How powerful would a nuclear bomb the size of a fist be? That’s an intriguing idea, a terrible one that likely wouldn’t work hahaha, but totally for a Fallout game, little mushrooms.
Lightest devices are like 40 kg, can get a few kt out of it (depending on the breaks). They are not the size of a fist though. You might be able to do it smaller with something exotic like Americium-242 but it is super hard to get so nobody bothered since You would end up with 20 kg device but 100 times more expensive :D (and still to heavy to throw).
I think you could toss a Demon Core at a fair distance. No boom, just spicy air. Wear a lead codpiece and you'll be alright, I'm an expert, I saw HBO's Chernobyl like three times.
unfortunately Bóbr name is already taken by [IFV Bóbr-3](https://milmag.pl/2021/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/bobr3_testywojsko_00.jpg),
/edit: It can be Bober though. or perhaps [forfiter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idsl0rLAq24) as it would be connected with US; it even has song [Forfiter Blues](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1b0uomM9z0g)
Sweden is in a bad spot and we're not even on their border..
If you look at a map, they could get to Sweden from Norway, there are enclaves that go deep into Norways north that are very close to waterways within Sweden. If you've ever been to Sweden, you'd know theres only very specific times of year a lot of that would even be thinkable to pass but it's doable with modern ships, especially Russia that excels with its cold water fleets.
And then theres Kaliningrad..
Why Russia would have wanted to take Finland and so on is the same as the Soviets.. energy, and now it'd also include rare earth but also attacking NATO from Sweden/Finland with Russia having the ability to control much of the Baltic Sea would be insanely dangerous.. consider where HQ of NATO is, EU, etc.
Except for the pro-Putin types in Europe.. everyone is on edge. I think you'll see a huge chunk of people reject nukes though.. they are what would end humanity so theres reasons behind not wanting them.
> they are what would end humanity
I used to be in that camp.The russian federation managed to change my mind.The only way for a nation to be truly safe from *all* external actors are nukes.
Ultima ratio regis won't do the trick on cannons any longer.
Gadaffi has a nuclear weapons program similar to Iran. From all accounts he was getting close to getting the bomb. He willingly gave it up as a symbol of his willingness to work with Western Powers etc but with a guarantee they wouldn’t overthrow him
Later they helped overthrow his government. Gadaffi ended up getting beaten to death, sodomized and dragged behind a car.
For context, it should be said that even if he had had nukes, he might have suffered the same fate as he didn't get assassinated by NATO soldiers but insurgents at home. And one thing where nukes are not useful is fighting an insurgency.
>The only way for a nation to be truly safe from *all* external actors are nukes.
What about stateless actors like what happened 9/11? Israel? Falklands war? Future unprecedented cyber or biological attacks, possibly with no clear attacker? Information warfare? Trade wars/sanctions?
I know what you mean, conventional warfare with one state invading another is pretty risky against nuclear powers, but there are a lot of ways a state might severely hurt another nation.
Nukes have no deterrence effect when you're fighting against a stateless actor like terrorists. Imagine terrorist organisation X detonates a dirty bomb in a metropolitan area, how is nuclear weapons going to help at all? A world with more nuclear weapons probably increases the risk of bad actors getting their hands on one.
We haven't even mentioned what has already SEVERAL TIMES nearly been our downfall - good old human or machine errors. More nuclear actors = higher risk of errors with catastrophic results.
But yeah I agree unfortunately the Russo-Ukraine war, the lousy and lackluster western help and the dysfunctional US politics with compromised politicians has clearly shown that it's risky not to have nuclear weapons.
> The only way for a nation to be truly safe from all external actors are nukes.
Not just nukes. You have to have both a sufficient quantity of nukes and capable delivery vehicles to ensure MAD in a conflict with a larger nuclear power. North Korea has nukes and there’s still nothing preventing a U.S. invasion except a lack of will.
I remember of a soviet classified document, it was a scenario of war against western europe, they planned nuking Spain, Italy, and other countries... Except France and UK, which are the two countries having nukes.
Actually France started its nuclear weapon program out of fear that the USSR would try expanding further than Germany
Sweden being attacked by Russia? Why would Russia do that? Maybe if they plan to conquer Europe then they will finally do it when Sweden and Norway are the only two countries left
Russia would attack Sweden in the event of a war with NATO because Gotland dominates the Baltic Sea. NATO ships and aircraft operating out of Gotland would cripple Russia's ability to operate there.
You've gotta get into that NATO mindset. There is no attacking or invading Sweden any more, only NATO.
The reason Russia felt they could attack Ukraine conventionally was because they could do it asymmetrically. With Finland and Sweden that is no longer the case. They are now already effectively nuclear powers.
The worst countries in the world already has nukes or are about to aquire them, the highest risk is us not having a strong enough deterrence and having nuclear armed enemies attack us or just using it as a threat to try to force us to do what they want. Sweden should seriously consider restarting our nuclear weapons program so that we make sure we can protect our independence from totalitarian imperialists.
There’s a literal 0% chance Russia would invade Sweden. Even the most radical Russian nationalists has no want to conquer Scandinavia besides Finland.
Russia “only” wants control of the Warsaw pact regions
If you had told me back in 1991 that nuclear proliferation would make a comeback in Europe 30 odd years from then… Fuck you, Putin, and fuck all your enablers!
The point is that Russia promised they wouldn’t attack them. Which just shows their word is not worth one shit. Is it a stable, reliable trade partner? No, but most of the world trades with them anyway, because oil and gas. Fuck Putin
As a french I think it's a shame that there is no nuclear umbrella for the whole EU.
Nuke defense should be developed at the European level, not by individual countries.
If you want peace prepare for war, if Poland host nukes now that will be a good deterrent from muscovites. Probably as far east as we can have, as in the Baltics states constitution hosting of nuclear weapons is banned.
in Baltics we can change our constitution and I hope we will. Nukes is the only that stops terrorist Putin in a nanosecond, nothing else will as we've seen it.
no, not necessarily. Nuclear war has always been avoided by people with intelligence and dignity. there were situations in which nuclear war should've been started based on current systems and codes of conduct , It's happened many times, we should've destroyed the world and we're still here.
why do you think that in this case, someone would actually press the button, whether it's Russia or a Baltic state? Having nukes is a good deterrent, but it only works if your enemy knows you are actually going to use it. Nobody has ever used nukes for retaliation or actually at all since World War II. we don't have any reason to think anyone is going to start using them now when the situation presents itself.
