Alex WellersteinVerified account

Did either curtail their strategic weapon deployments? Did either slow their military progress? Did either say, "hey, we better ease up"?

Not one bit. But they did do something: they developed semi-automated systems that could guarantee nuclear strike in case of decapitation.

They developed hair-trigger alerts, launch-on-warning, deep bunkers, etc. They developed the means to remain credibly dangerous.

Read @thedeadhandbook 's Dead Hand for details on Soviet mindset, and the dangerous ends to which their fears of decapitation led them.

So I don't have a clue what DPRK will do. But I don't think history suggests to us that threatening decapitation will do anything positive.

Here's a 21st century joke: What's more dangerous than a nuclear-armed North Korean dictator?

A nuclear-armed North Korean early-warning system!

We do, incidentally, have historical templates for how to deescalate, how to disarm. But they involve parties feeling safer, not afraid.

And they involve solutions that work to mutual benefit. E.g., actual diplomacy, actual "deals" (not one-sided grifts), mutual empathy.

Anyway, I don't claim to know how to get from here to here. And I can see — of course — the value in saying to DPRK, "we can threaten you."

But it seems unlikely to me that they aren't acutely aware of that already. And if you make them think you are planning preemptive attack...