Abolish Nuclear Weapons? A Soho Forum Debate
Author Ward Wilson advocates eliminating nuclear weapons. Defense consultant Peter Huessy says that's unrealistic.
HD DownloadIs it imperative that the world eliminate all nuclear weapons? That was the topic of a live debate hosted by the Soho Forum on September 19, 2022.
Ward Wilson is the author of Five Myths About Nuclear Weapons and executive director of RealistRevolt. He argued that nuclear weapons have almost no practical application, and it's time to end world leaders' fascination with their awe-inspiring power.
Peter Huessy is director of strategic deterrent studies at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies and president of his own defense consulting firm, GeoStrategic Analysis. He argued that we can't get to nuclear abolition without getting other nuclear powers on board, including Russia and China, both of which see nuclear weapons as essential tools in their foreign policy agendas.
The debate was held at the Sheen Center in downtown Manhattan and was moderated by Soho Forum Director Gene Epstein.
Narrated by Nick Gillespie; edited by John Osterhoudt
Photos: event photography by Brett Raney; Mikhail Metzel/ZUMAPRESS/Newscom Format; Ju Peng Xinhua News Agency/Newscom
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post comments
As libertarians, we should support free market neocons, like Bill Bristol and Max Boot, as well as liberal interventionists, like Anne Applebaum and Bernard Henri-Levi. What better way to promote GDP growth by crossing Russian and Chinese "redlines" that threaten war. God bless the brave Ukrainians who are dying today to help boost Raytheon's stock price.
"God bless the brave Ukrainians who are dying today to help boost Raytheon’s stock price."
*Stiff salute with small tear rolling down cheek*
In only 5 weeks, I worked part-time from my loft and acquired $30,030. In the wake of losing my past business, I immediately became depleted. [res-04] Luckily, I found this occupations on the web, and subsequently, I had the option to begin bringing in cash from home immediately. Anybody can achieve this tip top profession and increment their web pay by:.
.
EXTRA DETAILS HERE:>>> https://extradollars3.blogspot.com/
In only 5 weeks, I worked part-time from my loft and acquired $30,030. In the wake of losing my past business, I immediately became depleted. [res-10] Luckily, I found this occupations on the web, and subsequently, I had the option to begin bringing in cash from home immediately. Anybody can achieve this tip top profession and increment their web pay by:.
.
EXTRA DETAILS HERE:>>> https://workopportunity23.blogspot.com
Well, he's right that it's not realistic. Getting both India AND Pakistan to give up their nukes is silly.
On the other hand, this is not an excuse to keep on with the arms race. We need to reduce nukes when and where we can.
Oooh, good answer.
We need to reduce hunger, poverty, violence, lies, fraud, burglary, rape, and a whole host of other things too.
I can be virtuous too.
I want to reduce my personal poverty. I'm big like that.
Giving up nukes worked out great for Ukraine.
What the hell? Let’s give up democrats too. Both would improve the world we live in.
(And they are equally likely)
Where can I find that petition to sign?
Just get them all in one place, and then nuke it.
Lol! A twofer!
Look for the words "Terms Of Unconditional Surrender," and that'll be the petition, treaty or capitulation you're looking for. That's the only way to get around the Second Amendment and deprive America's well-regulated militia from the only weapons effective for stopping Godly Imperial Japan from raping and murdering Chinese women and children and bringing Positive Christian practitioners of National Socialist genocide to pale imitation of justice.
I think I get it now. Your handle is supposed to be ironic.
Learn html.
When you abolish nukes, don't forget to also abolish all the knowledge and capabilities involved in making them.
Ukraine made an agreement in 1994 to give up their nukes in exchange for a security guarantee from Russia, US, and UK.
How'd that work out for them?
Ok until they became a militarized de facto NATO member that suppressed their Russian speaking population and let the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion run around with impunity.
Good work comrade. You must keep up the story if you don't want to tragically fall out of a window.
Da! As a comrade from Texas oblast, I know that any opposition to America's war efforts abroad are a sign of disloyalty to the country and the Party.
Are you implying that what the good Rabbi just claimed isn't what happened?
NATO promises Ukraine, Georgia entry - April 2, 2008
"“We agreed today that these countries will become members of NATO,” NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told a news conference, reading from a communique agreed at a summit of the pact’s 26 leaders in Bucharest."
"Abolish Nuclear Weapons?"
