H303: Nuclear Warfare and the Rebirth of Limited War

1. H303: Nuclear Warfare and the Rebirth of Limited War

2. Chronology of Early Cold War -October 1944: Communists take over Yugoslavia -January 1945: Yalta Conference -March 1945: Communists take over Romania -April 1945: Roosevelt Dies -May 1945: European War ends -July 1945: Potsdam Conference -August 1945: U.S. drops atomic bombs -November 1945: Communists take over Albania -February 1946: Kennan’s “Long Telegram” -March 1946: Churchill’s “Iron Curtain Speech” Communists take power in Bulgaria -March 1947: Truman Doctrine -July 1947: Marshall Plan, NSA Act,& X Article -January 1948: Communists take power in Hungary -February 1948: Communist Coup in Czechoslovakia -July 1948: Berlin Blockade and Airlift -April 1949: NATO Treaty signed -May 1949: Soviet Union ends Berlin Blockade -September 1949: Soviet Union tests atomic bomb -June 1950: Outbreak of Korean War -September 1950: Truman Approves NSC-68

3. NSC-68 • Issued by NSC 14 Apr 1950. • Based on assumption that Soviet Union had a systematic strategy aimed at the spread of Communism around the world. • Recommended a massive buildup of and an increase in funding for the armed forces in an effort to contain the Soviets. • Laid on Truman’s desk until NKPA attacked.

4. Containment Elements: Diplomacy Economics Political Military Social

5. Old Theories “Aerial offensives will be directed against such targets as peacetime industrial and commercial establishments; important buildings, private and public; transportation arteries and centers; and certain designated areas of civilian population as well. To destroy these targets three kinds of bombs are needed - explosive, incendiary, and poison gas - apportioned as the situation may require.” Giulio douhet The Command of the Air, 1921 Atomic

6. Explaining Deterrence: Simply He thinks we think he’ll attack; So he thinks we shall; So he will; So we must.

7. Nuclear Deterrence • Deterrence: Subjective state of mind • Requirement: Second-strike capability that is • Secure • Credible • Stabilizing: Anything that enhances second strike • Destabilizing: Anything that degrades second strike, or enhances first strike capability.

8. Deterrence “It should be obvious that what counts in basic deterrence is not so much the size and efficiency of one’s striking force before it is hit as the size and condition to which the enemy thinks he can reduce it by a surprise attack - - as well as his confidence in the correctness of his predictions.” Bernard Brodie

9. What are the assumptions associated with America’s nuclear strategy from 1946-1968? • US has a monopoly 1945-1949. • Deterrence will work. • Superiority is necessary. • The next “war” will be a thermonuclear war. • The military is the foundation of containment.

10. How good is the Strategic Policy of the United States at countering insurgencies or revolutions?

11. Second Order Effects of the Nuclear Military Revolution? The term; “National Security State” is used express that which Americans dare not plainly speak– that we have created a global empire, which projects its power onto the world not through lofty idealism, but rather with massive, overwhelming military and economic force. During the Cold War, the American empire took shape through the subordination of elected government representatives to the un-elected state; the unification of the armed forces into the Defense Department, the numerous secret intelligence agencies, the National Security Council, the integration of science and the military; mass mobilization of manpower recompensed by a growing social welfare system, and a self anointed “messianic role to “save” Western Civilization…While the resulting power is wielded by the state, the financial burden of the arrangement is placed upon the taxpayer… the Cold War…enshrined a new type of institutional decision making, a new political culture that undermined our foundational republican ideology in favor of overwhelming state control