Self-preservation on a grand scale

[Totenkopf]

Self-preservation is the perenial no-brainer, or damn well ought to be for a reasonable person. But that's actually pretty simple for most people to agree on. What about the case of war? If your opponent will not, to a man (woman or child), surrender and intends to kill as many of you as possible before succumbing to death, is it okay to basically commit a form of genocide to defend yourself? Or, should you in essence surrender/ceasefire and give them the ability to replenish themselves before they have another go at you?

 

Using the modern world as an example, is it somehow permissible to use atomic weapons (the ultimate in deadly force) if that is the only way you can successfully defend yourself against an opponent? For instance, could you justuifiably use preemption to remove your opponents nuclear arsenal (think Iran, NK, etc...), when said party has made it quite clear that they intend to use those weapons against you if you don't submit? If you don't have conventional means (so I'm not strictly speaking of the US here) at your disposal, what do you do? Do you think it's truly moral to wait for the other guy to kill millions of your own people before you act or to cave in to all his demands, however heinous in nature?

 

Mind you, before someone has a knee-jerk reaction here, I'm not advocating that any country use nukes (Hiroshima and Nagasaki are merely a foretaste of what awaits down that route) in some kind of casual manner (like, say, bullets). Rather trying to assess your limits as to how much deadly force can be used in a percieved life-death scenario on grander scale than just the individual.

[Vaelastraz]

Wow had to reread that in order to understand it.

 

Well it all depends on what you really know... if your enemy has made it "quite" clear that's not enough! You cannot kill millions, just because they MIGHT have done the same...you have to be 100% sure.

And even then, I'm not too much into weapons & tactics but surely there are other methods to prevent someone from using nuclear weapons, you don't have to use your own.

[JediMaster12]

Well if the enemy is persistent and says that they will not stop, then the logical thing would be to continue efforts until such a defeat will demoralize the enemy. That was the idea with Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Japanese, though following into the modern world still adhere to the ideal of the samurai where they fight to the death and never give up. To surrender was disgrace. I have noticed that other Asian countries base it along similar principles, that to be captured was dishonor. It's not totally an obscure idea. The Aztecs believed that it was better to be captured and die as asacrifice to the gods, an honor.

The talk of using nuclear weapons is a sensitive subject indeed. We know what happens when they are used, that occurred in 48/49. We came close to nuclear exchange with Russia and Cuba for thirteen days in 1963. The comments I hear about people saying that we should nuke them is more or less born out of ignorance. Because we place such a value on life, we find it difficult to push the buttons that will send the missiles to our enemies. However if they intend to use those weapons if you don't surrender, the logical follow through would be to take them out before they take us out. We can't rule out diplomacy though. It worked in 63 when we did something like trade our missiles in Turkey for Russia's in Cuba but 6 months from the incident so there appears no tie in. I'm not sure if that is completely accurate but the powers of persuasion can be great.

Technically North Korea broke the armstice agreement after the Korean war so I am not up to date concerning the international court of opinion and law on the subject.

True we do what we can to survive and we as a species are very VERY good at it. We have outlasted the australopithicines and the Neandertals in terms of time lengths. We have survived and we will continue to survive. A good place of proof is looking at our world population. It is still growing and now we have growing concerns about overpopulation and deforestation and stuff.