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Comment by MisterBastahrd | Hacker News Reader

The entire purpose of nuclear armaments is to make certain wars too nasty to fathom engaging in. If their organization didn't exist at all, we'd still have exactly the same number of nuclear war casualties since the 1940s.

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The net result of this has enabled nuclear powers to engage in asymmetric wars against countries that don't have nukes, or to engage in proxy wars between nuclear superpowers. Meanwhile, we heave come perilously close to nuclear armageddon, with Stanislav Petrov standing in the way.

So make everyone a nuclear power?

(Considering what's been happening in Ukraine and Palestine I would like for the Netherlands to obtain nukes. If we ever get invaded we can at least take out 50 million of the enemy with us to hell).

Interdependence via global trade makes it unlikely that without nuclear weapons we would have nearly the number of wars we had in the 1940s.

In 1913, Norman Angell published a book called "The Great Illusion" in which he argued that the use of military force had become economically futile due to the interconnectedness of international finance and trade. World War I started one year later. Trade and interconnectedness probably have a net positive effect on reducing war, but not a reliable guarantee.

Thats not a thing though is it? Sanctions aren’t affecting Russia in any capacity.

Sanctions are hurting Russia financially. Putin doesn't care because he can extract wealth from oligarchs in whatever manner he sees fit. That's the benefit of being a dictator who has a wealth of knowledge on how to watch his own back after his career in intelligence work. He'll just tell his people to create some propaganda and everyone will fall into line.

Sanctions aren’t affecting Russia in any capacity.

Definitely false. They were never the slam dunk that they were supposed to be, and it's true to say their effect has been significantly blunted. But that's not the same as "no effect". It's just turned out to be a comparatively mild one (but important nonetheless).

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