“Deliberate nuclear use

Written By: - Date published: 10:38 am, March 9th, 2024 - 18 comments
Categories: AUKUS, gaza, Judith Collins, uncategorized, us politics - Tags:

in a war over Taiwan” is the title of an Atlantic Council paper produced last September. They mean nuclear weapons use. These are serious people; Undersecretary Bonnie Jenkins addressed them last year about AUKUS.

The Atlantic Council paper’s conclusion is specific:

The United States might also find itself in a situation where it could not defeat a Chinese invasion force from reaching Taiwan with conventional forces, but could do so with nuclear weapons. In this case, the United States should be prepared to consider first use as well.

Given that virtually every war-game pitting China against the United States and its “allies and partners” in a war over Taiwan concludes that the US team are defeated, this proposition has to be taken seriously. The Atlantic Council report has a submarine on the cover. Given that the UKUS partners have nuclear weapons available and that China is the AUKUS target, fears that this project is nuclearising the Pacific are legitimate and real.

Pillar 2 is no protection from this. Ambassador Jenkins commemorated International Women’s Day by having a girlie chat about AUKUS with Defence Minister Judith Collins on Thursday. I’ll bet they didn’t mention nuclear weapons there.

We should not have a bar of Pillar 2. Its price is too high, and too hidden.

As I noted in a previous post, Ambassador Jenkins was due to have a “conversation” with Wellingtonians at a Victoria University event yesterday. Due to a variety of challenges and objections expressed by audience members over American actions in Gaza supplying weapons to Israel, this did not happen.

So I was not able to ask Ambassador Jenkins for her comment about the Atlantic Council report advocating first use of nuclear weapons in the event of the US losing a war with China over Taiwan, but did share it and its recommendation with the remaining members of the audience.

18 comments on ““Deliberate nuclear use ”

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  1. francesca 1
    9 March 2024 at 10:58 am

    Thanks Mike .I presume it was you speaking out at that talk about the US’s possible use of first strike nuclear attack on China , with the report from the Atlantic council in your hand i

    Personally I would have preferred that Jenkins was allowed to speak so that she could take questions later.

    But it is interesting that the younger generation have developed political views beyond TikTok etc

  2. SPC 2
    9 March 2024 at 12:51 pm

    It is quite possible to be part of AUKUS Pillar 2 (likely to include all nations of Five Eyes and Japan) and oppose a security guarantee to Taiwan and or military defence of Taiwan.

    Given we already recognise that Taiwan is part of China, that it the course open to us.

    However Labour should signal to National the policy would only be bi-partisan on certain conditions – including that it not occur till after the risk of a Trump presidency is gone.

    Others could include diplomatic work to move the Korean cease-fire to a peace that involves nuclear weapon disarmament, resolve the impasse over Taiwan and have China accept that atolls in the South China Sea are not part of their territory. This to de-escalate tensions in east Asia to secure a nuclear free South Pacific.

  3. Sanctuary 3
    9 March 2024 at 6:15 pm

    The purpose of a nuclear deterrent is to convince the other guys you'll use them if required. If China thinks the United States could use nuclear weapons to protect Taiwan and that keeps the peace and keeps Taiwan free, then that is deterrence working.

  4. Belladonna 4
    9 March 2024 at 6:30 pm

    Meanwhile, Putin is making direct threats of nuclear war – over Sweden joining NATO

    "(Western nations) must realise that we also have weapons that can hit targets on their territory. All this really threatens a conflict with the use of nuclear weapons and the destruction of civilisation. Don't they get that?!" said Putin.

    https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-warns-west-risk-nuclear-war-says-moscow-can-strike-western-targets-2024-02-29/

  5. randal mcmurphy 5
    9 March 2024 at 8:40 pm

    It seems the whole world is in the grip of madmen who will stop at nothing to enforce their will. It is not as if China does not have enough human beings to rule over and boss around as it is without playing games with any other power.

  6. Ad 6
    9 March 2024 at 8:56 pm

    American Secretary of State John Foster Dulles often bragged that it was the success of American nuclear brinkmanship that had finally brought the Chinese and Korean communists to a negotiated settlement in July 1953.

    The fact is the American and allied troops were exceedingly lucky not to have been entirely wiped out.

    The Russian President Putin has made multiple threats in the last two years to use nuclear weapons against the Ukrainians, on their own soil.

    As with most current military analysis, Ukraine is the test bed of military preparedness for the highly possible Taiwan war.

    So let's go deep and follow the likely scenarios.

    We know with quite a high degree of certainty what NATO told Russia what they would do if Russia really did used nuclear weapons there.

    Back in 2022 there were reportedly at least two instances where Russia was close to using a nuclear weapon in Ukraine: once around March/April, and once again around September. Both times coincided with increased Russian narrative – official, state propaganda and online trolls – about the threat of nuclear weapons/war.

    On the first occurrence, USA reportedly cut a deal with China– the US prohibited Poland from transferring fighter jets to Ukraine, and China sent strong message to Russia through its back channels.

    During the September 2022 occurrence the likelihood of using a nuclear weapon was seemingly much higher. Around that time Washington and NATO were sending strong signals to Russia, Jake Sullivan was engaged with Russian officials, and Kremlin was reportedly given a list of actions that NATO would take (unfortunately I can't find links to this now). Those actions allegedly included NATO striking Russian forces in Ukraine and its Black Sea Fleet. David Petraeus, who is a retired but still well connected general, suggested in multiple interviews that those were indeed actions that NATO would take.

    And then it ratchets upwards. Russia doesn't take the warning and sends a hypersonic and explodes a nuclear bomb straight into Kiev.

    Then (depending on who is President and who is Chairing NATO) NATO responds with a similar device but does so to an agricultural area well outside a major population area.

    That says to Russia that no one is blinking. And they are prepared to use what they have.

    Then there is a set of phone calls to make between Putin and the next US President.

    Just because it's "unthinkable to us", it's clearly thinkable to many others.

    We can't flinch from the evil of either Putin or Xi.

  7. randal mcmurphy 7
    10 March 2024 at 9:25 am

    anybody that uses "THE BOMB" first has in my opinion a death wish and/or is not fully compos mentis.

  8. Michael who failed Civics 8
    10 March 2024 at 3:27 pm

    Mr Smith seems to have an animus against the United States and everything it does or doesn't do. I believe he may have held communist sympathies at one time. Perhaps he still does?

    • JeremyB 8.1
      12 March 2024 at 4:14 pm

      "communist sympathies"
      How are you finding this future world, time-traveller from the 1950's?

  9. Mike Smith 9
    10 March 2024 at 9:40 pm

    I have many American friends who like me believe in cooperation rather than competition and peace rather than war, and who oppose anyone or any institution that advocates deliberate first use of nuclear weapons.