In the Borderland

The Center for Security Policy has heard such talk before and is wise not automatically to dismiss it. The responsibility of those who look after the national security is best measured by the awesome difficulty one has in merely mentioning apocalyptic weaponry. In 1964, Senator Goldwater said offhandedly that there might be a conceivable use for low-yield nuclear weapons in effecting the desired impenetrability of the DMZ in Vietnam—using them not against human beings but to defoliate the jungles that were giving the North Vietnamese troops cover.

He was of course immediately denounced as Dr. Strangelove. I wrote to him at the time that the only way a presidential candidate can use the two words “nuclear bombs” is to deplore their existence. There is a sense in which we all deplore their existence. There is also a sense in which we measure their special weight not reproachfully, but gratefully, a weight commensurate with our devotion to liberty.

RP

About the Author

Richard Pipes

Featured Tags

The Center for Security Policy has heard such talk before and is wise not automatically to dismiss it. The responsibility of those who look after the national security is best measured by the awesome difficulty one has in merely mentioning apocalyptic weaponry. In 1964, Senator Goldwater said offhandedly that there might be a conceivable use for low-yield nuclear weapons in effecting the desired impenetrability of the DMZ in Vietnam—using them not against human beings but to defoliate the jungles that were giving the North Vietnamese troops cover.

He was of course immediately denounced as Dr. Strangelove. I wrote to him at the time that the only way a presidential candidate can use the two words “nuclear bombs” is to deplore their existence. There is a sense in which we all deplore their existence. There is also a sense in which we measure their special weight not reproachfully, but gratefully, a weight commensurate with our devotion to liberty.