US President Joe Biden has been criticized for opposing a no-fly-zone over Ukraine. Though decent people everywhere are horrified by the mounting war crimes being committed by Russian President Vladimir Putin – crimes of war, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity – the nuclear war risks of a no-fly-zone could quickly become intolerable. Understood in terms of classic Prussian military thinker Carl von Clausewitz’ On War, these risks are best described in terms of “friction.” (1)
These risks are not for meaningful consideration in everyday politics. Rather, they are complex issues that require very precise terminologies. Although an accidental nuclear war would necessarily be inadvertent, an inadvertent nuclear war would not necessarily be the result of an accident. To wit, other conceivable forms of an unintentional nuclear conflict could represent the outcome of human misjudgments or technical miscalculations. This is the case, moreover, whether a nuclear war was caused by singular nation-state error or by both sides to an ongoing nuclear crisis escalation.
To continue, the determinable risks of deliberate nuclear war and inadvertent nuclear war should be calculated separately. Still, any US military preparations for nuclear war by intention (preparations oriented toward strategic deterrence) could affect the likelihood of an inadvertent nuclear war. Furthermore, such preparations could be entirely rational. They would be designed to ensure US “escalation dominance” whenever intra-crisis hegemony was being sought.
There is much more. Purposeful defense policies will require variously refined methods. Most worrisome among all potentially credible causes of an inadvertent nuclear war would be errors in calculation. These could involve assorted misjudgments of adversarial intent or capacity that emerge “in synch” with any ongoing crisis escalation.
In all prospective nuclear crises, “friction” could figure importantly. Costly misjudgments could stem from an amplifying desire by one or both contending parties to achieve “escalation dominance.” Among other stratagems, relevant “desire” could involve an apparent willingness to tolerate “limited nuclear war.” In such fragile conditions, the rational “contestants” would strive for intra-crisis supremacy, but without risking unacceptable odds of suffering total or near-total destruction.
On such strategic matters, intersections and complexities could be expansive and difficult to fathom. As a related matter, the plausible causes of inadvertent nuclear war now warrant closer expert study. These causes include flawed interpretations of computer-generated nuclear attack warnings; unequal willingness among calculating adversaries to risk catastrophic war; overconfidence in deterrence and/or defense capabilities on one side or the other; adversarial regime changes; outright revolution or coup d’état among variously contending adversaries; and poorly-conceived pre-delegations of nuclear launch authority.
A potential source of inadvertent nuclear war for the United States would be as “backfire” effect of “pretended irrationality.” In principle, a rational Russian enemy that somehow managed to convince Washington of its decisional irrationality could spark an American nuclear escalation. Presently, of course, the greater fear is of an authentically irrational Russian President Putin.
In the urgent nuclear security matter of Ukraine, US President Biden, faced with multiplying uncertainties about Vladimir Putin’s willingness to “push the nuclear envelope,” could suddenly find himself confronted with a bewilderingly stark choice. This choice would be deciding between capitulation to egregious Russian war crimes and risking a full-scale nuclear war. Inter alia, Biden would need to continuously bear in mind America’s law-based responsibility to uphold basic justice in other countries, especially where basic human rights were under conspicuous assault by the other super-power.
Within the broad parameters of Realpolitik or geopolitics, the field of nuclear policy decision-making remains largely without tangible precedent. While the search for “escalation dominance” may be common to every imaginable sort of military deal-making, the credible costs of nuclear bargaining losses could prove incomparable and intolerable. Prima facie, no other military losses could reasonably be compared to ones incurred during a nuclear war, whether intentional, inadvertent or accidental.
On pertinent matters of “friction,” the most urgent US responsibility must concern calculated prevention of inadvertent nuclear war. Even in the absence of a nuclear adversary that would more wittingly brandish expressly apocalyptic threats, America would remain imperiled by the Russian nuclear adversary via multiple and synergistic dangers of Putin policy inadvertence. Even in a strategic universe in which Russian and American leaders could remain reliably rational, these grave dangers would remain prospectively existential. They could, however, be properly managed if they were first delineated, clarified and prudently investigated.
In the final analysis, US President Joe Biden and his senior advisors must meet the perplexing expectations of “escalation dominance” in Ukraine without triggering a nuclear exchange. In significant measure, this challenging task will require the decision-making principals to manage an existential crisis without historical precedent, and to do so with the more-or-less active cooperation of Russian president Vladimir Putin.
For the moment, at least, such cooperation hardly seems imminent or forthcoming.
Going forward on Ukraine, an American strategic failure could not be acceptable under any circumstances. Still, success in any of its conceivable forms will remain evasive and sorely problematic. Joe Biden’s de facto recognition of Clausewitzian “friction” – that is, his rejecting a “no-fly-zone” over Ukraine – is understandable and indispensable. To be sure, decent people may wish it were different, but, in the end, all relevant cost-benefit calculations are straightforward and incontestable.
For the United States, meeting all pertinent obligations of nuclear war avoidance in Ukraine should remain utterly overriding.