UNACKNOWLEDGED BRINKSMANSHIP
Strategic nuclear arsenals (2022)
USA : 3,508 includes ICBMs, SLBMs and bombers (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists)
Russia: 2,565 includes ICBMs, SLBMs and bombers (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists)
In my undergraduate college daze I didn't much give a shit about politics. I watched it unfold with no strong opinions, emotionally detached. That all changed when I got my butt drafted into the Army in 1966 to fight against the 'evil ' Communist North Vietnamese. Fortunately I never ended up shipping out and winding up "in country " as they called it. Suffice to say I have followed 'the news' (and the politics behind it) intensely ever since.
And as such I have seen many wars come and go with the USA involved in many (or most) of them: Korea, Vietnam, Central America, Iraq, Afghanistan, Al Queda, ISIS. And now we have two going on at once: the Ukraine-Russia war and the Israel-Hamas/Hezbollah war.
It appears to me with respect to the Ukraine-Russian imbroglio we are dangerously close to nuclear war as step by step escalation and counter escalation unfolds? That is we are again as in our long Cold War with the Soviet Union, again engaged in brinksmanship, risking the entire planet livable existence for old fashioned geopolitics. Some experts (whose opinions never see the light of day in the main stream media) also think so. Visit Jeffrey Sachs (Columbia) or John Mershiemer (Univ of Chicago) on Youtube. The credentials of alternate sources, that is their expertise, honesty and agenda-free nature is important, especially if one assumes that mainstream media has baked-in biases and underlying pecuniary motives. One such alternative source is Sheerpost . Sheerpost is run by Robert Sheer, a former columnist for the LA Times.
A contributor to Sheerpost is Scott Ritter. Currently Ritter is very concerned about the Biden Administration's handling of the Ukraine War. He believes Biden's team is engaging in very dangerous WW III nuclear war brinkmanship. Ritter is a former U.S. Marine Corps intelligence officer who served in the former Soviet Union implementing arms control treaties, in the Persian Gulf during Operation Desert Storm and in Iraq overseeing the disarmament of WMD.
Also, here is a recent interview with Norwegian scholar, Glenn Diesen, who likewise is concerned that we are in serious danger of pushing the Russians into the use of nuclear weapons.
One can never know the overall story as an ongoing crisis unfolds and is reported in the mainstream media especially with respect to wars. My experience over the years is that the most influential media (NY Times and Washington Post and TV network news) are almost always supportive of any military engagement the US is involved in. Only after the fact does the underlying truth surface, and sometimes that takes years.