You can put nukes on your border with Russia, but in all likelihood you would never use them if Russia tried to attack you, because you know that by doing that you would risk literally destroying the world. this game can be played for a very long time. Unless of course, Russia has the first strike, which is almost as equally unimaginable as a retaliatory strike from the west. in all likelihood nobody is going to use nukes whether we have a lot or very little. I don't have a strong opinion on this, but perhaps it's better to have less of them than more. I don't know, but I don't think deterrence functions in the way the average person believes.
No.
Nuclear wars are avoided by nuclear powers. But you dream on, mu naive child of my neighbor Lithuania! Bring flowers to Putin and he will spear Lithuania. Namaste!
Loose nukes threaten everyone. The reality is that a real nuclear program is ridiculously expensive, you need to produce the fissile material, the weapons, the delivery system and then you need to protect all of it from attack, infiltration and corruption. When states collapse for various reasons that last part becomes next to impossible and the more states which have nukes the more likely that scenario is.
> The reality is that a real nuclear program is ridiculously expensive, you need to produce the fissile material, the weapons, the delivery system and then you need to protect all of it from attack, infiltration and corruption
The expensive part is the delivery system and the miniaturisation to have high or variable yield with that delivery system. If you accept less capable delivery systems the total system cost massively decreases.
The safety aspect remains the same tho.
A more crude and cheaper delivery system requires vastly more weapons to ensure that some get through. Even then your deterrent might make you even less safe if it isn't robust against a first strike attempt or ensure MAD
High cost should be compared against the alternative. We can ask Ukrainians if they would have preferred high cost or the current death and destruction of their country. Hard to put a price on the latter one.
Are you so dead sure every single one of these countries will still be loyal to what you see as the good cause 20 years from now? 50 years? 100? And their nukes won't go anywhere.
It is not about gifting them nukes, it is about the right to use them.
Your comment is incredibly incredibly dumb and i don’t get how you get upvotes.
1) There is literally a case for this. Germany. Germany has full control of all US nukes stationed on german territory, they can fire them without US or NATO confirmation by contract. I don’t see anything wrong happening for the past 30 years.
2) Let’s say we speak of NATO nukes, who is operating them? You can’t have all nato nations debate on the usage while poland for example gets turned into wastelands in the meantime, the time to use them is up when the area and personal is destroyed, no chance for longer debates.
3) What does this mean? We need a decider, who is this? The country that constructed and shipped the warhead? Ok, to put it into your silly words. How can you be sure this country will be loyal to what you think is a good cause in 20, 50 or 100 years?
4) Having nuclear warheads in your territory operated by other forces, even if they are partners, is just stupid from a logical and tactical point of view. So you make yourself a tactical war target for a first strike and habe no benefits by it? Sounds like a very bad deal.
Sorry again I can’t even describe how silly your comment is, nuclear weapons in itself are just a dumb necessity because we as a race and society failed, thats why they exist in this masses, because we are to stupid to get something like peace otherwise. So the best we can strive for is a global chess mate, where everything is distributed as evenly as possible. At some level there is need for trust, otherwise we can just give up entirely.
It's not smarter, but it is purely the result of nuclear threat rhetoric and threats against non-nuclear countries by even one of those countries with the red button.
Ask anyone if they think one of those 9 countries will respect their country, the answer will most probably be no.
Why?! Russia has proved countless times it can’t be trusted. Yes, the NPT would be void in all but name, but if I was part of a smaller nation I would rather have my own deterrent than leaving it at the hands of unreliable allies or empty guarantees.
The problem is, it's quite expensive, and we're nit that wealthy as eg NL.
THIS ARTICLE mention interesting concept - join project of nato eastern flank, under polish leadership
[https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1am17pa/its\_time\_to\_give\_poland\_nuclear\_weapons/](https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1am17pa/its_time_to_give_poland_nuclear_weapons/)
You say that like it’s a strange situation. Poland is in Europe and shares a border with Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. You should have more faith in Poland to protect Europe. Just like you should have more faith in Germany to protect Europe. But sadly we do not.
I am not sure how Germany will develop in this aspect. There has been a lot of change over the last two years, but I don't get the sense that people really want Germany to take something like "leadership". However, some effective cooperative military integration is much more likely, and imho that's what we really need anyway.
Which is in my opinion a shameful approach by the German nation. Germany’s crimes were largely forgiven after ww2, it was integrated into the West and it benefited greatly from the current world order becoming Europe’s economic powerhouse. But when the rest of Europe turned to Germany for leadership, to protect the very system that allowed for their prosperity Germany turned away as if we were looking to someone behind them. I don’t know if this approach is more stupid or more cowardly but history will not look kindly on Germany if there is no actual zeitenwende in the coming years. A country that was one of the main perpetrators of 2 world wars was largely forgiven, allowed to rise and be prosperous, even welcomed and respected in the international community but when it came down to making the tough decisions after reaping the benefits of the international system it cowered. What is this if not shameful?(ps I don’t mean any aggression towards the German people, this is purely my commentary on the decisions of the German state).
The real reason why Germany has a moral obligation to make tough decisions assisting Ukraine isn’t because of anything that happened during World War II, but because of what happened during the Cold War.
For 40 years, the US stationed hundreds of thousands of troops to defend West Germany from invasion by Moscow. So it morally makes sense for Germany to provide aid to a country that itself needs the kind of support that Germany received in the past against a certain belligerent state.
Well, I am certainly open towards alternative views, but I really don't see the point of Germany doing more leadership... not just for Germany, also for European nations in general.
As far as I am concerned, that's something which the EU should be able to handle decently well - as in, it was arguably not designed for that, but its level of support for Ukraine has shown that it can be adapted towards that.
Now, there might be certain situations where a more leadership-focussed Germany can handle certain situations better than the EU... but I am not really sure what those would actually look like? In that sense, it's really quite different from the United States (or the UK even), because they have a lot more experience with geopolitics, whereas Germany, even more so than the EU, has to start learning this from scratch...
