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In the last of the week’s COMMENTARY podcasts, Abe Greenwald and Noah Rothman (John Podhoretz returns on Monday) explore the rising radicalization of the liberal left and the Democratic Party’s efforts to rein in its more self-destructive impulses. Also, North Korea’s provocative missile launch leads to increasing resignation to the nuclearization of Japan, but few have considered the pitfalls associated with widespread proliferation.
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I assume this is a misdated reposting of Thursday’s show.
I commend Noah and Abe for addressing the worst case scenario resulting from a multi-polar world (resulting, in turn, from abdication of American leadership) and for addressing the follow-up question, namely: “Why aren’t other commentators addressing this same question?” Besides the answer Noah gave (“It’s complicated”) I suggest another: complacency. It is all too easy for key advisory of the titular leaders of the great powers to assure themselves that they are too sophisticated to allow a breakdown of the system of international security like that of summer 1914. I dare say the advisors of the titular leaders of the great powers in the generation prior to 1914 assured themselves that they were too sophisticated to allow another outbreak of anything as bad as what we now call the Napoleonic wars. A century without a catastrophic war begets that kind of complacency and that is exactly what we should fear most now that 72 years have elapsed since V-J Day.
Does anyone else keep getting the problem of the podcast playing for a few seconds and then stopping?
Our strategy on nuclear proliferation seems to be to permit our enemies to arm themselves but keep our friends disarmed. The result is strategic imbalances in various corners of the world.
If Ukraine had kept its nuclear deterrent, for example, it’s very likely that Russia would never have occupied Crimea or invaded eastern Ukraine, and would be much less of a threat to the world.
We could probably have stopped the North Korean nuclear program in its tracks if we had threatened to arm South Korea (with a better weapons) in retaliation.
China’s adventurism in Asia might have been discouraged if, decades ago, we had permitted Taiwan to respond to China going nuclear by developing a nuclear deterrent of its own. Instead, we almost guaranteed that Taiwan will eventually lose its freedom.
Nuclear proliferation control ideology resembles gun control ideology. They both fetishize the number of weapons or the number of weapon holders without regard to who they are. During the LA riots, you may recall, Korean shop owners successfully deterred looters with firearms — until the shop owners were disarmed by the LAPD, and the looters came back.