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Friday, March 4, 2022

SIXTY YEARS AGO, I DID NOT ANTICIPATE THAT I WOULD HAVE TO WRITE THIS NOW IN MY NONAGE

Let me just say a few things about tactical nuclear weapons to make it clear by their use would be so horrendous. A tactical nuclear weapon is described as having a yield of “just a few kilotons”, let us say, for example, 3 kt. A flight of 50 World War II bombers, each loaded with four 1000 pound blockbuster bombs, could deliver 200,000 pounds of TNT in a single raid, which is to say 100 tons of explosive munitions.  If that armada of bombers returned to the city every night for a month it would dump a total of 3000 tons of explosive munitions. That is an explosive yield equivalent to a single “small” 3 kt tactical nuclear weapon.  Five such tactical nuclear weapons used in a battle would have the equivalent explosive force of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima. How many people died in Hiroshima? The estimates vary from 70,000 to 200,000 and this does not include all of the people who were injured, many of whom later died of radiation poisoning.


The use of nuclear weapons is unthinkable. Their existence is a monstrosity.

18 comments:

aaall said...

"The use of nuclear weapons is unthinkable."

Except for those folks who possess them and just want to watch the world burn - it only takes one. I can't imagine tactical nukes being used Hiroshima-like as a sample and example. More likely several would be used and an event cascade would ensue. While a detonation at an appropriate height would be fall out free, an almost inevitable error due to the stresses of actual combat would change that.



james wilson said...

I’m truly sorry, RPW, that no one has seen fit to join you in your condemnation of nuclear weapons, for they truly are monstrous things. Their monstrous nature was brought home to me anew recently when I learned that my 14-year-old grandson had become quite fascinated by them, no doubt because the possibility of nuclear war is in the news. It got me looking at the issue of nuclear winter again. I found the following papers interesting:

https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.694.6038&rep=rep1&type=pdf

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2006JD008235

The second paper, in particular, challenges those who sought to minimise the climate effects of nuclear war.

Since I was diverted before I could attach this, I’d like to add that, contrary to aaall, I think they’ll be used, if they’re used at all, by people who will imagine they have a good reason to use them because their way of thinking about the world and how it works will seem to give them no choice in the matter. They’ll be horrified that the world will burn or become incapable of supporting life, but they’ll go ahead anyway because they won’t be able to imagine not doing it.

Another Anonmymous said...

Prof. Wilson,

As a point of clarification, I would note that several commenters on the previous posts have deplored and condemned Putin’s threat to use nuclear weapons. We can deplore and condemn the nuclear weapons themselves, but that won’t make them go away. None of who are sane admire their destructive capacity. But they are here, and its their use, and the threat of their use, that we should focus our condemnation on.

james wilson said...

Another Anonymous, Perhaps I misspoke, but I would have thought my intention was clear: to deplore and condemn both those who cause these monstrous weapons to be manufactured and--sometimes the same people--those who actually contemplate using them, even as a last resort. Perhaps those who imagined and created such weapons are also to be deplored and condemned, though that is perhaps a more difficult argument since it would bring into question the moral status of some of our scientific icons?

Which countries are known to possess such weapons, which would seem to imply that their leaders are willing at least as a last resort to use them, is tabulated, as I recall, in one of the papers I referenced.

That some politicians are willing to contemplate using them despite what we know their catastrophic effects would likely be is a conclusion I derive from the fact that a former leader of the British Labour Party was severely criticised for saying that he would never use them were he ever in a position to be able to order them launched. This is not the position of Labour's current leader. [See, e.g., https://labourlist.org/2021/02/labour-stresses-commitment-to-nato-and-nuclear-deterrent-in-defence-speech/ ] I can't remember whether it has been part of the discussion that Britain could only launch its nuclear weapons if it had the US's permission to do so. The current British Prime Minister is unlikely ever to have thought seriously about this or any other matter, which likely means he'd do it. France, more nuclearly independent than Britain, is also now led by someone--someone likely to be re-elected in a few weeks-- who contemplates at some level the possibility that he'd use them. [See, e.g., Kjolv Egeland and Benoit Pelopidas, “ European nuclear weapons? Zombie debates and nuclear realities,” European Security vol. 30 (2), 237-258 (2021), accessed at https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/09662839.2020.1855147 ] I imagine that those who hold supreme power in all the nuclear countries are willing to do likewise.

