“Man has killed man from the beginning of time, and each new frontier has brought new ways and new places to die. Why should the future be different?”

So when is the right moment to use nuclear weapons? Sure, I’ve explained the best way to use them as an offensive weapon, but the whole concept of nuclear deterrent is that it can be used defensively. But, as Mr Hacker so aptly put, how can one defend oneself by committing suicide?

Using a nuclear weapon has quite a few problems, for instance the minimum range. Before using a nuke one has to be certain the fallout won’t affect that person, country, institution, or whatever is that ‘one’ negatively. For example, in theory, Latvia would never be able to nuke Lithuania as the bang would be too big – it would be like nuking oneself, hardly a bright idea. In modern times this minimum range requirement causes a huge problem: the nuke has to reach far enough from the position it was fired from before any chance of interception. There is hardly any point in Norway nuking Moscow if the nuclear missile is intercepted above the Baltic Sea or a few miles from Riga or Tallinn. It’s even worse if Finland were to try to nuke Ukraine and the nuke would barely reach the Gulf of Finland before someone shot it down or caused it to detonate. It’s like playing tennis with an extremely high net – sure there is a tiny chance you’ll get the ball over, but more likely it’s going to drop right back down at you. Even if you get it far enough from you, it still has only a small chance of hitting the designated target.

The aforementioned examples are naturally probably never ever going to have even the measliest probabilities of having the possibility of happening, but the concept of nuke-blocking does work. And in a defensive position it is a very real problem as the aggressor is most probably prepared for any possible nuclear launches and is ready to shoot down any nukes before they become a threat to the aggressor. In the worst case scenario, the aggressor has to make a temporary tactical retreat due to scorched (or rather radiated) earth. To those that do not know what a scorched earth tactic is, it is the simple concept of destroying all infrastructure (buildings, roads, pipelines, power lines) while falling back. This makes it more difficult for the other party (the hostile army) to pursue or rehabitate the land.

In the end, it is obviously wiser not to use nuclear weapons, unless one no longer cares about one’s own future – anyone who actually used weapons of mass destruction would either get a taste of their own medicine or get to taste the medicine in different flavours (other models of the same weapon/retaliation attacks). This is partly with the exception of the United States – a country as powerful and large as that can probably nuke a smaller country without causing too severe consequences to the country itself. Unless it strikes at an ally or an another powerful state.

But if it is wiser not to use them, why have them? Well, to put it simply, it is to force salami tactics. Nobody actually wants to confront an enemy with nukes, not in a large-scale war at the very least. So the only option is to go slice by slice, giving the defendant a chance to recover from the initial attack and call upon its allies to kick the aggressor’s backside all the way back to wherever it used to be before the military conflict. Without the power of a nuclear threat, it could be easy to overtake a whole country by storm (or Blitzkrieg), but such aggression would only cause nuclear retaliation if it is possible. The difference is the amount of pressure put on the weakening country and its diplomatic and military options – the more options, the less likely it is that a nuclear weapon will be used. Basically, nuclear weapons are necessary for causing longer wars.