What’s The Best Way to Avoid Nuclear War?

The following piece, written by Peter Huessy, first appeared on Warrior Maven, a Military Content Group member website.

In 1984, Ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick scorched the Democratic Party for always “blaming America first” for the problems in the world. The American people took to her charge and voted fifty states to one to re-elect President Ronald Reagan.

Five years later, the USSR collapsed, all of Eastern Europe joined the free world, and freedom appeared to be on the march. In the Americas, by 1991, every nation had a near democratic government, with the exceptions of Haiti and Cuba.

Fast forward to 2024, now forty years later, the Ambassador could now give that speech, but instead of talking just about the leftist part of the Democratic Party, she could be describing conservative members of the CATO Institute.

In a September 12 essay, Doug Bandow, a CATO Senior Fellow,  writes that the United States has to avoid and not fight future nuclear wars but that to do so, the United States has to recognize the wars that might reach its shores are being kindled by US foreign interventions. In short, America is the real bad guy in this narrative.

Most importantly, the US is guilty of pursuing “global primacy.”

In the Middle East, we gave weapons to Israel that were used for the “brutal destruction” of Gaza, and thus, in retaliation, the Houthis in Yemen attacked commercial shipping in response.

U.S. Air Force B-52H Stratofortress long-range strategic bombers flew over the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, Nov. 13. pic.twitter.com/JMMFidm4Mr

— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) November 15, 2024

The US is regularly attacked by Iranian militias in Iraq, but it is our fault for being there in the first place. The US “enables” Israeli attacks on Iran, which “triggers” retaliatory strikes. Overall, Bandow writes that the US does much to “encourage” conflict in the Middle East.

In Europe, the US has “recklessly violated” assurances to Moscow, including that NATO would not expand following the unification of Germany. Ukraine engaged in a reckless act of sabotage against the   Nord Stream pipeline, so why shouldn’t Moscow attack Ukraine? As for Russia, they were never interested in threatening Europe, even throughout the Cold War, and their interest in Ukraine is to establish a protective sphere of interest while the US is risking nuclear war to oppose.

And in the Pacific, Taiwan is an existential interest to China and being only 100 miles offshore from the mainland, is hardly of any real interest to the United States. The PRC disputes with the Philippines are only territorial and about small islands and similarly should not be of interest to the United States. The US commitment to the Philippines causes unnecessary concern in China and could lead to armed conflict.

It was one of the worst harassment experienced by BRP Datu Pagbuaya from the China Coast Guard in its two year patrol of the West Philippines Sea preventing it from approaching Scarborough Shoal or Bajo de Masinloc which is within the 200 mile EEZ of the Philippines. pic.twitter.com/unoh1gIo1F

— Raffy Tima (@raffytima) December 6, 2024

After all, the US was willing to go to war over Cuba in 1962, so we should understand why China is so concerned with Taiwan. As for North Korea, Bandow asserts that North Korea is “perpetually threatened” by the United States: and quips Bandow, every time the US flies a strategic bomber over the Korean peninsula, Kim Jong In probably adds a few nuclear bombs to his inventory.

Defending our allies with an extended deterrent in all these cases risks bringing nuclear retaliatory attacks onto the US mainland. And given the “aggressive US policy,” says Bandow, none of these nuclear-armed nations can afford to back down.

During the early years of the Cold War, the US could threaten nuclear destruction without consequence. That all changed in the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. Today, the US is the one threatening the core interests of contending great powers, including maritime control in the case of China, a buffer zone with respect to Russia, and the territorial integrity of North Korea.
Writes Bandow, all three—Russia, China, and North Korea—have no designs on the United States. They pose no threat and have no territorial disputes with the United States.

However, putting more countries under our nuclear umbrella does make the US a threat to China, Russia, and North Korea. See, defending our allies from invasion is bad form.

In reality, these three members’ axis of evil simply want the right to invade and kill their neighbors, but Bandow cleverly says that there is no reason China should be “penned” inside its territory or that Putin’s Russia should not also “influence” its neighbors, and North Korea be free to terrorize the ROK.

So, Bandow thinks it would be better for the US to simply drop its extended deterrent strategy and, avoid unnecessary war and bring its troops home. After all, he says the oceans are big and wide, and the US has friendly neighbors.

The result could, of course, be that our allies, such as Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and Ukraine, all build their own nuclear weapons and protect themselves.

Then, the US can pretend that through surrender, the world will be safer, and the United States will successfully safeguard its homeland.

As we contemplate NW Asia with China, Russia, the DPRK (North Korea), the ROK (South Korea), Japan, and Taiwan, all with nuclear arsenals.