WILL U.S. USE NUKES TO DEFEND ALLIES?

Yale Prof. Paul Bracken says there are increasing doubts among our allies that the U.S. has either the political will or military power to defend all of the big world we’re in. They ask if the U.S. would really use nuclear weapons to defend them against China or North Korea when China has the ability to destroy the United States. In the next few years, there will be three nuclear superpowers with India possibly joining the club. We’re used to being one of two nuclear superpowers but it’s now a different world. The Chinese are highly focused on Taiwan in a way the Pentagon is not. We’re still pouring billions into maintaining armies, ships and planes. The Chinese are not. China is cutting the size of their infantry army. They skipped the generation of tanks, radar, jet fighters to pour money into cyber warfare, hypersonic missiles, and A.I. Bracken asks what would we do if we got into a serious crisis with a weak national security team and President? There’s not a lot you can do in bureaucracy without challenging civilian control of the military and this leadership could get worse in a second Biden Administration. Some are afraid of a nuclear version of the exit from Afghanistan. Bracken says we are moving into a more dangerous world and we don’t even recognize what many of these dangers are.

GUEST: YALE PROF. AND AUTHOR PAUL BRACKEN

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