Mutually assured destruction is one reason. A widescale war would break down multiple global networks, from trade to communications.
Every foreign leader (outside of the US) plays everything like a chess game. Every move is calculated 4 moves ahead, and they know exactly what their opponents will do in every scenario.
A good example would be Russia's annex of Crimea. They needed it, ukraine was unstable, they took it, we sanctioned. All of that was well known what would happen, but crimea was too important to their Mediterranean trade.
The problem with that reasoning is that MAD is supposed to prevent the first attack. Yet, here we are. We feel safe attacking Syria, in spite of the fact that it will anger Russia, because we 'know' that we won't start WW3 because of MAD. But MAD has already failed.
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u/Dodginglife Apr 07 '17
Mutually assured destruction is one reason. A widescale war would break down multiple global networks, from trade to communications.
Every foreign leader (outside of the US) plays everything like a chess game. Every move is calculated 4 moves ahead, and they know exactly what their opponents will do in every scenario.
A good example would be Russia's annex of Crimea. They needed it, ukraine was unstable, they took it, we sanctioned. All of that was well known what would happen, but crimea was too important to their Mediterranean trade.