We've had no WW3 (so far) and no one here needs to worry about being drafted into a war. Gatling might have thought his gun would reduce the number of war fatalities, but but Oppenheimer thought he would end the world. Both were wrong.
Alternative take: Inventors are bad at predicting the downstream societal effects of their inventions.
Since this result is presumably inevitable at increasing frequency, it's more like nukes prevented another major world war and stole a form of peace from the future, temporarily. That peace debt might be repaid with the end of everything.
My question is, how low is that probability, exactly? Because the tradeoff looks very different if it’s one in a million per year, versus one in a hundred per year.
My assessment, looking at the history and the close calls, is that it’s more like one in a hundred.
At least, it gives impunity to attack others with less fear of retaliation…
here meaning the US or HN?
Lots of talk in the UK recently about conscription.
The Americans wanted to keep it all to themselves you know...