01 OCT 07 / "It's Still a MAD World"

During the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, thousands of nuclear weapons targeted millions of people. Not surprisingly, the fundamental characteristic of this confrontation was Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). If one nation were to attack with nuclear weapons, the other would certainly retaliate -- and neither the United Sates nor the Soviet Union would survive.

Ironically, this dire scenario kept the peace for more than 40 years.

Today, as terrorists and the rogue regimes that support them ratchet up their efforts to obtain weapons of mass destruction, the United States must send a clear message that the consequences of using them against American targets would be devastating. Just as preemption is a central tenet of our national security strategy, strategic deterrence must also continue to be. Although we fighting a completely different enemy, the lessons of the Cold War are still applicable.

There are many people who believe that such a posture is provocative. They think MAD is, well, mad. But effective foreign policy is not always rational. In a recently declassified Department of Defense document entitled "The Essentials of Post-Cold War Deterrence," the Policy Subcommittee of the Strategic Advisory Group argued "that the U.S. may become irrational and vindictive if its vital interests are attacked should be part of the national persona we project to all adversaries."

We now face the threat of suitcase nukes being delivered by terrorists in a stolen UPS trucks. A bomb as powerful as the one used at Hiroshima detonated in West Los Angeles would instantly kill hundreds of thousands of Americans and cripple our economy. How can the United States deter such an attack? The only way is the declaration that a nuclear attack upon the United States will be returned in kind, mirroring the intensity and scale of the initial attack.

The Islamists would like you to believe that they cannot be deterred from attack because they care more about Islam than they do about the nation states in which they live. But they fail to understand that the American people would demand a response. In World War II, the United States and its allies killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in aerial bombing campaigns of Germany and Japan in addition to the atomic blasts at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There should be no doubt that the national will would exist to carry out a retaliatory attack. In fact, not responding would only encourage additional nuclear attacks against the United States. Portable nuclear weapons used in a series of attacks could mean the end of our civilization.

Looking back to the Cold War, revisionist historians now absurdly believe that the Soviet Union was a paper tiger and that engaging in an arms race was a conspiracy of the 'military industrial complex.' Yet the power of the Soviets during the Cold War was no illusion. They had supremacy in almost every military category. Many of the same people protested President Reagan's deployment of Pershing II missles in West Germany. Weakness is what's provocative, not strength and the willingness to use it.

Nuclear weapons proliferation is the most important national security issue we face, but it is not acceptable among the foreign policy elites to discuss the option of nuclear retaliation. If we don't start talking about it, we won't be able to prevent it. George Washington said "the only way to achieve peace is to prepare for war." The United States must be prepared to educate our enemies of the consequences of a nuclear attack on American soil.

Our terrorist enemies may be suicidal, but they still care about their native countries, their culture, and their families. MAD is certainly not fail-safe, but if Islamic terrorists were convinced that their civilization would be destroyed, they would be less likely to attack with nuclear weapons. As they threaten all that we hold dear, we must do the same. Otherwise we will be the vanquished, and they the victors. Think it won't happen? Think again. 9/11 demonstrated that the inconceivable can occur. And it's still a mad world.