Immature leaders could prompt Second Korea War
Here’s the scenario. Late one evening Donald Trump is watching Fox News and a report comes on that North Korea is planning to launch a missile that can reach the United States. (Kim Jong Un’s regime has said it is going to do that one of these days – but only as a test flight landing in the ocean somewhere, not as an attack.)
Trump misunderstands, and thinks Pyongyang is going to launch a missile AT the US. After all, there was a graphic with the report that shows the trajectory of the North Korean missile reaching the US, and Trump trusts Fox much more than his own intelligence services. So he orders all US strategic forces to go to DEFCON 1: Defence Readiness Condition One – nuclear war is imminent.
The North Koreans spot all the unusual activity in the American forces – leave cancelled in
Strategic Air Command, US nuclear subs in port sailing with zero warning leaving part of their crews behind, etc – and conclude that an American pre-emptive attack is imminent.
The North Koreans go to their own equivalent of DEFCON 1: Mobilising and dispersing their armed forces, evacuating their leadership from the capital to some bunker in the countryside, and so on. American intelligence reports all this activity, and this time Trump actually listens to them. So he orders a disarming strike on all North Korean nuclear weapons and facilities. With US nuclear weapons, of course. Nothing else would do the job.
That’s how the Second Korean War starts. Not many Americans would be killed, and probably no civilians, because in fact North Korea doesn’t yet have any longrange missiles that can accurately WORLD VIEW and Kelly are serious, experienced and professional military officers, and it would be a dereliction of duty for them not to ensure that there is always at least one responsible adult between Trump and the nuclear button.
If one of these generals actually found himself in the position of having to stop Trump, he would face an agonising decision. All his training tells him that he must obey civilian authority, and he will certainly be court-martialled if he disobeys a presidential order. On the other hand, he must not allow millions of human beings to die because of a stupid mistake.
I’m sure they think about it, and I doubt that any of them knows which way he would actually jump if the situation
If one of these generals actually found himself in the position of having to stop Trump, he would face an agonising decision.