If we launched a massive pre-emptive nuclear attack on Russia and China, would a world war be avoided?
99369
Have you heard of the MAD doctrine?  The doctrine has deterred nuclear war for the past 60 years.  Although there are falacies in the doctrine, ie, we could disguise nuclear devices that could avoid detection.  The automatic triggers in the Russian and Chinese early warning system would presumably deter us from a pre-emptive strike as people have mentioned above.
121059
We haven't been warned of this for the same reason we weren't warned of all the other theories regarding global collapse over the last several....centuries.  Basic science.  \n\nTheory of relativity.  An object at rest will stay at rest till an outside force acts on it.  An object in motion will stay in motion until an outside force acts on it.  Now, lets apply that to the world theatre.\n\nThis theory just uses new "climactic events" in place of the old, but what its saying is that the world is going to go to hell based on these 'events'.  No it wont.  It would take way to much effort on the parts of way to many people for them to care enough for things to change.  \n\nNo one really wants change anymore.  The last major chage in the world was World War II.  Russia giving up communism and going democratic?  Gee, China stepped into that spot, didn't they.  Now the US and China are playing the same game with other countries that the US and the USSR did.  Just another cold war.  Just more status quo.  No one's going anywhere.  Too many people fear change for change to actually occur on a drastic or global scale.  It has to be slow, insideous, and sneak up on people, or it's resisted so completely that it will never happen.  \n\nI'm really not worried.  And if I'm wrong, then its all about surviving the chaos, and our debate doesn't matter.  But I'm not stockpiling guns and canned foods either...  :)
468404
Of course we would have. President Roosevelt had started the Nation's first peacetime draft in history, starting in 1939, before the war began. Before the draft, the US had around 100,000 active duty soldiers. A year after the draft, we had over a million. By the end of the war we had over twelve million soldiers. \n   Roosevelt's massive pre-war military expansion was a precautionary measure; he could smell a storm coming, and we needed to be ready\n   Consider how world war one played out. We stayed on the sidelines and watched the Europeans kick the snot out of each other for three years. But we were not neutral. From the beginning of the war, we wanted Great Britain to win, because we knew our seas would not protect us from the world's turmoil much longer, and we needed good friends on the other side of the ocean. So even though we didn't fight until 1917, we kept sending food and war material to the Allies, which kept them in the game against Germany.  Germany realised that as long as we kept supplying their enemy, they could not win. So the Germans, out of necessity, started sinking our ships, and then, finally, we went to war, after the Germans were exhausted from endless trench warfare.  This strategy was preffered by the US, as it made winning much eaisier and less painful.\n   Back to WWII....\n   By the autumn of 1941, history was repeating itself, as we had hoped. The Germans were locked into an ugly, brutal stalemate (in USSR), that was taking a heavy toll on their military (and the USSR). We would have been content to let that play out another year or two, but inevitably, when Germany was on the ropes, we would have mobilized our Armed Forces to deliver the coup de gras.\n   When Japan launched a major strike on US soil, that did not change our ultimate decision, it just brought us into the war earlier than we had planned on. Winston Churchill cheered when we got hit, because he knew we'd have to start helping then.
364202
Unfortunately yes. We will not suffer another country (that is so full of terroristic groups) to possess nuclear weapons. The threat to our country would be too great, considering we are not well liked (for various reasons). I think a pre-emptive strike will happen in the near future, though the cost of it (economically, politically, and diplomatically) will be immense.
1134586
Yes,\n\nThe cold war in theory was the arm build up, and conquest of third world nation in an attempt to for the capitalist countries to prevail over the Communist one.\n\nMost people see the fall of the Berlin wall and elections in Russia as the end of the cold war. And china's number 5 trading partner is Wall Mart.\n\nHowever,\nA cold war is being prevented as we discuss this with control over nuclear weapons in both Iran and Korea.\n\nShould those countries ever obtain weapons capable of hurting our country or allies, it will technically be a cold war as opposed to hot. A hot war would be the active use of such weapons.\n\nIf the cold war is seen in terms of two world powers fighting for economic and militaristic dominance then your best bet is to look China....its economy is maturing and should it one day decided to rival the US it would not be a joke. it has a serious potential to start a new cold war. \n\nwith regards to Communism. In Russia it was never pure Communism or in any other country for that matter. Wherever there are poor  people in large large numbers with an ineffective government there is bound to come a breaking point. Should those countries build their economies through military industrialism.......then were back where we started from 40 years ago......
1116836
In reference to another post there is no working star wars program in place, we are just as vulnerable to a missile attack today as we were fifty years ago, now the likelihood of a large scale nuclear attack is much much lower without the soviets runnin around, though it is always possible that by some computer error that a launch will take place from either us or the russian silos, afterwards if we don't convince each other that it was a mistake it would probably lead to a full scale nuclear exchange, now that covers the U.S. and Russia, but don't forget the other nuclear nations out there such as Pakistan and India which are pretty much where the U.S. and Soviets were twenty years ago, so on that side of the planet I would say within the next two years that there is a 20% possibility of a nuclear exchange barring any massive change in policy or major event such as some sort of military incident betweent those two countries. It is possible that there could be a nuclear device smuggled and detonated in the U.S. by some terrorist organisation but that would not lead to a nuclear war, unless the perpetrators of such an attack posessed a nuclear arsenal. Let me just say that with today's great technology a nuclear device does not have to be any bigger than a briefcase and with lax border control and nearly unlimited funding for terrorist organisations in addition to lack of intelligence on nuclear material around the world it is very possible that some terrorist organisation may suceed in detonating a device on American soil. Let's all hope that never happens
502324
We could, but we need to worry about Russia & China. Would Russia and China, both member of U.N. Security Concil, stand back and do nothing?  North Korea is like their little brother.
