10) There is a better way: peace through strength. Throughout the Cold War, no American in a position of serious responsibility ever considered allowing the United States to be overwhelmingly outmatched in nuclear armaments. Rather, American leaders of both parties chose to maintain at least approximate parity with the adversary at all times. This policy empirically succeeded. In spite of many intense crises and in spite of conventional inferiority, the United States kept the peace for forty-six years without surrendering a scrap of vital territory to Communist aggression. The best that the advocates of minimum deterrence can say for their policy is that it is an unproven theory. We in the opposite camp disagree: we say that minimum deterrence has been proven wrong. 

We hold that the proper objective of a retaliatory force in nuclear warfare is much the same as in any other kind of warfare: to terminate the war on the most favorable terms possible at the lowest possible cost. To this end, U.S. strategic offensive forces should be equipped to target the full range of enemy nuclear forces, general-purpose forces, and war-supporting industries. Also, adequate non-strategic nuclear forces should be reconstituted to target enemy forces in the field. We reject the concept of population-targeting (or “city-busting”) and generally advocate the destruction of the enemy war-supporting industries only in retaliation for similar actions by the enemy. 

If nuclear war is forced upon us, then the militarily optimal force is the force best suited to limit damage to our society, terminate the war on acceptable terms, and get the best possible outcome out of a bad situation. It is also the force best suited to deter a nuclear war from ever occurring in the first place, which is our highest goal. Insofar as peace is the objective of minimum deterrence, we agree on the ends: we merely contend that the proposed means have never worked. 

Ben Ollerenshaw is a journalist who writes on defense matters. Contact him at [email protected].

Image: Andrea Izzoti / Shutterstock.com.