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Originally Posted by Cooling
Certainly the use of these weapons is morally indefensible, noone would dispute that. ?
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I'll dispute it. Nuclear weapons are just a bigger version of normal bombs, and their use would be justifiable in many situations. Hiroshima would be the classic example - when you want to win a war, its better to kill lots of the other side than to force your soliders to lose their lives. Even today, I see no a priori reason to completely rule out the use of nuclear weapons- it would be very bad move in most situations for purely pragmatic reasons (mainly the risk of being hit back, and the effect it would have on world opinion), but there may still be situations where it would be justified. A preemptive strike on Iran or North Korea would be worth considering if there were good reasons to believe they were about to acquire nuclear capabilities, and if we could disregard the pragmatic factors* and focus entirely on moral issues, nuking a Chinese city if they invaded Taiwan would probably be a decent idea.
* starting world war 3 and probably ending the civilised world
Anyway, most of his points seem pretty silly. Its easy to be against nuclear weapons when youre on a fairly insignificant island in the middle of nowhere. If a country sharing borders with the soviet union had been against them, I'd be more impressed. I'm struggling to think of good reasons why New Zealand even needs an army, let alone nuclear capabilites.
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You might argue that it is idealistic to suggest that alternative avenues are possible; nuclear weapons will always exist and in that you would be right. But does not equate with a justification of their existance.
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I dont think this makes sense. If something already exists, and will continue to exist no matter what you do, then what are you actually asking for when you talk about justifications? What is the justification for the colour red or Neptune existing? Nothing - theyre just brute facts that youre going to have to live with.