736809
If Hitler hadn't attacked Russia, they would have been very suspicious allies. Germany may have put Britain out of the war and captured more of Africa and the Mideast. With all that captured by Germany, the US would have concentrated on the Pacific war. I don't think Germany could do a trans-Atlantic invasion, especially if the British scuttled their navy or sailed to the US to be the "Free British". The Germans had very few ships. After 1945 there would have been a US-German cold war.
352350
We would simply all be screwed.\n\nHoping that Nuclear war doesn't happen, US would probably be in an alliance with Brittan, France, Russia, Germany vs. some new threat, like the Middle East (I MEAN NO OFFENCE TO ANY OF MIDDLE EASTERN DESCENT OR OF THOSE IN THE MIDDLE EAST, I MEAN IT SIMPLY AS AN EXAMPLE. An example of a region who has slightly different views, and is not completely out of the running.)
994977
If that was the case, all hell would break lose and there would be a huge war.\n\nThat'll never ever happen.
1074806
Well ,the question is, why shouldnt they have these weapons? The security council nations, ie You guys, Us (Britain), France, China and Russia all have high-payload nuclear weapony in stockpiles..Id say were more of a danger to world peace, wouldnt you?\n Besides, north Korea is a tinpot state, its a wreck and everyone knows it, except the media, who love to play this kind of thing up. Its almost as stupid as believing iraq could actually threaten us *laughs* States like Iran and N.Korea will never use nuclear weapons in anger, as this would almost definatly result in a nuclear response from the Security nations. Basically, we dont need to go to war with them, they wont use them and theyll probably disintergrate as a nation soon anyways..
131639
The US tried very hard to avoid this war and for a long time it ignored all the help requests that came from Europe. \nLikely for all the world, Japan attacked the US at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7 1941 (http://education.yahoo.com/reference/encyclopedia/entry/PearlHar )  and by that forced the US the join the war.\n\nIf Japan would not have done that, it is safe to assume that Germany would have win this war and got enough time to build an atom bomb. That would have influence all the world, imagine a Nazi regime with such a weapon.\n\nBTW- kingjoey66- Albert Einstein tried to warn the US government about the intense German efforts to develop the atom bomb but was almost arrested for that. Einstein was not involved with the atomic bomb development at all. His only (and major) contribution to the development is to show that such energy exists in any material.
1148371
Um I think either North Korea or Iran might spark ww3. China & Russia would back them cuz they are communist or somehow allied or have common interests. I think on the side of the US, would be the UK, EU, Japan, & Austrailia. This is the big shocker though. The hidden communists in Canada would sieze power & use Canada as a staging ground to attack the US & UK. Most of ww3 would be fought in Canada or something along those lines with slight variations in the outcome depending on how it all unfolded.
742073
No one right on its mind will use first Nukes.   You will be the paria of the whole world and loose all allies.   Nukes will be used when one party is completly lost.\nA ground war with China would look as the war in Russia.   Very long distance to conquer (even worse since you must bring everything by sea).\nAll Chinese have a minimum military training.   When fully mobilising they have more soldiers than the entire population of the US.\nIn Korea, Us had a lot of trouble with the Chinese which were badly underarmed.  The modern Chinese army has very good material and even more troops than in 1950.\nCarpet bombing has someone suggested : China is even larger than the US.   Do you think the Chinese army and factories will stay in the towns ?  Think again.\n\nSo how would look a war with China really ?\nSimply : a lot of naval raids on the Chinese coast, Taiwan taken by the Chinese after a heavy sea battle (with a lot of combats between Chinese airforce versus US navy carriers).\nAn invasion of China is very unlikely because no way you can stop the millions of Chinese (well trained and motivated).\nAt the other hand China can not do much to arm the US and will be cut off from the world for trade so no more export (and so no more currency coming in).\nChina will fall back on it own (like in 1960), the US will be seriously crippled after the first months of battle and can not affort to have a second front somewhere.\n\nAll depends what other countries will do especially Russia, India.\n\nConclusion : both countries have no interest to start a war with each other.   Military it would make the US vulnerable, China would loose a lot economical.
1179731
Not necessarily. The U.S. or any other countries don't use theirs. If they are "used," per se, it is as a deterrent for other countries using nuclear weapons.
473077
Sure, if they want to start WW III. On NPR a week ago some military guy was saying that in every scenario of an attack on Iran it ended up with a huge uncontrollable war involving the entire middle east. ITMFA!
939617
I am a die hard republican and I will say, you are absolutely right.\n\nI should add though that Europe, Russia, China's indifference to Iran is troubling.  Avoiding war is not the highest ground, but instead the choice of a practical war.