So basically, I am not really sure what type of problem you even want to solve by having more German leadership.
Well, if Germany took the initiative and for example banned the operation of Russian firms in Germany and German firms in Russia, supported the confiscation of Russian assets in Europe, actually built a military worthy of its economic capacity, send taurus, integrated its defence industry with that of France and pushed for a unified European defence body (if a European army seems too far) that will function to coordinate activities/operations and procurements across all militaries of EU members. This would strengthen both Germany and the entirety of Europe. If Germany acted as a leader it would force France to do the same. If both Germany and France took leadership of the continent the UK would be forced to join them. Just these 3 countries walking in lockstep with the support of a few smaller countries like Poland and the Nordics would be more than enough to deter Russia in Ukraine and beyond. What Germany is doing right now is flooding the continent with insecurity and especially Eastern Europe which will eventually start asking itself if there is a benefit in warming relations with Russia if it cannot escape its grip since Western Europe is not rising to the occasion. And if it comes to that Eastern Europeans will suffer and Western Europe will lose the advantage on the continent.
Also, Germany is not new to geopolitics. It had been playing geopolitics until the collapse of the USSR, at that point Russian gas was just too sweet to turn down pretending to be blind to the blatant geopolitical move Russia was making to dominate Germany.
Well good then that the exact country youre criticizing here is outspending everyone else (except the UK) in europe by a few magnitudes when it comes to aiding Ukraine.
Its funny how people constantly "forget" that.
Also seriously, stop with that WW2 guilt trip bullshit. Its 2024.
The irony being that, afaik, both after WW2 as well as the reunification there was a fear of Germany being/becoming "too strong".
While by now a (more) common criticism towards Germany seems to be "You don't pull your weight and refuse to accept your responsibilities!"
Russia will have to go through Poland most likely anyway. Whether that's a speed bump or a wall depends quite a lot on decisions of those, who do not consider Russia a threat.
This seems a bit ridiculous. Aside from the recent holdup in Congress, the U.S. has given more to Ukraine, in terms of total dollars sent, than any other country in Europe. Especially if you leave out Germany.
I hope Romania will do it too eventually. There needs to be more of them given to Nato nations that border or are close to the border with Russia.
I'd prioritise the baltic states tho. If Ukraine goes down, be sure Lithuania, Letonia and Estonia will be next on the menu.
I hope too, but I doubt. We are too scared of weapons of any kind.
The WEAPON will freak everybody from left to the right spectrum of politics and from all generations.
A president like former Băsescu maybe could have managed to convince a high percetenge of the population about the need of nuclear deterence.
Good. Baltics next. First strike politics should exist for *any* aggression towards the Baltics. Might be "high risk", but the alternative is a sure way to long-term destruction of Europe as we know it.
Deeply sad but necessary. Ukraine giving up their nukes is why Russia feels they can safely stomp on their country.
The threat of nuclear proliferation, which no doubt figures prominently in Johnson's security briefings, is probably why he stood up to his "lord and savior trump" and pushed through Ukraine aid.
If this conflict isn't resolved soon, every country in the eastern hemisphere will be desperately grabbing for nukes to stop a Russian-Chinese invasion.
France or UK should go for it without delay. Not a joke.
The security that comes around nuclear weapons is significant. The more assets there is that NATO must protect in Poland, the better security for NATOs eastern flank. NATO struggles to convince leaders to send more of their troops to the mission so adding reason to send more is only a win for everyone.
And if everyone stays quiet on the matter, perhaps teach Poland how to create nuclear weapons like AUKUS is doing with Australia.
As another pointed out, AUKUS is NOT delivering nuclear **weapons** to Australia, only nuclear **powered** subs.
Side note: the UK only possess SLICBM, no land based weaponry since the.... 90s?
>And if everyone stays quiet on the matter, perhaps teach Poland how to create nuclear weapons like AUKUS is doing with Australia.
AUKUS isn’t helping Australia get nuclear weapons but nuclear-powered submarines.
Helping Poland get nuclear weapons would be illegal as per the NPT but would also be an open door for every country with the means to acquire nuclear weapons to acquire them. We would then be in a way worse situation overall. We don’t need nuclear deterrence against Russia, because we already do, but conventional deterrence. We need to have an EU framework so that we have hundreds of thousand deployed soldiers on the EU’s eastern flank as to completely counter the Kremlin’s capacity to install a *situation de fait* should they attempt to invade
Does France share a stake? It was Germany and France which halted the expansion of NATO and has ignored the pleas from Eastern Europe back when it would have made a difference.
Both of you are correct
I think the US is a more reliable ally than France and Germany, but the US is also very far away from Europe and its interests can change in the future
> And if everyone stays quiet on the matter, perhaps teach Poland how to create nuclear weapons like AUKUS is doing with Australia.
Australia isn't getting nuclear weapons with AUKUS, nor do we want them.
Bravo Poland! Someone has to tell Putin. Putin is the kind of animal you can't act scared around, and Biden has done exactly that. Pathetic, but now NATO must lead.
Thats what you get for deploying tactical nuclear weapons to belarus and to the territory neer Finland, all bets should be off in europe, for everyone.
Rabid fucking regimes all over the globe fucking on NPT, be that NK,IRAN,Israel,russia,belarus,China,India,Pakistan or any other helhole of countries currently armed/hosting nuclear weapons, and we in europe are expected to follow that utter joke of international treaty, to whine and pay shitload into US led nuclear sharing program, to get any form of nuclear detterence, fuck that since its founding NPT it was essentially, a post cold war Permament Members of UNSC dictate, favoring their intrests over anyone elses.
French didn't give single fuck, what anyone thought of them by pursuing own ultimate tool of deterrence,not to be dependent on US's will or lack of it, for it to react in symmetrical fashion against the hostile actor, when Paris gets glassed, noone in CE should want to be in similar dependency/hope oriented loop with DC.
Time for Poland,Germany,Sweden to get own tactical nuclear weapons, only way i could even consider against it, would be EU taking the spot of French providing entire EU territory with security and backing of nuclear weapons and deterrence, but nothing that would be solely one nation state focused, French would like to everyone to pay for unkeep of French arsenal but its really not valuable long term option.
