Matt Yglesias

34 Responses to “Uh-Oh”

1. Why oh why Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 12:44 pm

   Whether Caroline Kennedy will disclose her financial records is obviously a much more important story.

2. njbunk Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 12:46 pm

   “If I were Rama Lakshmi, I’d be a bit pissed . . “

   You’re totally right if by Rama Lakshmi you mean any person with half a brain. I would love to know that two nuclear powers are on the brink of a war. One gunshot in Kashmir and we could have a BIG problem on our hands.

   An Indo-Pakistan war just beats out Iran attacking Israel on the deadliest war ranking, but gets trumped by China invading Taiwan

3. Why oh why Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 12:49 pm

   Iran attacking Israel

   Why would Iran attack Israel? Can it even do that? (look at a map)

   Besides, Iran has almost never attacked another country, whereas Israel has engaged in constant aggressive warfare in the last 30 years.

4. shariq Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 12:50 pm

   No its not. Not saying we don’t need to be vigilant but india isn’t going to strike first and the chances of pakistan doing so are slim. If the BJP get elected and we have a hardline govt in Pakistan then the chances increase slightly. But with a democratic govt in Islamabad and Congress in power in New Delhi – no.

5. David in NY Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 1:01 pm

   Look Matt, according to you there isn’t even going to be a page A-12 pretty quick, so why worry about it?
   What we won’t know can’t hurt us, y’know?

6. Patrick Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 1:55 pm

   I’m tired of all the nuclear hyperbole. Pakistan and India can get into a war, I would doubt either would use any of its nuclear weapons. If anything, the fact that both sides have nuclear weapons would probably keep the scale of any conflict smaller and shorter. In fact, the reason these two countries haven’t been fighting for the last 10 years is that they have nuclear weapons.

   If there were no nuclear weapons, does anyone think the Cold War would have stayed cold for 50 years? The only time nuclear weapons were used was when the other side didn’t have them and the world had never heard the term fallout. Since then, they have pretty much been off the table.

   And since I’m ranting, I don’t believe India or Pakistan have fusion weapons. Thus, even if they did a full exchange, “10s of millions” is probably off by 1-3 orders of magnitude. Especially since initial uses would be on troop concentrations, not population centers. Of course, 100,000 is a lot, which is why they won’t be used.

7. njbunk Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 2:00 pm

   Why would Iran attack Israel? Can it even do that? (look at a map)

   Look at the US and Iraq on a map. We managed to attack them. I’m almost certain Iran has the missile capability to bomb Israel. God forbid Iran ever gets nukes.

   The real threat with Iran/Israel would be either one attacking the other. At this point I’m not sure which one is more likely to do it.

   I don’t want to get into a huge “Israel is the Devil/Israel is a Saint” debate, mostly because both sides are wrong.

8. Rich in PA Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 2:06 pm

   Come on Matthew, haven’t you eve heard of a little thing called percentages?

9. njorl Says:
   December 23rd, 2008 at 2:22 pm

   There is a temptation to compare the India/Pakistan situation to the cold war. People believe that neither side will use nuclear weapons because to the possibility of a counterstrike. The comparisson is not acurate.

   The bulk of the US and Soviet nuclear arsenals had very long flight times to get to their targets – 30 minutes or so. They were launched with very observable events. No first strike could destroy the other side’s weapons before many of them were launched. Each side also had a reserve of weapons that were not vulnerable to a first strike.

   India and Pakistan border eachother. Either side could easily have intelligence failures that reveal the locations of all of their nuclear weapons to the other. Both sides have the means to deliver their weapons quickly and accurately. Both sides have a small but non-negligible chance of launching a successful first strike. Both sides recognize that the other side could try it. That makes the situation inherently less stable.

   It is something that I think is still of low probability, but it is not nearly as improbable as a US-USSR nuclear war was.

10. wiley Says:
    December 23rd, 2008 at 4:49 pm

    Two nuclear powers potentially at war is an issue. The so-horrible-they’d-never-be-used argument is tired. Nuclear weapons aren’t a psychological state of equilibrium–they’re weapons of war that could be very useful to someone hell-bent on destroying another nation. To most leaders they are an option, otherwise they wouldn’t exist. Even if all leaders in both countries are determined not to strike first with nuclear weapons, chances are they won’t assume that to be true for other.

    Luckily, in U.S. history the nay sayers have prevailed, but in many conflicts, either the president or the military chiefs have wanted to use nukes—Viet Nam, Korea, Six-Day War… There have always been people and groups of people in powerful positions for whom nuclear weapons are not only not taboo, but are very utilitarian weapons. Such people get the upper hand, and a nuclear confrontation can easily follow. It only requires a decision, and orders that would, in all likelihood, be followed.

    I can only wonder what kinds of safeguards India and Pakistan have in their nuclear forces—especially their early warning. In a war with conventional missiles, how might they distinguish between the conventional and the nuclear?

11. Akash Says:
    December 23rd, 2008 at 6:44 pm

    A few points:

    (1) On nuclear deterrence, I would argue that, firstly, the odds of a nuclear exchange in an India-Pakistan conflict ARE higher than they were during the Cold War.

