The Least Awful Option
Concern about a "limited"nuclear war
The outbreak of nuclear war has long been regarded as a virtually suicidal exchange in which the U.S. and the Soviet Union fire thousands of atomic warheads at each other, obliterate both societies and kill scores of millions. But what if one side attacked with conventional weapons and the other retaliated with just three or four nuclear missiles? How would the first nation react to that?
This kind of contingency planning for a less than total war, sometimes called the "least awful option," is attracting attention among...