It is a trademark
characteristic of the military mind that ‘the enemy’ is always watching, always
waiting, just looking for an opportunity to launch a surprise onslaught to
seize territory and impose his will on others. Currently, the prime enemy is
assumed to be Putin, who is almost portrayed as a live version of a Bond
villain, forever plotting world domination (although, as far as I’m aware, he doesn’t own a
cat, which somewhat spoils the image). In the fictional and real worlds
alike, the reason for seeking world domination has never been entirely clear to
me, but perhaps I over-analyse: a madman seeking to dominate the world doesn’t
necessarily need a logical reason. Like the man who wanted to be world king, maybe
Putin just wants power for its own sake. And possibly for a bit of personal
enrichment on the side; although – in real life, just as in fiction – being
the head of a criminal organisation rarely leaves enough time to relax and
properly enjoy the proceeds. Permanent paranoia is an essential attribute, even
if those around him really are all out to get him.
When it comes to
deterrence, if he’s truly mad all bets are off. Deterrence necessarily depends
on an assumption that the person being deterred is capable of a rational
analysis of the likely costs and benefits of any given course of action so,
whilst painting Putin as a madman, the policy of deterrence counter-intuitively
assumes that he isn’t. That raises its own problems. If he is indeed rational,
then telling a man who (allegedly) is determined to attack and destroy the UK
that we’re not ready
for him now, but give
us three years to prepare and we’ll be able to kill two or three times as
many Russians with the same level of armed forces looks more like an invitation
to urgent action than a deterrent. Using it before you lose it is far from an
irrational position to take if you feel threatened. If he’s not rational, then
it has no effect at all. And neither will the additional expenditure on
armaments.
In the fictional
realm, it’s never entirely clear whether the flunkies and minions who rush to
do their master’s bidding are doing so in expectation of some reward for
themselves, or out of fear, or out of blind loyalty. They always turn out to be
expendable, though. And in most cases, they end up duly expended. In real life,
the expendable ones are the foot soldiers, invariably drawn from the working
people of all belligerents whilst the ruling elites stay safely out of harm’s
way. In a war with a clear conclusion, the elites on the winning side count their
profits from the arms industry whilst those on the losing side rue their
financial losses. Where there is no such clear outcome from a conflict, the
elites on both sides win: the arms industry rakes in the cash all round. Financially,
war and peace end up looking quite similar in one important way – wealth gets
further concentrated in the hands of the few. In a war which degenerates into a
major nuclear exchange, there’ll be no money left to count; just as well, for
there’ll be no-one left to count it either.
Nuclear deterrence,
they tell us, works. Just look at the fact that there has been no all-out war
between two nuclear-armed blocs since the end of the last world war. Maybe. We
can’t re-run history without nuclear deterrence to see what would have happened;
perhaps there are other compelling reasons why war has somehow been avoided.
But even supposing, for the sake of argument, that we accept the lack of war to
date to be an indicator of the success of nuclear deterrence, that doesn’t justify
an assumption that it will always work. It could be like that little strip of
Velcro holding the curtains up, which works really well – until the day that it
doesn’t.
The politicians are
rushing to agree with the military assessment, and vying to see who can offer
to divert the largest sums from promoting the wellbeing of citizens into
building weapons of destruction. There is one thing about which they are right –
our future prosperity depends on our security. But what they’re not willing
even to countenance is the idea that security, in the sense of a lack of war,
could be achieved in other ways. De-escalation, removal of threats, negotiation,
and building trust aren’t even up for consideration as they continue the slow
but inexorable march towards a war. It’s a war which their own actions are making
increasingly likely.
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