Difference between revisions of "Debate:Were both sides in the Cold War morally equivalent?"

Revision as of 18:14, August 21, 2007

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YES

NO

Jazzman had written elsewhere:

• This stuff is Cold War 101: missile defense worries have always been about first-strike capabilities. Granted, it's not as real a threat as it was in the 60's (or 70's or 80's, for that matter), but if we had a way to reliably stop all (or enough) incoming Russian missiles, the opponent loses the protection he gets from assured destruction. So, in terms of game theory and logic, if we had a working MDS, and we decided to strike, Russia can't do anything about it. That's a very scary thing to Russians. And it would be very scary to us, if the Russians had a first-strike capability.
• This has nothing to do with moral equivalence (and it's kind of hard to derive a definition of moral equivalence from that page you linked, but that's a seperate issue). It's about the idea that if the US wanted to launch an attack, there's nothing to stop them. Without an MDS, if the US wanted to launch an attack, the Russians could still completely destroy us. It's one of the reasons that MD hasn't been persued seriously until the last 20-30 years. We have even signed treaties stating that neither we nor the Russians would create an MDS -- that's how scary these things are. (And if I remember correctly, Reagan broke that treaty.)

Jazzman implies that the "Russians" (meaning the government, I suppose) were genuinely "worried" about a U.S. first strike. Every anti-MD argument I've ever heard asserts this, but I've never seen any evidence that (1) the Russian government actually had this worry or (2) more importantly, that it was a well-founded concern.

Anyway, the real MD question is about aggression, which involves a conflict between the Judeo-Christian concept of "good and evil" (undefined at the moment!) and moral equivalence (which I just took a crack at outlining).

The actual political conflict is between an aggressive totalitarian dictatorship (the USSR) or an aggressive, imperialist former dictatorship (Russia in the current decade) - and a meek, innocent country which just wants to left alone and not conquered.

The Czech Republic doesn't want to be the victim of Iran's aggression, and it naturally resents any threats from Putin to destroy its MD installations. CR isn't going to attack Moscow. They want to be able to prevent an invasion (or other aggressive pressure) from foreign bullies. --Ed Poor ^Talk 11:01, 21 August 2007 (EDT)

Well, this is again off topic, but since you told me to post here I guess it's ok. Moral equivalence has nothing to do with whether or not Russia feels threatened, it has to do with whether or not Americans think Russia is justified in taking action. There's a huge difference between how we perceive actions and how Russia perceives them.

You have never seen any evidence that Russia had this worry?! That's what the whole arms race was about! The Cold War was two competing realist powers -- a classic case of the security delema. The fear of a first strike is why arms limitation talks started as early as 1966 (between Johnson and Kosygin), why the Soviets wanted to ban MIRVed missiles in SALT I, and why we created the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. You simply can't chalk it all up to warmongering Commies.

Finally, deterrence theory is not about agression, and it's certainly not about good and evil! How can it be good and evil when both sides think they are the good guys? And it's not necessarily about agression, nearly as much as it is about perceived agression (as I mentioned before) or possible agression. So even if Russia doesn't think we are going to nuke them today, having an MDS in the Czech Republic still gives us a first-strike capability. Russia has been growing more and more wary of our activities over the last couple of years; it's perfectly in their interest to fear a first-strike capability -- if not for now, then somewhere down the road.

It seems I have some red links to fill in. In the meantime, I would highly suggest (as I did on the mainpage before the dissent got deleted) that you research the political theory analysis of the Cold War -- it really is fascinating stuff. Jazzman831 14:14, 21 August 2007 (EDT)

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