You bet, and un-ring a bell, also,
'You first.' -Every Nuclear Armed Country
I propose that everyone love everyone and stop fighting, a forum.
As that's basically what this is. Discussing utopia is not interesting.
In socialism, utopia is always one mass murder away.
That must be why the State loves nukes so much.
The State loves conscription. This was the reason for "banning" chemical weapons. In Germany and These States, it became a lot harder to goad slaves into a poison trench to die like cockroaches. Chemical weapons were set aside after much use because prison or resistance became preferable to being gassed--only to please politicians and kings seated on plush velvet thrones. Nuclear weapons can easily bake politicians and their gutless minions.
People shouldn't be mean. Prove me wrong.
There was a song about this: "The Reluctant Cannibal"
Colt made men equal.
Oppenheimer made nations equal.
^This
I unmuted you to see how you could possibly insult me for this comment, and you actually agree with me?
Fuck you you Canadian piece of dried moose shit. Go eat a pine cone.
He mutes me,
He mutes me not,
He mutes me,
He mutes me not,
He mutes me,
He mutes me not,
Peek a boo
LOL! The calling card of the disingenuous cunt. The inability to accept agreement from a critic when they (accidentally) make a valid point.
Way to ruin it, douchebag!
And nobody believes you don't read every response to your posts. If you didn't crave validation of your miserable existence, there would be no reason to continually subject yourself to such ridicule.
He boasts about muting for attention. He's self defeating like that.
He's like the girl who tries to make a guy she likes jealous by sleeping around.
Wow, did I ever laugh. Never change Sarcasmic.
Groves and Oppie ran the show, but Canadian Physicist Robert Christy came up with the solid PU pit, and Louis Alvarez (of meteor impact fame) designed the way to detonate the outer explosives within the short timeframe needed. Kistiakowsky, Ukrainian, designed the explosive lenses, drilled holes in them and injected explosive to fill defective voids. He figured it had to be done and "if 35 lbs of high explosive go off in your lap, you'll never know it." It is funny how National Socialism surrendered just in time to avoid being cooked.
12NOV1923: PRESIDENT COOLIDGE: "Of course not. The only power the government has to make a treaty comes from the Constitution, and there wouldn’t be any question about it, for any treaty that might be made, that was contrary to the provisions of the Constitution, would be absolutely void."
The question Coolidge was answering had to do with a prohibition law. Questions about prohibiting weapons involve the Second Amendment--except where manipulators have hand-picked parrots prepped to ignore the Constitution.
Section 8 of Article I of the Constitution specifies, in clause 15, that “Congress shall have the power…To provide for calling forth the militia to… repel invasions;”. Article IV, section 4 charges the United States with the responsibility to protect each of the States from invasion. Finally, Article II of the Bill of Rights guarantees that our right to “keep and bear arms”, within the context of a well regulated militia, “shall not be infringed.” While it is true that Article II of the main body of the document grants the President the power to make treaties (Section 2, clause 2), and it is also true that these treaties “shall be the supreme law of the land” (Article VI, Section 2), it is nowhere stated that this treatymaking power shall override the Bill of Rights or the main body of the Constitution. Nukes are there to use against all who seek to abolish the Constitution. Line 'em up, bring 'em on.
even asking this question seems to be disconnected with reality.
the purpose of nukes is not to use them, it is to keep them from being used against you. it is kind of "an armed society is a polite society" taken to the next level. asking if we should get rid of them is more than a little like asking if we should get rid of guns..... where only the people you have to worry about end up with them.
Why do these articles never report the results of the debate?
Being an Oxford-style debate, the audience is polled before and after. The "winner" is the person who converted more votes. Huessy (arguing for the negative) had a strong win.
. . . . . . . . . . Pre . . . . Post .. . Change
Yes . . . . . . . 28.4% . 38.3% . +9.9%
No .. . . . . . . 33.3% . 51.9% . +18.5%
Undecided . 38.3% . 9.9% . . -28.4%
The outcome is clearly Constitutional, insensitive, unwoke, unaware, unconcerned, and not supportive of totalitarian aggression in which politicians make side bets on the war from the comfort of leather chairs. Nick was perhaps forced to omit that as a matter of conscience and convenience. The Soho is essentially a trap in which libertarians are set up and ambushed by communist anarchist audiences. It is nice to see this backfiring in their faces. (https://bit.ly/3SkbRrA)