Winning the Nuclear Game Against Putin’s Russia
It’s a question of who would strike whom first, and who would enter the fray.
Game theory?
Photographer: Chris McGrath/Getty Images EuropeLast week I discussed nuclear game theory with Vipin Narang, a professor of political science at MIT and author of “Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era.” If we agreed on one thing, it was that nuclear war is not a game. “It’s really about a strategic logic,” Narang explained, “how your adversary behaves based on your moves and how you react to their reaction to your moves.”
President Donald Trump meets with Kim Jong Un in Vietnam next week. I don’t expect to see much strategic logic when the self-proclaimed “best negotiator in the world” sits down with the monomaniacal leader of a starving police state. I also don’t consider North Korea a viable nuclear threat to the U.S. or its allies. Kim may be unhinged, but he doesn’t seem the suicidal type.