dutch Empires precisely at the moment where they felt they had the last chance to do so. They completely miscalculated their odds nonetheless – due mainly to believing their own propaganda. It also transformed the USA from a bystander to a hegemon. Today, China has a far greater chance of falling into the same Thucydides trap. They also believe their own propaganda and only regression analysis will determine the time to strike (reunification of Taiwan being their principal objective). With the seismic shifts and social upheavals caused by COVID 19, the time has surely moved forward. In WW2 no side dared use their chemical or biological arsenal, even when faced with defeat. The US military used atomic bombs without at first realizing all the consequences. They do now. The next major war will be ferocious. As all wars are. But If Hitler could resist putting chemical weapons into warheads, crazed as he was with Dr Morell’s crack, then so can future madmen. And yes, ultimately our futures will be determined by madmen (or women).
Far too many people are entirely unaware of how many times nuclear war was almost launched **by accident**, when they guys in the silos received valid launch codes transmitted in error and just refused to do their job of destroying the world. It happened several times in the US, I’d be shocked if the Soviets hadn’t experienced the same thing.
Nuclear war will remain a threat so long as those who threaten it remain blameless.
For example, on April 25 Australia celebrates Anzac Day to commemorate those who served in war. It should, however, be the day that those who were forced to fight vilify the leaders who put them on the battlefield to start with.
Only when belligerent national leaders are treated like Guy Fawkes and burned in effigy every year will there be any change. Politicians are far more protective of their image than of the people in their electorates.
The threat of nuclear war is greater today not because the arsenals are bigger (US/Russian arsenals are only 10%-20% of Cold War warheads and maybe 5% of megatonnage) but because deterrence/MAD is failing due to changes in the balance of power and the changes in technology/arms agreements.
1. During the Cold War the US and Soviet Union feared and respected each other. The US/NATO did not have overwhelming conventional non-nuclear military supremacy like today (Warsaw Pact might have had conventional superiority at some points). Other nations like Russia/China fear without nuclear weapons they cannot deter US/NATO especially with their forces near their border. North Korea is the best example of this as they are conventionally weak. Unfortunately this is not raised in the media at all. The imbalances in conventional military power mean nations aren’t going to give up their nukes.
2. The changes in technology and arms agreements is the other factor. The last 30 years have seen considerable improvements in anti-ballistic missile technology and the removal of the ABM treaty in 2002. This puts the retaliatory second strike of nations at risk, under MAD doctrine this increases the risk of firing first and increases the need/search for new nuclear warhead delivery methods like HGV. The possible militarisation of space (Space Force) which increases the chance of nuclear missiles being disabled in Low Earth orbit doesn’t help matters either. The increasing digitatisation and automation of war also increases risks because decision makers have less time to react to potential threats. It is estimated the time from detection to ready to fire nuclear missiles might be 15 minutes or less. Also the possibility of a more advanced version of Dead-Hand systems might increase risks.
So in summary, what does this mean? It means potential adversaries of the US might increase their chance of using nuclear weapons first because 1. they’ll lose a conventional war if they don’t use them, 2. they might be compelled to fire first to ensure they can retaliate to a reasonable degree and 3. they have less time to make that decision.
Caitlin’s hope for a non-nuclear world is far off, we need to discuss issues like the above and make sure MAD/deterrence doesn’t fail first.
I’ve held a nuclear security clearance since just turning 17. During my career in the military, I was also responsible for upgrading such weapon systems as required. So far, I’ve been surprised that we haven’t used one or more, simply on the basis that the USA has used them twice before. My expectation in future, based upon the delusional beliefs and practices of our billionaire elites, is that at some point they will be used whenever Russia and the PRC don’t submit to their quest to power, a quest that has been proven by the ever eastward march of NATO despite assurances by the President Bush I that this would not happen. They are seeking total dominion and we mere peons are left to the results when it all goes to Hell while they hide in their bunkers in New Zealand or elsewhere. Meanwhile, I’ve prepped enough to hold out a while should I survive the strike on the Naval Air Station 18 miles to the South. Sorry to be a downer, but these literally sociopathic people have no regard to anyone save those who preserve their power and survival, which frankly I can’t even understand despite being considered sociopathic myself due to autism.
