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Now, however, Democrats love the "D" word. It's hard to find a skeptic of President Bush's Iraq policy who doesn't welcome the idea of incinerating Baghdad in response to an attack by Saddam Hussein.
Sen. Bob Graham (D., Fla.), is skeptical of an Iraqi war, since Saddam supposedly knows that his country would face "catastrophic" retaliation if he used weapons of mass destruction against the United States. Deterrence, Graham reasons, makes a perfect security blanket, since it is "the strategy which, for 40 years, kept the Cold War in balance." But in their conversion to the "nuke them till they glow" faith of Dr. Strangelove, liberals have missed some subtleties of the doctrine — details like the fact that deterrence could well work in Saddam's favor. During the Cold War, the U.S. deterrent was never primarily to dissuade the Soviet Union from nuking us (although that was important). It was meant to deter a conventional attack against Western Europe. Since the United States didn't have the conventional arms to oppose such a Soviet attack on the ground, it depended on the possibility of its first use of nuclear weapons to discourage Moscow from rolling its armor across the Fulda Gap. The problem for the United States in today's international environment is precisely that its deterrence worked in the Cold War: It demonstrated that a nuclear force can make the potential costs of war too high even for an adversary with an overwhelming conventional advantage. It is for this sound strategic reason — to deter America's vast conventional power — that Saddam seeks weapons of mass destruction. There is also a difference between today's adversaries and the Soviets. Moscow had a bureaucratic power structure and a decision-making process that we understood. Our enemies will not always be so relatively easy for us to read, or so reasonable. Annihilation doesn't have a deterrent effect if it is welcomed, as it has been throughout history. In March 1945, Hitler gave his infamous Nero's orders, essentially calling for the destruction of Germany. After the first U.S. atomic attack on Hiroshima, the Japanese war minister said, "Would it not be wondrous for this whole nation to be destroyed like a beautiful flower?" During the Cuban missile crisis, according to a Soviet commander's account, the Cubans "believed so strongly, they were ready to sacrifice themselves. They would say, 'Cuba will perish, but socialism will win.'" The Cuban confrontation demonstrates how deterrence almost failed even against the Soviets. In a crisis, the communication that is so important to deterrence — to convey threats and establish thresholds — might break down. The United States did not know, for instance, that the local Russian commander in Cuba apparently had been pre-delegated to launch his missiles if attacked. So the option pushed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff — an airstrike and invasion — could have unwittingly prompted a nuclear exchange. As Bob McNamara always says, "We lucked out." More recently, deterrence failed against Saddam prior to his 1990 invasion of Kuwait, partly because we didn't know how to deliver a message to him. Diplomat April Glaspie's subtle warning was taken as a go-ahead. "We foolishly did not realize he was stupid," said Glaspie afterward. Well, get used to it — the world is full of folly and miscalculation. Which is why deterrence has already failed in the war on terrorism. Last year, we warned the Taliban to hand over Osama bin Laden or face destruction. They decided to go down in a blaze of daisy-cutter-ignited glory. All of which is why Democrats like Graham should put aside their dreamy faith in the power of potential mushroom clouds over Baghdad, and instead support ending Saddam's regime — so we don't have to find out whether deterrence will work with Saddam or not. © 2002 by King Features Syndicate |
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eterrence
used to be derided by liberal critics as "the balance of terror,"
an immoral principle that prompted the United States to stockpile thousands
of nuclear weapons and put the world at risk in its Cold War with the
Soviets.