    Whether nuclearization of the India-Pakistan conflict has reduced chances for war, the truth is probably mixed: the presence of nuclear weapons probably prevented both countries from going to all-out war at least a few times in the past decade, but the presence of nukes also probably helped embolden militants and terrorists, who could be more confident of making attacks given that the threshold for retaliation was going to be a lot higher when nukes were in the picture. Indeed, it’s possible that the very opportunities to go to war (in, say, 1999 and 2001) that nuclear deterrence prevented, would never have arisen without nuclear weapons in the first place.

    (2) The odds of war happening now are still fairly low, I’d say. The situation is complicated, however. The Congress government in India very clearly does *NOT* want to go to war and indeed some of the public anger seems to have dissipated — the Congress did not get crushed in state elections a few weeks ago as expected. But the rhetoric is going to heat up, given that the Congress doesn’t want to risk losing power to the BJP in the spring.

12. runescape gp Says:
    December 23rd, 2008 at 9:51 pm

    Welcome to our website for buy rs powerleveling and buy runescape powerleveling service.

13. Patrick Says:
    December 23rd, 2008 at 10:44 pm

    There is no way either Pakistan or India would do a first strike for many reasons. One is that they can’t have total confidence their weapons would work. Another is that they would ever find their target. Comparing every potential conflict to the Cold War is one thing. But a bigger mistake, made by Matt in his original post, is equating other countries nuclear technology with U.S. nuclear technology. These would be simple fission bombs (Hiroshima type) carried by planes or cruise missiles or scud type missiles. The idea that such weapons, could be deployed unexpectedly, and with such effect as to completely knock out the other side is far-fetched. Certainly not the kind of gamble even insane people would make.

14. DJ Says:
    December 23rd, 2008 at 11:03 pm

    Right, its not as if these two countries have ever had a restrained limited conflict *after* having declared themselves nuclear powers. Like, if Pakistani troops were to, say, seize disputed territory, who knows how India would react?

15. Richard Steven Hack Says:
    December 24th, 2008 at 9:28 pm

    There is almost zero possibility that Iran would initiate an attack on Israel with missiles, since their missiles aren’t accurate enough to do any serious existential damage to Israel. Whereas Israel has the Air Force and submarine cruise missiles – probably with nuclear warheads – to obliterate most of Iran’s major cities.

    Not to mention that the US would almost certainly intervene with its military on behalf of Israel.

    And once again, Iran does not have nukes, has no nuke program, and couldn’t begin to match Israel’s nuclear arsenal even if they did.

    Anybody talking about Iran attacking Israel is simply totally ignorant of the real world. It’s simply not going to happen – unless of course either Israel or the US attacks Iran first.

    As for Pakistan and India, Pakistan clearly cannot knock out India with its nukes. India would have the advantage with its larger military. India could probably knock out either a good deal of Pakistan’s military or a couple major cities in a first strike. But in neither case would that end the war.

    Presumably both Pakistan and India pretty much know where each other’s nukes are stored and/or from which air bases they would be delivered (it’s not a hard calculation if you have any decent intelligence), and would knock out each other’s stockpile in the first strike, much as would happen if the US and Russia engaged in nuclear war. So the only nukes that would end up getting used are the ones ready to be loaded and delivered on the first run. Either side might get off a second run if they planned sufficiently for it and the first run was reasonably effective at knocking out significant amounts of their air defenses. But that’s about it.

    The war would then degenerate into a major conventional military affair, with India having the advantage for a while, anyway. Eventually India would get bogged down in Pakistan and both sides would sue for a truce.

    Many of the Islamic militants in Pakistan have announced that despite their enmity for the government, they would fight against India.

16. viagra Says:
    March 1st, 2009 at 5:52 am

    viagra
    If you have to do it, you might as well do it right

17. levitra Says:
    March 2nd, 2009 at 5:21 am

    levitraExcellent site. It was pleasant to me.

18. viagra Says:
    March 11th, 2009 at 4:46 am

    It is the coolest site,keep so!

19. zyban Says:
    March 12th, 2009 at 11:35 pm

    Incredible site!

20. tramadol Says:
    March 22nd, 2009 at 6:19 am

    tramadol
    It is the coolest site,keep so!

21. buy viagra online Says:
    March 22nd, 2009 at 10:31 am

    buy viagra online
    Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!

22. viagra brand Says:
    April 3rd, 2009 at 4:17 am

    Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
    cheap brand pfizer viagra

23. dlqi imjfyvzsa Says:
    April 4th, 2009 at 2:40 am

    yhmo guxtp tfuvj ifvdamhxp hgskxfyte cypfzut risqothk

24. Ex Back Says:
    April 9th, 2009 at 6:30 am

    My friend on Orkut shared this link with me and I’m not dissapointed that I came to your blog.

25. cheap viagra Says:
    April 9th, 2009 at 6:33 am

    I rarely comment on blogs but yours I had to stop and say Great Blog!! viagra

26. ethinfelt Says:
    April 10th, 2009 at 5:34 pm

    FANTASTIC!