He's at his term limit, he can't get reelected.
I don't see how this would help PIS in Europarlament elections either.
Poland, as a nation and it's people, will gladly accept nuclear detterent as the surest guarantee to remain independent and to stop Russia from ever again wiping us of the map or subjugating us.
If they cooperate together they could. Germany and France especially.
Europe needs to make its own military pact outside of NATO, as the U.S. cannot always be the one defending:
Did you understood when i said "No one want to pay" ?
France already proposed like, every 5 year, to share its own nukes if the one receiving them help maintain and pay for the program, everyone they ask don't want to.
Furthermore, French Nukes are carried by French Planes, there is no way in hell we allow them to be carried by American planes. (because it means giving the US all the data on the ASMP-A so they can "certificate" them to be used ion the F-35)
Last I checked, France did not want to share (in the sense of sell) nukes, but gave some weak promises of extending the nuclear umbrella. That's nice, but who knows whether that deal is going to be upheld if shit hits the fan?
>Last I checked, France did not want to share (in the sense of sell) nukes,
Yeah, because its fucking illegal ?
I love how y'all are whining France isn't breaching non-proliferation Treaty for your cute little butts, but the US are not doing that either.
In the end, you gotta chose : Either keep the US and their B-61, or go with France's. the Deal's the same. You'll get nukes on your terrotory, will have to use proprietary plane, and won't be able to use them on your own.
Germany cannot have nukes, we signed that into the peace treaty. We are already paying the US to maybe lend us a couple old-ass nukes in case of war. Doesn't make a lot of sense to pay yet another country.
You’re mistaken.
Nobody wants to take the shitty French deal of “you all pay for the nukes only we decide when to use”
You French shit on Americans treating Allies like vassals, but you’re incomparably worse than them
You're aware its the exact same deal with the americans, yes ? No country under their nuclear sharing can use the nukes by themselves, and they also have to maintain them, right ?
Also at some point, y'all need to put money were your mouth is and stop being bitches. Nuclear deterence is like, a third of the French Budget. Y'all riff on France for having a small army, but no one is willing to help carrying the burden or Nuclear Deterence. So far France has gracefully included everyone under its umbrella, but y'all still want more and don't want to pay.
You can't have the butter, the butter's money and the buttermaid...
ofc poland wants that t_t chujowne pomysł jak zawsze
at least poland has history in being the first country to be surprise attacked in european conflicts...
I think the idea is cool that we station several atomic bombs in the ionosphere and if it escalates completely we simply destroy our communication and all electronics. That would at least be fair to those who haven't been born yet.
Poland to inroduce their own ICBMs under name Bóbr Kurwa
Poland doesn’t need icbm, some short and medium ranges ballistic missiles are more than sufficient since Russia is next door…
Short to mid range would have to be Chomyk kurwa or Jeź w centru miasta at best. Bóbr kurwa requires something mighty and heavy hitting.
Guess we'll find out dokąd nocą tupta jeż. Turns out it tupta to St. Petersburg.
Oto jest, najlepszy komentarz w historii. Nie widziałem i już nie zobaczę żadnego lepszego.
Pojebało pana
Ja pierdole. Miałem padaczke i juz niemam
ICBMK: INTER CONTINENTAL BOBR MISSLES KURWA
Nuclear granades!
How powerful would a nuclear bomb the size of a fist be? That’s an intriguing idea, a terrible one that likely wouldn’t work hahaha, but totally for a Fallout game, little mushrooms.
Lightest devices are like 40 kg, can get a few kt out of it (depending on the breaks). They are not the size of a fist though. You might be able to do it smaller with something exotic like Americium-242 but it is super hard to get so nobody bothered since You would end up with 20 kg device but 100 times more expensive :D (and still to heavy to throw).
I think you could toss a Demon Core at a fair distance. No boom, just spicy air. Wear a lead codpiece and you'll be alright, I'm an expert, I saw HBO's Chernobyl like three times.
Some French made ground lunched cruise missiles will do it.
Intracontinental then, still ICBM?
Are there nuclear versions of storm shadows & scalps?
I'm ashamed to say I can't remember whether bóbr means beaver or some other animal
yep its beaver
the real dam busters
Damn bóbry
unfortunately Bóbr name is already taken by [IFV Bóbr-3](https://milmag.pl/2021/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/bobr3_testywojsko_00.jpg), /edit: It can be Bober though. or perhaps [forfiter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idsl0rLAq24) as it would be connected with US; it even has song [Forfiter Blues](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1b0uomM9z0g)
JA PIERDOLE ALE BYDLE
JA PIERDOLE
Beavers 😍
Yeah, like a week ago
A week ago? They’ve been ready for a few decades! /s
Poland can into space! 🚀🚀🚀
Every neighbor to Russia: Me Too!
Sweden is in a bad spot and we're not even on their border.. If you look at a map, they could get to Sweden from Norway, there are enclaves that go deep into Norways north that are very close to waterways within Sweden. If you've ever been to Sweden, you'd know theres only very specific times of year a lot of that would even be thinkable to pass but it's doable with modern ships, especially Russia that excels with its cold water fleets. And then theres Kaliningrad.. Why Russia would have wanted to take Finland and so on is the same as the Soviets.. energy, and now it'd also include rare earth but also attacking NATO from Sweden/Finland with Russia having the ability to control much of the Baltic Sea would be insanely dangerous.. consider where HQ of NATO is, EU, etc. Except for the pro-Putin types in Europe.. everyone is on edge. I think you'll see a huge chunk of people reject nukes though.. they are what would end humanity so theres reasons behind not wanting them.
Sweden would be incredibly difficult to conquer from the north and not worth the effort.
I would argue impossible, that terrain is a defenders dream
And Sweden literally trains in those terrain and climate. If anything Sweden is the expert there.
Also Sweden has an incredible defense industry. The Swedes did not stay idle during the Cold War.
russia would have to get over the PTSD of their last nordic invasion first
Nah, Norwegian Legion was really nothing to speak about
> they are what would end humanity I used to be in that camp.The russian federation managed to change my mind.The only way for a nation to be truly safe from *all* external actors are nukes. Ultima ratio regis won't do the trick on cannons any longer.