Another Anonymous said...

Prof. Wilson,

No responsible world leader would publicly announce his country’s unilateral disarmament, because that would expose the country to a possible preemptive strike by an aggressor, such as Russia. Would the world, or the universe, be a better place if only those willing to use nuclear weapons first survived, just to insure that the species survived? Given the circumstances, mutual assured destruction is the best tactic to prevent that from happening,

Regarding the moral responsibility of those scientists who encouraged and participated in the development of nuclear weapons – e.g., Einstein, Oppenheimer, Fermi (?), Szilard, etc. – that was a different time, with different circumstances. The U.S. was facing the threat that Nazi Germany would develop them first. I do not believe we are in a position to make moral judgments about them.

My comment was prompted by your assertion that “no one has seen fit to join you in your condemnation of nuclear weapons.” Several had, in prior posts, by condemning their threatened use.

LFC said...

The U.S. and Russia have issued joint statements in the past (as Sec of State Blinken remarked the other day in response to a reporter's question) to the effect that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. (Whether that remains the official Russian position, who knows for sure, but it probably does.) I'm pretty sure the official U.S. nuclear posture rules out the first use of nuclear weapons.

Given the events of the past couple of days, I think the use of tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine is unlikely. Russian forces are advancing in the south, causing civilian casualties not as an unintended byproduct of war but rather by what seems an indiscriminate targeting policy, and are on the way to reducing Mariupol to rubble (see the report on the NewsHour tonight). If this continues, they won't need to use tactical nuclear weapons. The Russian invasion seems to violate both of the two traditional prongs of just-war theory: jus ad bellum (i.e., the invasion is unlawful aggression), and jus in bello (i.e., the conduct of the campaign violates customary and now codified principles about not deliberately targeting civilians and taking care to try to ensure that civilian casualties are kept as low as possible).

Given the actions of Russian jets/bombers in support of Assad in the Syrian war, and also Russian actions in Chechnya for example, this isn't surprising. But it underscores that the Russian military's doctrine seems to be out of line in this respect with that of other "advanced" militaries. Now of course practice does not always succeed in matching principle, as the U.S. record of recent years shows. But in the Russian case, as far as I can tell -- as admittedly a complete non-expert on the Russian military -- they don't even see it as a particular concern. The other possibility is that they launched the invasion intending to be somewhat more restrained, and then abandoned that as they met fierce resistance. In any event, the conduct of this campaign -- from the limited amount of info I've gleaned so far (from the Western mainstream press, but photos/videos are hard to manipulate and there is no reason to discount them) -- violates the law of armed conflict.

So have other campaigns by other countries, but at present that is mostly irrelevant.

LFC said...

P.s. not to suggest that the violations are all on one side (that's almost never the case), but the Russians as unlawful aggressors bear the main responsibility.

Marco Aurelio Denegri said...

It seems that the main reason we are discussing nuclear weapons is that there is a strong suspicion that Putin is deranged enough to use them if cornered. I am curious what are plausible lines of events that could lead to such a scenario. Is any leader, even Putin, really capable of launching something so destructive due to his or her own psychological shortcomings?

aaall said...

M.A.D., Putin can't launch anything. He can order launchings but we have two examples of Soviet officers not following orders/protocols so who knows? I would guess that straws are drawn at that point. If he's immunocompromised and roided up, he might well be at the apres moi... stage

Michael Llenos said...

Right now President Putin is still playing chess. And he knows he's checkmated (meaning: forced out of his office) if he uses any kind of nuclear weapon, tactical of otherwise. That is probably why he doesn't use them. The Russian oligarchy will not remove Putin unless all (or most) of the Russian people want him out of power. Right now many Russians just want the Russian troops out of Ukraine. Putin ain't still ticking because of his 25-foot long dining room table between him and the oligarchs. It's instead because in Russia removing a top leader from power is very tricky & slow going as compared with the U.S. version. The reason being a dictator is backed by kingly fear over the masses & has more weathering power than a U.S. president. In Russia or China no one's domestic citizen rids themselves of a ruler unless the citizens have almost nothing left to lose. Power corrupts, but anyone very desperate is not afraid of power. And no man has complete control over another man who is very, very desperate.

