The “Nuance” of Deterrence
August 2nd, 2026
One of those smart guys who reads my ramblings posed me a number of questions early this week and I have been wrestling with the answers… he raised several issues - huge issues: war and peace in the Mid East (writ large, not just the mess over Iran) the Pan Arab movement, such as it is, the issue of many key international choke points being in at least somewhat contested space (Strait of Hormuz, Bab al Mendeb, Suez, Strait of Malacca, Strait of Gibraltar, etc.) The question of nuclear weapons. The war in Ukraine. And, of course, Taiwan - which is a little bit of everything…
What I think this all reduces to is a question of deterrence. Or, more accurately, why aren't nations deterred? Where have we gone wrong?
To begin, we need to remind our selves what deterrence is and isn’t. What it is NOT is simply a bunch of weapons or capabilities sitting “on the shelf.” Rather, deterrence, which really exists in the minds of the enemy, has two key components: a very real capability to inflict unacceptable levels of damage, and an understanding that the will exists to use it.
The first means that that it must be clear in the minds of the enemy that the other guy - the US - has the very real capability to inflict substantially more damage than any possible gain they might achieve by starting - or continuing - a war. Note that this is a very subjective measurement. What is an unacceptable level of pain? Both Ukraine and Russia have shown, once again, that most countries have much higher levels of pain than seems makes sense from 5,000 miles away. So has Iran. And Yemen. In fact, there are very few wars that stop simply because the level of destruction is high. Invariably, it is a host of factors added together that lead to breaking a nation’s will.
So, for deterrence to be effective the systems on hand must be destructive enough - and reliable enough - that it is crystal clear that if they cross some certain nebulous - but very real - line, the level of destruction will be far beyond what you they can accept, and far, far beyond what they thought they might gain in the war.
The second piece to this is that the enemy (or possible enemy) needs to truly believe that it is a credible threat: that is, that the will exists in the US to use those theater weapons to defend US interests and US friends and allies.
In the global nuclear standoff that the US and USSR / Russia have lived under for more than 60 years, that threat of a “nuclear holocaust” was and remains real, at least to some extent.
But deterrence has, in many respects, unraveled. One might say the nuclear umbrella - under which most of the world found shelter - is now full of holes. If we are to find some sort of solution to many of our problems, if we are to step back from great power war - as we now have in eastern Ukraine (Ukraine plus Europe versus Russia), then we need to repair that umbrella.
But repairing the umbrella involves two major pieces.
The first is that the entire architecture: the weapons (the warheads themselves), the systems (the missiles, the aircraft, and all the ancillary equipment that supports our national and theater nuclear forces, all need to be modernized, brought to the highest level of readiness and reliability. This is essential. Without a clear awareness around the world that our nuclear force is in fact capable of the full spectrum of responses, and can respond in a timely manner, the deterrence loses its foundation. If the entire “system of systems” is not credible, there is no deterrence.
But there almost must be an awareness that we are prepared to use these weapons if our interests or our allies are threatened.
For more than 30 years we have heard a wide range of experts deny the importance of nuclear weapons, particularly “tactical” or “theater” nuclear weapons (ie, not the ones used in response to a direct nuclear attack on the US). We have been told that precision weapons, now with what can only be called an exquisite level of precision, have supplanted the need for weapons with huge destructive potential. We don’t need to blow up an entire enemy naval base when we can hit the particular room in the command post that is the essence of the base.
This is a wonderful argument and it sounds very good the further you get from a battlefield.
But Iraq, Afghanistan, Iraq again, Somalia, and now Iran, have shown the limits to that concept. Very simply, the process of precisely poking out the enemy’s capabilities does not break his will. And in the end, all war is a struggle of will. Arguably, the opposite can be said, that relatively small levels of destruction on any given day, a slowly accumulating number of deaths, serve to steel the will of nearly any country. Ukraine fights on - and so does Russia. The Taliban never gave up. The IRGC has not broken.
At the same time there appears to be a firm conviction among pundits left and right, that no one is going to use theater nuclear weapons.
But, there is a problem in all this, and the man who really created the US “nuclear umbrella” first identified it. The man was Eisenhower, who knew a little bit about planning and executing a war, and about what deterrence did, and did not, mean. And his position was simply this: no conventional force alone would ever be large enough to deter a great power from going to war. That force might be large enough to eventually defeat the great power, but it would not deter another nation from starting the war. If you wanted to deter a great power, particularly a great power in its own “theater,” nuclear weapons were necessary.
This was his point in making it known that he would use atomic weapons on Chinese forces in Korea if the war continued. This was at a time when the US was spending in excess of 10% of GDP on defense. Simply put, the conventional forces were very large, but they did not deter.
How can we possibly rebuild credibility in the nuclear umbrella? Very simply, we need to take it seriously. Training with nuclear weapons across most of the services needs to be returned to prominence. Major exercises need to include nuclear branches and sequels. Presidents and key cabinet offices need to be made aware of their potential roles. And yes, we need to go back to that “game” we used to play in which we never acknowledged whether a given ship or aircraft was carrying a nuclear weapon while admitting that it was possible.
We need to make it clear to potential enemies that there are real limits beyond which we - and our allies must not be pushed. They must not know the exact line, but they must be certain that such a line exists and that we have the weapons and trained crews on hand to execute that mission.
As for the sense that this would be escalatory, China has for a number of years suggested that the use of a nuclear weapon over an enemy fleet to generate a high altitude EMP would not constitute a nuclear attack, but views it as part of information and cyber warfare.
I have a friend who has told me the story of being questioned by an Atlanta PD psychologist on his weapon use. In the course questioning he was asked how often he had used his weapon in the past; he answered that he used his weapon on a daily basis, usually several times per day. The psychologist was shocked. He then explained that every time he got out of his squad car and walked up to a bunch of young men standing on the corner, he was using his weapon, in one way or the other. Did he place his hands so that the weapon was hard to see? Or did he rest a hand on top of the weapon? On occasion he had taken the shotgun out of the vehicle and laid it on the roof of the car. Each was a use of his weapon, each had, to use the policy wonk phrase, a nuanced meaning that was fairly clear to a couple of 20 year old punks, acting tough on the street corner at 2 in the morning…
Deploying DDGs and other ships and aircraft around the world capable of sending the same “nuanced” message would help rebuild real deterrence.