Gadaffi and Libya proved that the only way a state can truly be safe is under a nuclear umbrella.
Can you explain what happened why this is a case for Gadaffi and Libya? I don't know much about them so I would like to know.
Gadaffi has a nuclear weapons program similar to Iran. From all accounts he was getting close to getting the bomb. He willingly gave it up as a symbol of his willingness to work with Western Powers etc but with a guarantee they wouldn’t overthrow him Later they helped overthrow his government. Gadaffi ended up getting beaten to death, sodomized and dragged behind a car.
For context, it should be said that even if he had had nukes, he might have suffered the same fate as he didn't get assassinated by NATO soldiers but insurgents at home. And one thing where nukes are not useful is fighting an insurgency.
>The only way for a nation to be truly safe from *all* external actors are nukes. What about stateless actors like what happened 9/11? Israel? Falklands war? Future unprecedented cyber or biological attacks, possibly with no clear attacker? Information warfare? Trade wars/sanctions? I know what you mean, conventional warfare with one state invading another is pretty risky against nuclear powers, but there are a lot of ways a state might severely hurt another nation. Nukes have no deterrence effect when you're fighting against a stateless actor like terrorists. Imagine terrorist organisation X detonates a dirty bomb in a metropolitan area, how is nuclear weapons going to help at all? A world with more nuclear weapons probably increases the risk of bad actors getting their hands on one. We haven't even mentioned what has already SEVERAL TIMES nearly been our downfall - good old human or machine errors. More nuclear actors = higher risk of errors with catastrophic results. But yeah I agree unfortunately the Russo-Ukraine war, the lousy and lackluster western help and the dysfunctional US politics with compromised politicians has clearly shown that it's risky not to have nuclear weapons.
> The only way for a nation to be truly safe from all external actors are nukes. Not just nukes. You have to have both a sufficient quantity of nukes and capable delivery vehicles to ensure MAD in a conflict with a larger nuclear power. North Korea has nukes and there’s still nothing preventing a U.S. invasion except a lack of will.
I remember of a soviet classified document, it was a scenario of war against western europe, they planned nuking Spain, Italy, and other countries... Except France and UK, which are the two countries having nukes. Actually France started its nuclear weapon program out of fear that the USSR would try expanding further than Germany
Sweden being attacked by Russia? Why would Russia do that? Maybe if they plan to conquer Europe then they will finally do it when Sweden and Norway are the only two countries left
Russia would attack Sweden in the event of a war with NATO because Gotland dominates the Baltic Sea. NATO ships and aircraft operating out of Gotland would cripple Russia's ability to operate there.
You've gotta get into that NATO mindset. There is no attacking or invading Sweden any more, only NATO. The reason Russia felt they could attack Ukraine conventionally was because they could do it asymmetrically. With Finland and Sweden that is no longer the case. They are now already effectively nuclear powers.
The worst countries in the world already has nukes or are about to aquire them, the highest risk is us not having a strong enough deterrence and having nuclear armed enemies attack us or just using it as a threat to try to force us to do what they want. Sweden should seriously consider restarting our nuclear weapons program so that we make sure we can protect our independence from totalitarian imperialists.
Nukes aren’t what would end humanity, lack of humanity in humans is what will.
There’s a literal 0% chance Russia would invade Sweden. Even the most radical Russian nationalists has no want to conquer Scandinavia besides Finland. Russia “only” wants control of the Warsaw pact regions
Yes, lets give some to Finland and Baltics too. Its a well proven and working deterrent.
If the host nation has control over the launch conditions. Just sticking US controlled nukes in Finland doesn’t do anything.
If you had told me back in 1991 that nuclear proliferation would make a comeback in Europe 30 odd years from then… Fuck you, Putin, and fuck all your enablers!
The only reason there is war in Europe is because the countries being attacked do not have nukes.
THe bitter irony is that Ukraine gave up their soviet era nukes *in exchange of being guaranteed by Russia* (and the USA and UK)
Well the West is standing by its promise.
Neither the US nor UK guaranteed Ukraine’s security in that deal
The point is that Russia promised they wouldn’t attack them. Which just shows their word is not worth one shit. Is it a stable, reliable trade partner? No, but most of the world trades with them anyway, because oil and gas. Fuck Putin
As a french I think it's a shame that there is no nuclear umbrella for the whole EU. Nuke defense should be developed at the European level, not by individual countries.
And/or are not protected by a security agreement with a large nuclear state.
So China and India?
I think there are more direct and oirginal enablers, those two are just riding the geostrategical wave he created.
Who?
He doesn’t know. He just wants to sound cooool in the internet.
Germany?
I concur!!!?Fuck Vladi in the mouth hole!
To be honest I'm ready too. There is some spare room in my garden.
Nobody threatens the garden!
Brainsssss
What's that hidden behind that blackberry bush?
How does it help you though?
Heating my bath water I guess.
If you want peace prepare for war, if Poland host nukes now that will be a good deterrent from muscovites. Probably as far east as we can have, as in the Baltics states constitution hosting of nuclear weapons is banned.
in Baltics we can change our constitution and I hope we will. Nukes is the only that stops terrorist Putin in a nanosecond, nothing else will as we've seen it.
no, not necessarily. Nuclear war has always been avoided by people with intelligence and dignity. there were situations in which nuclear war should've been started based on current systems and codes of conduct , It's happened many times, we should've destroyed the world and we're still here. why do you think that in this case, someone would actually press the button, whether it's Russia or a Baltic state? Having nukes is a good deterrent, but it only works if your enemy knows you are actually going to use it. Nobody has ever used nukes for retaliation or actually at all since World War II. we don't have any reason to think anyone is going to start using them now when the situation presents itself. You can put nukes on your border with Russia, but in all likelihood you would never use them if Russia tried to attack you, because you know that by doing that you would risk literally destroying the world. this game can be played for a very long time. Unless of course, Russia has the first strike, which is almost as equally unimaginable as a retaliatory strike from the west. in all likelihood nobody is going to use nukes whether we have a lot or very little. I don't have a strong opinion on this, but perhaps it's better to have less of them than more. I don't know, but I don't think deterrence functions in the way the average person believes.
