"The last thing we want is a smoking gun. A gun smokes after it has been fired." -- Donald Rumsfeld

In a recent Winds of Change post, I pulled together a lot of Parapundit's recent work on deterrence theory and how it applies to Saddam et. al. Gideon's Blog, which has always impressed me with its quality and consistency, responded. His outlook is not promising, but he makes his points well. Here's his conclusion:

"Let's take a deep breath and realize that this generation is going to live through at least one nuclear war. Yes: live through. I live in New York, so my odds are a little lower; if I lived in New Delhi or Tel Aviv, my odds would be lower still, but even there the odds aren't bad. Nuclear munitions are more likely to be used against American aircraft carriers than American cities. And when they are used, we will not respond by destroying the world. That's the reality of ordinary warfare in the future. And we've got to be able to talk about it before we'll be ready to fight it. And we've got to be ready to fight it if we're going to have a prayer of not having to."

The only thing I disagree with is the likely choice of targets. You'll want to read the whole post to see how he came to his conclusions.