How do you feel about WMDs?

[The Empire of Pretantia]

And how exactly would you deliver the virus? Bites? And any modern country worth a damn has procedures for epidemics. I'm surprised you didn't suggest the Black Death, or the genophage.

Genetically engineer it to go through mosquitoes.

And then a countermeasure would be developed. Can rabies even be changed like that?

[MERIZoC]

Get rid of 'em. MAD is ridiculous, and no way to base a society around. Some may advocate their use for defense against other countries, but more often than not, plenty of civilians are directly affected by the attack.

[Shnercropolis]

Genetically engineer it to go through mosquitoes.

And then a countermeasure would be developed. Can rabies even be changed like that?

It's infectious in the blood already, you'd just have to take a few parts from malaria and put it in, and since it's a virus someone could genetically engineer it if they really wanted to. But that's the best I could think of on the spot.

[The Empire of Pretantia]

Get rid of 'em. MAD is ridiculous, and no way to base a society around. Some may advocate their use for defense against other countries, but more often than not, plenty of civilians are directly affected by the attack.

Too late. Can't remove them from the equation until all major powers stop trying to kill each other.

An appropriate quote would be,"Now we are all sons of bitches."

[Tule]

They can be used effectively and appropriately, disregarding the morality of war and killing in the first place.

Making someone's skin blister with Mustard gas is cruel. Turning someone's bone marrow into soup with a neutron bomb is cruel.
You know what's also cruel? Shooting someone in the gut with a rifle.

That being said there are a few weapons I do thing should be banned from warfare. Landmines. Fuck landmines.

Fallout decays, Chemical weapons disperse, Anthrax can be vaccinated against. Landmines will blow some child's foot off for decades.

[Pilotto]

In war people die. Does it really matter by which means the would be corpses are helped along to their ultimate destination? If you hate killing than by all means ban war it self. I can support that. Anything less are just meaningless gestures to make your self feel good.

That's ridiculous. How would you enforce a ban on war?

[The Scientific States]

I'm loving the biased OP, and the lack of any valid arguments in the op.

I'm actually undecided on the matter. I used to be strongly opposed, but I've reconsidered, and I recognize that there are upsides and downsides to WMDs, and at the moment, I don't have a strong opinion.

[Fartsniffage]

In war people die. Does it really matter by which means the would be corpses are helped along to their ultimate destination? If you hate killing than by all means ban war it self. I can support that. Anything less are just meaningless gestures to make your self feel good.

That's ridiculous. How would you enforce a ban on war?

Sanctions. *nods*

[MERIZoC]

Get rid of 'em. MAD is ridiculous, and no way to base a society around. Some may advocate their use for defense against other countries, but more often than not, plenty of civilians are directly affected by the attack.

Too late. Can't remove them from the equation until all major powers stop trying to kill each other.

An appropriate quote would be,"Now we are all sons of bitches."

The major powers aren't really trying to kill each other right now. More mutual disarmament treaties are what we need right now, especially between India and Pakistan.

[The Empire of Pretantia]

Too late. Can't remove them from the equation until all major powers stop trying to kill each other.

An appropriate quote would be,"Now we are all sons of bitches."

The major powers aren't really trying to kill each other right now. More mutual disarmament treaties are what we need right now, especially between India and Pakistan.

Seems to me Russia's starting to go mongering for some war right now. But I agree, we don't need that many nukes.

[Estado Paulista]

Well, MAD has been proven to work. If it didn't work, we probably wouldn't be here today.

[Dooom35796821595]

Let's say we "banned" WMD's and every country with them disposed of them.What if some terrorist or country disobeys and launches them we would have no way to retaliate

Three problems:

1.) Nukes are very hard to make. There are four cornerstones required for a nation to produce nukes: know-how, capital, management, and facilities. The average country doesn't have these to the specifics necessary for producing any sort of WMD except for comparatively weak chemical and maybe radiological "dirty" bombs.
2.) The average rogue faction such as terrorists or the above nation cannot simply steal or buy these weapons. Doing so would draw the ire of every nation on Earth the moment the transaction is made, and trust me, they'll know where every nuke is.

1- they really aren't, the hard part is enriching the uranium to the high percentage needed for fission.

2- average faction like the Taliban who rarely go outside their own nation. Trust me obtaining uranium enough for one bomb is easier then anyone wants to admit to. Just look at how many devices were lost by both the US and USSR and remain lost to this day. The reason they aren't more widespread is no nation or group have a motive that ought weighs the risk.

[Terra Sector Union]

I say keep them.

[Pandeeria]

While I would prefer a WMD-free world, that's not an option. Too many countries at this point have WMDs. It's s security risk not to have them if you're a superpower, or even a regional power.

And hey, WMDs could prevent WW3 from happening.

[Viritica]

The poll's answers are loaded.

This.

Also, nuclear weapons can be a good thing. They can serve as an effective deterrent against foreign aggression and can (believe it or not ) save lives. Had we invaded Japan instead of dropping the nukes on them there would have been more deaths than Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.