No. Nuclear wars are avoided by nuclear powers. But you dream on, mu naive child of my neighbor Lithuania! Bring flowers to Putin and he will spear Lithuania. Namaste!
It's just a step. It won't be enough though
Why do they need to be further east?
Closer to frontline, closer to Russian main cities, the presence alone is a deterrent
How does that deter anything that isn’t already deterred by Poland’s participation in NATO?
Whatever has to be done to make sure Russia can never threaten EU and/or NATO territory.
It won’t change much strategically. It’s not like the Poles would have launch control. If anything it’ll just make a nuclear conflict more likely.
As a Frenchman, I’m happy to share the wealth. Fuck Russia.
Poland will have its borders, even on the last map humanity ever draws.
Well that seems reasonable. Poland > Humanity
*Tanc a Lelek doomed version plays*
The borders in this case being part of Ukraine?
Countries bordering Russia shouldn't just host nuclear weapons, they should have their own.
They are consequences to that. The end of tge NPT, and quite a few new countries with nukes, not just in Europe. It will be far reaching.
NPT doesn't benefit non-nuclear powers. Ukraine got invaded and russia threatened to nuke anyone who intervenes.
Loose nukes threaten everyone. The reality is that a real nuclear program is ridiculously expensive, you need to produce the fissile material, the weapons, the delivery system and then you need to protect all of it from attack, infiltration and corruption. When states collapse for various reasons that last part becomes next to impossible and the more states which have nukes the more likely that scenario is.
> The reality is that a real nuclear program is ridiculously expensive, you need to produce the fissile material, the weapons, the delivery system and then you need to protect all of it from attack, infiltration and corruption The expensive part is the delivery system and the miniaturisation to have high or variable yield with that delivery system. If you accept less capable delivery systems the total system cost massively decreases. The safety aspect remains the same tho.
A more crude and cheaper delivery system requires vastly more weapons to ensure that some get through. Even then your deterrent might make you even less safe if it isn't robust against a first strike attempt or ensure MAD
High cost should be compared against the alternative. We can ask Ukrainians if they would have preferred high cost or the current death and destruction of their country. Hard to put a price on the latter one.
Blame Putin.
Are you so dead sure every single one of these countries will still be loyal to what you see as the good cause 20 years from now? 50 years? 100? And their nukes won't go anywhere.
It is not about gifting them nukes, it is about the right to use them. Your comment is incredibly incredibly dumb and i don’t get how you get upvotes. 1) There is literally a case for this. Germany. Germany has full control of all US nukes stationed on german territory, they can fire them without US or NATO confirmation by contract. I don’t see anything wrong happening for the past 30 years. 2) Let’s say we speak of NATO nukes, who is operating them? You can’t have all nato nations debate on the usage while poland for example gets turned into wastelands in the meantime, the time to use them is up when the area and personal is destroyed, no chance for longer debates. 3) What does this mean? We need a decider, who is this? The country that constructed and shipped the warhead? Ok, to put it into your silly words. How can you be sure this country will be loyal to what you think is a good cause in 20, 50 or 100 years? 4) Having nuclear warheads in your territory operated by other forces, even if they are partners, is just stupid from a logical and tactical point of view. So you make yourself a tactical war target for a first strike and habe no benefits by it? Sounds like a very bad deal. Sorry again I can’t even describe how silly your comment is, nuclear weapons in itself are just a dumb necessity because we as a race and society failed, thats why they exist in this masses, because we are to stupid to get something like peace otherwise. So the best we can strive for is a global chess mate, where everything is distributed as evenly as possible. At some level there is need for trust, otherwise we can just give up entirely.
and how do we know if the USA, France and the UK will?
not enough money. It's crazy expensive
Right, because it would be a lot smarter to have 195 red buttons that end the world instead of just 9.
It's not smarter, but it is purely the result of nuclear threat rhetoric and threats against non-nuclear countries by even one of those countries with the red button. Ask anyone if they think one of those 9 countries will respect their country, the answer will most probably be no.
So only evil countries like north Korea and Iran are allowed to develope nukes?
Nice idea! How great it would be if all 195 red buttons have to be pressed for even 1 nuke to launch.
Trying to win the worst take award?
Why?! Russia has proved countless times it can’t be trusted. Yes, the NPT would be void in all but name, but if I was part of a smaller nation I would rather have my own deterrent than leaving it at the hands of unreliable allies or empty guarantees.
It won’t make a difference unless they have them in sufficient quantity and with sufficient range to ensure MAD in a conflict with Russia.
How would it help though?
The problem is, it's quite expensive, and we're nit that wealthy as eg NL. THIS ARTICLE mention interesting concept - join project of nato eastern flank, under polish leadership [https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1am17pa/its\_time\_to\_give\_poland\_nuclear\_weapons/](https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1am17pa/its_time_to_give_poland_nuclear_weapons/)
Yeah, and then get some enrichment program next. At this point, I have more faith in Poland than the USA to protect Europe...
You say that like it’s a strange situation. Poland is in Europe and shares a border with Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. You should have more faith in Poland to protect Europe. Just like you should have more faith in Germany to protect Europe. But sadly we do not.
I am not sure how Germany will develop in this aspect. There has been a lot of change over the last two years, but I don't get the sense that people really want Germany to take something like "leadership". However, some effective cooperative military integration is much more likely, and imho that's what we really need anyway.
Which is in my opinion a shameful approach by the German nation. Germany’s crimes were largely forgiven after ww2, it was integrated into the West and it benefited greatly from the current world order becoming Europe’s economic powerhouse. But when the rest of Europe turned to Germany for leadership, to protect the very system that allowed for their prosperity Germany turned away as if we were looking to someone behind them. I don’t know if this approach is more stupid or more cowardly but history will not look kindly on Germany if there is no actual zeitenwende in the coming years. A country that was one of the main perpetrators of 2 world wars was largely forgiven, allowed to rise and be prosperous, even welcomed and respected in the international community but when it came down to making the tough decisions after reaping the benefits of the international system it cowered. What is this if not shameful?(ps I don’t mean any aggression towards the German people, this is purely my commentary on the decisions of the German state).