Howie said...

So Michael, if Putin is playing chess, is he black or white, what opening is he playing, it seems like a gambit of some kind, is he actually playing by the rules, for war like chess has rules, does anybody want to play a game with an antisocial thug like Putin, what happens if he wins and what happens if he loses?
I still believe he is a madman, in that he is trying to win by threatening a nuclear holocaust- I'm not sure he's civilized enough for chess- we'll have to nominate some other game. For now and it's been a long time since I've studied this: but game theory and psychiatry in some combination would be useful to understand Putin and deal with him.
If he's playing chess, he's not playing by the same rules as everyone else

Michael Llenos said...

If he is now a madman, I don't know. He does act like one. But I believe he is still playing chess. I believe right now he's backed up in a corner and does not know what to do. I believe he is nefarious, but he is still playing chess by his limited chess pieces. He'll definitely be proven a madman if he uses a nuclear weapon. And he'll stop playing chess with Ukraine (in the most positive way) if he just makes peace. I believe right now he believes his invasion was a huge mistake. I think he knows he is lost it's just that he is trying to figure out a way out that will save him the most face. I believe peace is his best option. But he's like the wolf with a bit of meat in his mouth. He sees his reflection in the river, wants the reflected meat, and is about to lose everything by not being content with what he's got, and by slowly opening his mouth.

aaall said...

"It's instead because in Russia removing a top leader from power is very tricky & slow going as compared with the U.S. version."

Or not,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjT2FhubAf0

Michael Llenos said...

aaall

American presidents like LBJ leave the presidency (or don't run for reelection) because of too many protests. Stalin-like presidents won't resign unless shot. --have not seen the video yet.

Barney Wolff said...

I have no wish to debate whether the use of atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was justified or not. Clearly Putzik's use of a nuke on Ukraine, tactical or bigger, would not be. But it would not automatically lead to the end of civilization or human extinction, unless it led to unconstrained escalation.

Megatons or kilotons are very impressive, but the explosive damage is not linear with bomb size. Consider the largest historical explosion, Tsar-Bomba, which had a yield of something like 50 megatons. Obviously, that one device did not destroy the USSR, which in effect bombed itself. If you do the math, had that blast been spread over the whole area of Russia, it would have been the equivalent of a dozen hand grenades on each acre, far more devastating.

I have naive faith that the US and NATO defense establishments have thoroughly gamed out what to do if Putzik is truly crazy and the Russian military actually obeys an order to use nukes. It could even be the case that the response plan has already been communicated directly with the top Russian military leadership. One of possibilities would be not to respond with a nuke, but take out that column of Russian tanks with smart weapons.

It would be a horrible tragedy of Russia uses nukes. But if we are paralyzed by fear of that, the crazy state will take over the world, without firing a nuclear shot.

Barney Wolff said...

I am a little surprised, amused, and heartened that Ross Douthat agrees with Tobias Barrington Wolff, that Lindsey Graham is a reckless idiot:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/05/opinion/russia-nuclear-war.htmld

Although Douthat is several megaparsecs to my right, he is not demonstrably crazy, and in this case makes a good deal of sense. To summarize, we should not push Russia so hard that they feel they have no alternative to avoid regime collapse other than going nuclear. So far, Biden gives every indication of agreeing.

aaall said...

As with his devotion to Trump, Graham seems to have serious judgment issues. Some people aren't supposed to say the quiet parts out loud. I have a feeling Biden understands that a knife in the kidney and a smile is sometimes the way to go.

Just a quibble but a dozen hand grenades evenly distributed at lethal range would only cover slightly less then a quarter of an acre, just evenly distributed would do less damage. Any structures would interfere with that. Grenades are limited because most of the US and Russia is empty - maybe a few thousand people with limited property damage. A Tzar Bomba set off over Moscow or Los Angeles would kill millions and flatten the cities.

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