[King Avalon]

As said by Wikipedia.com, a Weapon of Mass Destruction, or WMD, is a nuclear, radiological, biological, chemical or other weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to a large number of humans or cause great damage to man-made structures (e.g. buildings), natural structures (e.g. mountains), or the biosphere. These weapons, not only being able to cause massive amounts of death and destruction, can also cause harm to the Earth's environment as a whole.
Here are just a few of the problems WMDs make:

-They bring massive amounts of harm to the environment and man made structures
-They pose serious health risks (radiological cancers, mutations)
-They lead to hundreds of thousands of death
-They cause serious fear and pain (e.g blister agents)
-They break Human Rights and should not be used at all
-They are challenging, if not impossible to dispose of when activated
-Preventing them is a problem for some

Did you seriously submit your poorly written proposal for this to the General Assembly WITHOUT posting it on the GA forum for suggestions? It doesn't even follow the correct format.


It was just removed from the floor.

[Augarundus]

Tbh, I'm a bit torn on the issue of WMDs. I can't make up my mind on whether they can be justified or are even practically useful.

I'll tackle these one at a time:

Morality

1) A weapon itself is neither "moral" nor "immoral" - its just an arrangement of matter. So, there's obviously not anything "evil" about a nuke, anymore as there was something "evil" about the uranium prior to its weaponization.

2) On the other hand, WMDs are fundamentally different than other weapons. Guns can be targeted, so, theoretically, they have a clearly defined use: to deter and retaliate against aggressors. WMDs, on the other hand, will necessarily kill millions of innocents were they to be used. To have any value (even deterrent value), we'd have to plausibly accept the sacrifice of innocents. Clearly, murdering innocents is morally reprehensible, so WMDs are distinct from and more morally problematic than normal weapons.


Practicality
1) Tactically, WMDs are pretty much useless - they blow everything of value up, don't discriminate between friend/foe/civilian/military, and leave nothing behind for occupation. Strategically, though, they might confer a massive benefit upon WMD-armed nations: massive destructive power makes war a more costly endeavor, which reduces the chance of conflict. If more nations proliferate WMDs, that will presumably be an equalizer that disrupts traditional power disparities between big empires and their little victim neighbors.

2) On the other hand, WMDs have a credibility problem. Deterrence only holds true if the object of that deterrence strategy believes retaliation is plausible. If someone attempts to steal candy from me and I threaten to punch him in retaliation, they may be deterred, because that is a believable response. If, however, I threaten to burn their family and everything they love with lightning bolts coming out of my eyeballs, that's not very possible (not only because of my not being capable of doing so, but because such a response would be something of an overkill). WMDs suffer similar credibility problems - they are so extremely destructive, that nobody today really buys the possibility of a nuclear war... which eliminates the value of nuclear deterrence and serves to make war all the more likely in doing so! Putin's invasion of Crimea would never trigger the US nuclear option, so he's incentivized to keep pushing the envelope - there's no "limited nuclear war" response.


All in all, the answer on WMDs is not really clear, imo. This is an area on which there hasn't been sizable academic research in IR circles since the fall of the Soviet Union either :/

[The Greater Ohio Valley]

I have mixed feelings about them. While they have prevented large scale conventional conflicts between the worlds major powers from happening, they do have the real potential of killing a large portion of the human race, destroying civilization and causing long lasting environmental damage if they were used.

[Tule]

Tbh, I'm a bit torn on the issue of WMDs. I can't make up my mind on whether they can be justified or are even practically useful.

I'll tackle these one at a time:

Morality

1) A weapon itself is neither "moral" nor "immoral" - its just an arrangement of matter. So, there's obviously not anything "evil" about a nuke, anymore as there was something "evil" about the uranium prior to its weaponization.

2) On the other hand, WMDs are fundamentally different than other weapons. Guns can be targeted, so, theoretically, they have a clearly defined use: to deter and retaliate against aggressors. WMDs, on the other hand, will necessarily kill millions of innocents were they to be used. To have any value (even deterrent value), we'd have to plausibly accept the sacrifice of innocents. Clearly, murdering innocents is morally reprehensible, so WMDs are distinct from and more morally problematic than normal weapons.


Practicality
1) Tactically, WMDs are pretty much useless - they blow everything of value up, don't discriminate between friend/foe/civilian/military, and leave nothing behind for occupation. Strategically, though, they might confer a massive benefit upon WMD-armed nations: massive destructive power makes war a more costly endeavor, which reduces the chance of conflict. If more nations proliferate WMDs, that will presumably be an equalizer that disrupts traditional power disparities between big empires and their little victim neighbors.

2) On the other hand, WMDs have a credibility problem. Deterrence only holds true if the object of that deterrence strategy believes retaliation is plausible. If someone attempts to steal candy from me and I threaten to punch him in retaliation, they may be deterred, because that is a believable response. If, however, I threaten to burn their family and everything they love with lightning bolts coming out of my eyeballs, that's not very possible (not only because of my not being capable of doing so, but because such a response would be something of an overkill). WMDs suffer similar credibility problems - they are so extremely destructive, that nobody today really buys the possibility of a nuclear war... which eliminates the value of nuclear deterrence and serves to make war all the more likely in doing so! Putin's invasion of Crimea would never trigger the US nuclear option, so he's incentivized to keep pushing the envelope - there's no "limited nuclear war" response.