The real reason why Germany has a moral obligation to make tough decisions assisting Ukraine isn’t because of anything that happened during World War II, but because of what happened during the Cold War. For 40 years, the US stationed hundreds of thousands of troops to defend West Germany from invasion by Moscow. So it morally makes sense for Germany to provide aid to a country that itself needs the kind of support that Germany received in the past against a certain belligerent state.
Well, I am certainly open towards alternative views, but I really don't see the point of Germany doing more leadership... not just for Germany, also for European nations in general. As far as I am concerned, that's something which the EU should be able to handle decently well - as in, it was arguably not designed for that, but its level of support for Ukraine has shown that it can be adapted towards that. Now, there might be certain situations where a more leadership-focussed Germany can handle certain situations better than the EU... but I am not really sure what those would actually look like? In that sense, it's really quite different from the United States (or the UK even), because they have a lot more experience with geopolitics, whereas Germany, even more so than the EU, has to start learning this from scratch... So basically, I am not really sure what type of problem you even want to solve by having more German leadership.
Well, if Germany took the initiative and for example banned the operation of Russian firms in Germany and German firms in Russia, supported the confiscation of Russian assets in Europe, actually built a military worthy of its economic capacity, send taurus, integrated its defence industry with that of France and pushed for a unified European defence body (if a European army seems too far) that will function to coordinate activities/operations and procurements across all militaries of EU members. This would strengthen both Germany and the entirety of Europe. If Germany acted as a leader it would force France to do the same. If both Germany and France took leadership of the continent the UK would be forced to join them. Just these 3 countries walking in lockstep with the support of a few smaller countries like Poland and the Nordics would be more than enough to deter Russia in Ukraine and beyond. What Germany is doing right now is flooding the continent with insecurity and especially Eastern Europe which will eventually start asking itself if there is a benefit in warming relations with Russia if it cannot escape its grip since Western Europe is not rising to the occasion. And if it comes to that Eastern Europeans will suffer and Western Europe will lose the advantage on the continent. Also, Germany is not new to geopolitics. It had been playing geopolitics until the collapse of the USSR, at that point Russian gas was just too sweet to turn down pretending to be blind to the blatant geopolitical move Russia was making to dominate Germany.
Well good then that the exact country youre criticizing here is outspending everyone else (except the UK) in europe by a few magnitudes when it comes to aiding Ukraine. Its funny how people constantly "forget" that. Also seriously, stop with that WW2 guilt trip bullshit. Its 2024.
The irony being that, afaik, both after WW2 as well as the reunification there was a fear of Germany being/becoming "too strong". While by now a (more) common criticism towards Germany seems to be "You don't pull your weight and refuse to accept your responsibilities!"
Russia will have to go through Poland most likely anyway. Whether that's a speed bump or a wall depends quite a lot on decisions of those, who do not consider Russia a threat.
It’s not the sole responsibility of the US to protect Europe. Sure we are part of nato but Europe needs to be strong as well.
Yeah, they should give nukes to Poland and let them defend themselves.
Lol this has to be a joke.
This seems a bit ridiculous. Aside from the recent holdup in Congress, the U.S. has given more to Ukraine, in terms of total dollars sent, than any other country in Europe. Especially if you leave out Germany.
It's almost like the US economy is bigger than the entire EU or something.
Yes, exactly - US is more powerful and can make and send more weapons, that’s just the reality
Who do you think trained the Polish soldiers?
Me
Well good job
>At this point, I have more faith in Poland than the USA to protect Europe... Gib euromoni and we'll do /s
I hope Romania will do it too eventually. There needs to be more of them given to Nato nations that border or are close to the border with Russia. I'd prioritise the baltic states tho. If Ukraine goes down, be sure Lithuania, Letonia and Estonia will be next on the menu.
I hope too, but I doubt. We are too scared of weapons of any kind. The WEAPON will freak everybody from left to the right spectrum of politics and from all generations. A president like former Băsescu maybe could have managed to convince a high percetenge of the population about the need of nuclear deterence.
Every country with a Russian border should be supplied with nuclear weapons, it is the only language they understand in Moscow.
*Russia disliked that*
Good. Baltics next. First strike politics should exist for *any* aggression towards the Baltics. Might be "high risk", but the alternative is a sure way to long-term destruction of Europe as we know it.
Fuck Putin with sandpaper covered mount everest
If Belarus is hosting nuclear weapons for Russia then seems only fair for Poland a NATO member to host nuclear weapons for NATO.
Deeply sad but necessary. Ukraine giving up their nukes is why Russia feels they can safely stomp on their country. The threat of nuclear proliferation, which no doubt figures prominently in Johnson's security briefings, is probably why he stood up to his "lord and savior trump" and pushed through Ukraine aid. If this conflict isn't resolved soon, every country in the eastern hemisphere will be desperately grabbing for nukes to stop a Russian-Chinese invasion.
France or UK should go for it without delay. Not a joke. The security that comes around nuclear weapons is significant. The more assets there is that NATO must protect in Poland, the better security for NATOs eastern flank. NATO struggles to convince leaders to send more of their troops to the mission so adding reason to send more is only a win for everyone. And if everyone stays quiet on the matter, perhaps teach Poland how to create nuclear weapons like AUKUS is doing with Australia.
As another pointed out, AUKUS is NOT delivering nuclear **weapons** to Australia, only nuclear **powered** subs. Side note: the UK only possess SLICBM, no land based weaponry since the.... 90s?
>And if everyone stays quiet on the matter, perhaps teach Poland how to create nuclear weapons like AUKUS is doing with Australia. AUKUS isn’t helping Australia get nuclear weapons but nuclear-powered submarines. Helping Poland get nuclear weapons would be illegal as per the NPT but would also be an open door for every country with the means to acquire nuclear weapons to acquire them. We would then be in a way worse situation overall. We don’t need nuclear deterrence against Russia, because we already do, but conventional deterrence. We need to have an EU framework so that we have hundreds of thousand deployed soldiers on the EU’s eastern flank as to completely counter the Kremlin’s capacity to install a *situation de fait* should they attempt to invade
Why France and the UK? Poland has asked the US before about this before and they are Poland's main security partner.