There is wilful ignorance. The Pentagon top generals and so many others, even younger people if they have any decent background at all, must know of the terrible dangers of possible nuclear war. Daniel Ellsberg’s books and interviews make it quite clear, and are readily available. Gar Alperovich is still alive, and his seminal book “Atomic Diplomacy” is a must-read for interested intelligent observers.
Just hearing the absolute lies of “our leaders”, including the new “Defense Secretary”, are echoed by the free media to terrify us all about the threats and dangers of Russia, China, Iran with NO evidence that any of these have a wish to annihilate the USA (!) or even interfere with its elections(!). All the threats and belligerent words, as well as the constant upgrades of weapons, (leading to responses by the “enemies”) come from the USA, which never seems to want peace or even discussions allowing points of view to be debated, not tossed aside as thy now are.
This has been scaring the bejesus out of me as I watch all of the soma-dosed of my generation (who SHOULD know better) just going about their business as if nothing particularly out of the ordinary is going on. That “Countering Disinformation Blah-Blah” propaganda bill from Obama and Rob Portman in 2015(?) is working its magic just like every other sheep-dogging trick the CIA et al have come up with since skating around 1948’s Smith-Mundt Act expressly forbidding it.
This latest incarnation of Gen Jack D. Ripper is close enough to former General Phillip Breedlove who was foaming-at-the-mouth, tire-biting bellicose back when NATO first got its push to the Baltics border thing going. I’ve been calling my family members daily since this heated up. And honestly, it’s a matter of perhaps “Goodbye, I love you.”
Good God! Are we actually this insane as a nation?
(Don’t answer that, please.)
The scars from the week of the Cuban Missile Crisis never left anyone who saw them in person, let alone in hindsight the vision of the howling-for-blood generals in both the Kremlin and the White House in those deadly hours.
Gen Jack D.’s actual doppelgänger was indeed the one and only cigar-swallowing Curtis LeMay who ‘counseled’ immediate attack; “let ’em all fly!” in his not-not-so-even in-disposition (rage in his cage.) Little did he know that many of those missiles in Cuba were armed and already pointed at D.C., let alone the entire Eastern Seaboard.
Few know the drama occurring under the waves as U.S. Navy destroyers were depth-charging a Soviet sub armed with nuclear torpedoes; it was only the 3rd officer in a triad command structure that prevented WW III right then and there. The Russians have always to my knowledge played it cool, even in plenty of other other separate Cold War 1.0 instances of crisis. But this, knowing well enough who they are dealing with as adversaries? (Including befuddled Biden.)
Too much can go wrong in these high stakes games; just what in the hell are these people doing and how did we ever get stuck entrusting them with the fate of the world? I’m referring to the vicious, “score to settle” attitude coming from the Biden Bunch.
Just now I heard from a usually reliable source that Blinken’s mother emigrated from Ukraine. What does that mean to Cold Eyes Tony?
I fear it’s him that is actually directing White House traffic, Biden’s longtime aide and all that. For what it’s worth, I’m just glad it’s not John McCain sitting there, but with this gang of sociopathy-tending HRC confidantes buzzing around power of this magnitude without sufficient supervision, that is hardly any consolation in this darkest hour in all these ensuing decades since October of 1962.
So close, too close. And a bunch of immature fools to be pushing Russia to this extreme. I’ll hazard a guess most of them ran from any fight that came their way all through school. And find that most disturbing of all. God help us. We need it.
Thanks. You get it, as does Caitlin.
…as do I, forever imprinted with the grade-school memory (October, ’62) of the nuns asking us to pray, because we could all die today, and might never see our parents again.
But such consciousness has been deliberately erased from American memory over the last thirty years, by some of the worst people on the planet.
AMEN!
Nuclear war would be the end of music, the end of love, the end of babies, the end of baseball.
Part of the problem is that younger Americans don’t know this, don’t know what nuclear weapons are, and don’t understand Mutually Assured Destruction.
Ignorance has made us a danger to ourselves and to others.