All in all, the answer on WMDs is not really clear, imo. This is an area on which there hasn't been sizable academic research in IR circles since the fall of the Soviet Union either :/

WMD's can be extremely effective as tactical weapons. Weaponized Tularemia spores infect those exposed very easily and the disease is highly incapacitating, but it is rarely fatal.
A low-yield nuclear artillery shell can totally destroy a Forward operating base while causing little damage to civilians provided that it is not located in a town or a city.
A nuclear depth charge would cause an incredible amount of damage to a fleet of warships while the fallout would quickly be diluted and rendered harmless by ocean currents.

The purpose of tactical nuclear weapons is partially to solve the credibility problem you mentioned. "Stop your advancing troops or I'll nuke them" is a much more credible threat than "stop your advancing troops or I'll wipe your country off the face of the earth".

[Shnercropolis]

Three problems:

1.) Nukes are very hard to make. There are four cornerstones required for a nation to produce nukes: know-how, capital, management, and facilities. The average country doesn't have these to the specifics necessary for producing any sort of WMD except for comparatively weak chemical and maybe radiological "dirty" bombs.
2.) The average rogue faction such as terrorists or the above nation cannot simply steal or buy these weapons. Doing so would draw the ire of every nation on Earth the moment the transaction is made, and trust me, they'll know where every nuke is.

1- they really aren't, the hard part is enriching the uranium to the high percentage needed for fission.

2- average faction like the Taliban who rarely go outside their own nation. Trust me obtaining uranium enough for one bomb is easier then anyone wants to admit to. Just look at how many devices were lost by both the US and USSR and remain lost to this day. The reason they aren't more widespread is no nation or group have a motive that ought weighs the risk.

1) The hard part is figuring out how to make one. Atomic fission is very complicated, and weaponing it in any meaningful way is even more complicated(that's why it took a few years and tons of research to do it). Try to make a nuclear bomb is a different league altogether.

[Nationes Pii Redivivi]

MAD, keeps the world in check.

[0507011209200118090114]

The mere concept of 'weapons of mass destruction' is absolutely abhorrent in all regards. It's unconditionally offensive to very idea of life. Cynicism does not justify supporting their existence, unless you desire the cruel and utter destruction of our planet's biosphere in the future. Humans are unstable and irrational creatures (hence the existence of WMDs), it is not unlikely that 'weapons of mass destruction' will contribute to the Earth's demise. Life must be recognized as more valuable than petty and unnecessary political conflicts, the latter being the only thing that benefits from WMDs.

No authority is warranted in possessing, developing, or producing these tools of extinction. China, India, the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, France, North Korea, Pakistan, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Turkey, Belgium, and Israel deserve adamant and unwavering opposition to this fatal policy. If they refuse to erase the existence of 'weapons of mass destruction', they do not represent fundamental human rights and basic respect for life. As a result, they should be disowned and completely revoked of the support for their existence.

[Nationes Pii Redivivi]

The mere concept of 'weapons of mass destruction' is absolutely abhorrent in all regards. It's unconditionally offensive to very idea of life. Cynicism does not justify supporting their existence, unless you desire the cruel and utter destruction of our planet's biosphere in the future. Humans are unstable and irrational creatures (hence the existence of WMDs), it is not unlikely that 'weapons of mass destruction' will contribute to the Earth's demise. Life must be recognized as more valuable than petty and unnecessary political conflicts, the latter being the only thing that benefits from WMDs.

No authority is warranted in possessing, developing, or producing these tools of extinction. China, India, the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, France, North Korea, Pakistan, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Turkey, Belgium, and Israel deserve adamant and unwavering opposition to this fatal policy. If they refuse to erase the existence of 'weapons of mass destruction', they do not represent fundamental human rights and basic respect for life. As a result, they should be disowned and completely revoked of the support for their existence.

Human life, or any life for that matter, has no value, and we should, as rational creatures, not view it as having any special significance at all, nor deserving of our 'respect'. As rational creatures, we should only look to what works to our benefit or harm, and WMD works tremendously to our benefit as a nation, in that it provide us with power and a tool to keep that power. Your overly emotional responce to this indicate that you are, yourself, irrational, where reason and history shows us that WMDs have kept us more at peace than it is destructive. Therefore, we have no reason for condemning other nations for acting rationally in trying to promote and preserve their national self-interest, and those that do so must face their hypocrisy, that is that they would rather have our soldiers as murderers and murdered, than have a weapon which ends war quickly, efficiently, and may not even need to be deployed to achieve advance our aims.

[Aeken]

We're stuck with them.

[The Orson Empire]

Get rid of 'em. MAD is ridiculous, and no way to base a society around. Some may advocate their use for defense against other countries, but more often than not, plenty of civilians are directly affected by the attack.

Unfortunately, it is simply Human nature to go to war with one another. MAD keeps this from happening, and it is primarily the reason why there has been world peace ever since the end of WWII.