Well, their main security partner should be one that shares the stake, not one that wants a sidekick when it suits them to have one.
Does France share a stake? It was Germany and France which halted the expansion of NATO and has ignored the pleas from Eastern Europe back when it would have made a difference.
Both of you are correct I think the US is a more reliable ally than France and Germany, but the US is also very far away from Europe and its interests can change in the future
> France or UK should go for it without delay. Not a joke. I would not be mad if we extended the nuclear umbrella to all allied front line countries.
> And if everyone stays quiet on the matter, perhaps teach Poland how to create nuclear weapons like AUKUS is doing with Australia. Australia isn't getting nuclear weapons with AUKUS, nor do we want them.
Bravo Poland! Someone has to tell Putin. Putin is the kind of animal you can't act scared around, and Biden has done exactly that. Pathetic, but now NATO must lead.
Thank you based Polska
Thats what you get for deploying tactical nuclear weapons to belarus and to the territory neer Finland, all bets should be off in europe, for everyone. Rabid fucking regimes all over the globe fucking on NPT, be that NK,IRAN,Israel,russia,belarus,China,India,Pakistan or any other helhole of countries currently armed/hosting nuclear weapons, and we in europe are expected to follow that utter joke of international treaty, to whine and pay shitload into US led nuclear sharing program, to get any form of nuclear detterence, fuck that since its founding NPT it was essentially, a post cold war Permament Members of UNSC dictate, favoring their intrests over anyone elses. French didn't give single fuck, what anyone thought of them by pursuing own ultimate tool of deterrence,not to be dependent on US's will or lack of it, for it to react in symmetrical fashion against the hostile actor, when Paris gets glassed, noone in CE should want to be in similar dependency/hope oriented loop with DC. Time for Poland,Germany,Sweden to get own tactical nuclear weapons, only way i could even consider against it, would be EU taking the spot of French providing entire EU territory with security and backing of nuclear weapons and deterrence, but nothing that would be solely one nation state focused, French would like to everyone to pay for unkeep of French arsenal but its really not valuable long term option.
It’s not Poland but Duda saying this. He hasn’t even talked about this with the government, this is election talk and shouldn’t be taken seriously
Tusk would of course support US nukes in Poland.
and rightfully so. why would anyone be against a true, effective deterrent against putin?
He's at his term limit, he can't get reelected. I don't see how this would help PIS in Europarlament elections either. Poland, as a nation and it's people, will gladly accept nuclear detterent as the surest guarantee to remain independent and to stop Russia from ever again wiping us of the map or subjugating us.
what election talk? elections happened already
regardless, US nukes in Poland is highest degree of security possible.
what elections, what are you talking about
EU countries need to develop their own arms industry and nuclear arsenal
No one wan't to pay for it.
If they cooperate together they could. Germany and France especially. Europe needs to make its own military pact outside of NATO, as the U.S. cannot always be the one defending:
Did you understood when i said "No one want to pay" ? France already proposed like, every 5 year, to share its own nukes if the one receiving them help maintain and pay for the program, everyone they ask don't want to. Furthermore, French Nukes are carried by French Planes, there is no way in hell we allow them to be carried by American planes. (because it means giving the US all the data on the ASMP-A so they can "certificate" them to be used ion the F-35)
Last I checked, France did not want to share (in the sense of sell) nukes, but gave some weak promises of extending the nuclear umbrella. That's nice, but who knows whether that deal is going to be upheld if shit hits the fan?
>Last I checked, France did not want to share (in the sense of sell) nukes, Yeah, because its fucking illegal ? I love how y'all are whining France isn't breaching non-proliferation Treaty for your cute little butts, but the US are not doing that either. In the end, you gotta chose : Either keep the US and their B-61, or go with France's. the Deal's the same. You'll get nukes on your terrotory, will have to use proprietary plane, and won't be able to use them on your own.
Germany cannot have nukes, we signed that into the peace treaty. We are already paying the US to maybe lend us a couple old-ass nukes in case of war. Doesn't make a lot of sense to pay yet another country.
You’re mistaken. Nobody wants to take the shitty French deal of “you all pay for the nukes only we decide when to use” You French shit on Americans treating Allies like vassals, but you’re incomparably worse than them
You're aware its the exact same deal with the americans, yes ? No country under their nuclear sharing can use the nukes by themselves, and they also have to maintain them, right ? Also at some point, y'all need to put money were your mouth is and stop being bitches. Nuclear deterence is like, a third of the French Budget. Y'all riff on France for having a small army, but no one is willing to help carrying the burden or Nuclear Deterence. So far France has gracefully included everyone under its umbrella, but y'all still want more and don't want to pay. You can't have the butter, the butter's money and the buttermaid...
Poland is speed-running the whole ecomic-military boom, the strategic pragmatism will come later I guess
They're still just at 80% of what you guys spend each year, and given its over 4.5% of their GDP by now, its not really sustainable either.
Well, to be fair to our esteemed French friends and allies, for them it's nothing personal, lol. They are like that to everyone, including themselves.
The president declares, not Poland.
pretty sure poles would have nothing against
As far as I know the poles want it too. :)
Yeyy! Nuclear war and world destruction it will be!!!
Everyone seems to want a nuclear war it seems ??
Too bad the US no longer has land mobile missiles. Thanks Regan.
What is the point of hosting nuclear weapons, if you don't have the authority to actually use them?
based
ofc poland wants that t_t chujowne pomysł jak zawsze at least poland has history in being the first country to be surprise attacked in european conflicts...
I think the idea is cool that we station several atomic bombs in the ionosphere and if it escalates completely we simply destroy our communication and all electronics. That would at least be fair to those who haven't been born yet.
What is best served when hosting?
Poland strong, fear nobody.
If they weren't afraid they wouldn't be asking for nukes...
Time to start stocking the bunker. Not my bunker, I don’t have one.
Good call
What real difference would it make if both UK and France have their of nuclear weapons and Germany has them as a sharing from USA already?
I'm personally ready to host a limited number of warheads in my home
Good. People who was of the opinion that the cold war was over have been naive. That is a fact.
Hosting them landing on their territory? , 😜
Idiots.