{"id":517,"date":"2019-04-12T18:46:09","date_gmt":"2019-04-12T18:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/breaking-the-silence.online\/index.php\/2019\/04\/12\/deterrence-norms-and-the-nuclear-taboo\/"},"modified":"2024-09-14T06:25:04","modified_gmt":"2024-09-14T06:25:04","slug":"deterrence-norms-and-the-nuclear-taboo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/2019\/04\/12\/deterrence-norms-and-the-nuclear-taboo\/","title":{"rendered":"Deterrence, Norms, and the Nuclear Taboo."},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Iran<\/a>\u2019s strike<\/strong> has destroyed the taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> of \u00abthe invulnerable United States<\/a>\u00bb, which happens to exist in many anti-US organizations in the region<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

It <\/span>is sometimes assumed that the absence<\/strong> of nuclear war<\/strong> since World War II proves that nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> are not relevant for national security<\/strong>, will never be used in conflict<\/strong>, or that a taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> against nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> will deter their use<\/strong> in the future<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The Nuclear Taboo Exists, But it Can Be Broken<\/p>\n

It is sometimes argued that a normative basis<\/strong> of restraint<\/strong>, a \u00abnuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>,\u00bb is responsible for the lack<\/strong> of inter-state nuclear conflict<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

While such a taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> almost certainly exists, it is unlikely to prevent states from using nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> on its own.<\/p>\n

This is not to say the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> has no effect on policy<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>, combined with the mindset that the weapons<\/strong> would not be necessary for victory, contributed to President Harry Truman\u2019s decision to not use<\/strong> nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> in the early days of the Korean War, and prevented Gen.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Arms control<\/strong> agreements, for their part<\/strong>, have reinforced the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> by seeking to control<\/strong> potential escalation, provide transparency, and minimize the situations where it would be advantageous to use<\/strong> nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Considerations of nuclear warfare have become taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>, which has contributed, in part<\/strong>, to the non-use<\/strong> of nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> for so long.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

But the taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> does not guarantee that nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> will not be used in the future<\/strong>, and history shows us that taboos<\/span><\/strong> are often broken.<\/p>\n

Recent evidence suggests that the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> may not be as robust as many assume.<\/p>\n

The unfortunate reality is that the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> is falling apart.<\/p>\n

The church is working to change nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> policy<\/strong> and the normative framework by which nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> are judged, to strengthen the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> at a time<\/strong> when it is undermined.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> erodes, this breadth is important, reaching into the military.<\/p>\n

The deterioration of the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> and the international arms control<\/strong> framework, the rise of new and less stable threats, and the return of the nuclear arms race gives greater urgency.<\/p>\n

Nina Tanenwald likewise argues we are witnessing an undermining of the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

See Nina Tanenwald, \u00abThe Legacy of the Nuclear Taboo in the Twenty-First Century,\u00bb in The Age of Hiroshima<\/a>, ed.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s generated a taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> against use<\/strong> of nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong>, which, as Nina Tannenwald argued, \u2018has stigmatised nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> as unacceptable\u2014\u00abweapons<\/strong> of mass destruction\u00bb\u2019.<\/p>\n

In considering the prospect of a more dangerous and contested future<\/strong>, the key questions are whether our luck will hold, whether deterrence will continue to work or remain relevant, and whether that taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> is real enough to enable us to avoid nuclear-weapon use<\/strong> in the future<\/strong>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But what about the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>? It\u2019s impossible to really know whether the likes of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un<\/a>, or military decision-makers in Pakistan<\/a>, see nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> as non-usable in a crisis.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

New technologies such as hypersonics and advanced autonomous systems add to a more uncertain and complex future<\/strong> for the stability of nuclear deterrence and the efficacy of a nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>, and it would be a brave assumption to suggest that nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong> will never be used again.<\/p>\n

Avey claims that the non-nuclear state\u2019s leaders do not abide by the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> while challenging a nuclear-armed adversary.<\/p>\n

And yet Avey, in presenting his main case studies, does not convincingly refute the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> counterargument.<\/p>\n

Although Israel has never publicly acknowledged its nuclear arsenal, these weapons<\/strong> were acquired too recently for Israeli decision-makers to have fully internalized the nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> at the time<\/strong> of the October War.<\/p>\n

Pakistan<\/a> avoided an escalation in a nuclear-tinged crisis because its ruling elite believes in nuclear taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong>, i.e., an all-out nuclear conflagration is unthinkable.<\/p>\n

North Korea<\/a> as a nuclear problem case goes beyond the fact that it possesses nuclear weapons<\/strong><\/strong>, but rather how it plans to use<\/strong> them; its strategy, speaks to an important consideration about the international community\u2019s current problem with nuclear nonproliferation, arms control<\/strong> and the taboo<\/strong><\/span><\/strong> on nuclear use<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The text of this article was generated by the Breaking The Silence<\/a> system that collected 7<\/strong> news articles posted on the web from January 2019 to September 2020 and clustered for the taboo subjects related to nuclear weapons<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Iran\u2019s strike has destroyed the taboo of \u00abthe invulnerable United States\u00bb, which happens to exist in many anti-US organizations in the region. It is sometimes assumed that the absence of nuclear war since World War II proves that nuclear weapons are not relevant for national security, will never be used in conflict, or that a taboo […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[163,149,1263],"tags":[1176,505,721,1045,484,728,639,1175,726,526,527,1178,525,1177,180,256,668,1033,1060,1179,1174,59,461,528,171,506,1173],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/517"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=517"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1373,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/517\/revisions\/1373"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amaliafoka.com\/breaking-the-silence\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}