Day 8 of political science this semester is all about nuclear war. My professor began the lecture talking about how Putin’s recent speech threatened the usage of nukes if NATO sends its troops into Ukraine. War, as he describes it, is a condemnation of humanity. War just doesn’t make sense to my professor, killing for territory and to relive the glory of the Soviet Union is just wrong and nonsensical. He is, personally, very anti-war (sort of) and is hoping our generation will be different. After this he started the lecture.
We first learned about strategic bombardment, which is concerned with targeting the centre of an enemy rather than the periphery, you attack the capitals. This was a strategy from Giulio Douhet. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were brought up as examples of this strategy being utilized, yes Tokyo is the capital but it was already bombed to hell at the time so I guess the next best targets were those two cities. Apparently my professor visited Hiroshima and saw the site, so when he hears Putin talk about nukes he knows it’s serious. Before this section ended we learned about Massive Retaliation, AKA Mutually Assured Destruction. This led to the Russians (he never really refers to them as Soviets) developing their own arms to keep pace. Mutual assured destruction denies the enemy from achieving their goals and imposes huge costs. He then asked us if we were comfortable with countries having nuclear weapons, like the US. Do we trust Biden? No one really answered. There was then a tangent about hope North Korea has made itself very impenetrable, they cannot be messed with. He then told us that Ukraine used to have nukes too but they gave them away to Russia for safety guarantees. A student then made a joke that the deal was clearly violated by Putin and not upheld. My professor then said that he believes Ukraine should’ve kept its nuclear arsenal.
Next we learned about ICBMs, intercontinental ballistic missiles. Im sure you all know much more about this weaponry than I do but what was said in class was: ICBMs have the capability of destroying humanity and civilization, the can have multiple war heads in jut one missile (MIRVs), and that ICBMs make Hiroshima and Nagasaki look like playtime. He then mentioned the other acronyms: ALBM, ALCM, and SLBM, all different kinds of missiles. Next there was the differences between passive and active defence; passive meaning stuff like bunkers, he mentioned how political leaders and the billionaire class will be saved during nuclear fallout (yes, he used the term “billionaire class”); active defence is shooting down missiles, basically the “Iron Dome” which failed due to being overwhelmed by Hamas rockets. Then we looked at the targets of nukes: counter value targets and counter force. So counter value targets are your cities, communication hubs, intelligence areas too; counter force is related to the nuclear first strike, thats all we really went over. First strike is just if you want to win you have to hit first. He then gave an example scenario that if you were in a nuclear war with the US you would target Washington D.C. He then went on a tangent that the White House was very disappointing to see, in the movies it looks so clean and nice but in reality it is apparently located in a very shitty neighborhood. He then talked about how in the 70s and 80s the Americans developed a bomb that would kill all organic life while leaving buildings intact, this bomb was called the Neutron bomb. When people found out about this bomb there were mass protests against nuclear. Protesters in Germany became MPs and eventually formed the Green Party which was environmentalist and promoted peace. Nowadays the Green Party is less about peace but still focuses on the environment. Little do they know war is detrimental to the environment and continuing to support both Israel and Ukraine goes against their environmental values they supposedly have.
Next is limited nuclear war, which is fairly self explanatory: doing war with limited means. Nuclear weapons would be used only on the battlefield, so only tactical nukes, short range. Anyway he went on about Putin again, he seems absolutely terrified about nukes being used. A student asked if the reason America has so many military bases around the world is because they want to plant nukes there for potential use, my professor said no and the reason for those bases is promises of protection. He then mentioned how America has a Nuclear Umbrella over Canada… what? I don’t know how comfortable I feel about that, to be honest. I understand it’s supposedly for protection, but if we didn’t ally ourselves with the Americans so much we probably wouldn’t need this umbrella. Maybe I’m being overdramatic…
The last things we covered before the seminars were extended deterrence and minimum deterrence. Extended deterrence is what South Korea has, using nukes to deter attacks on allies; minimum deterrence is a country having the minimum ability to cause damage via nukes. Rationality, capability, credibility, and commitment are needed for proper deterrence. He then asked the class if Kim Jung Un was rational, no one really answered expect one student saying “it depends on your stance.” What did he mean by that? Maybe what your definition of rational is, I guess. The discussion didn’t goo further as we kicked off with seminars.
Tuning out the seminars is quite difficult for me. I tried to do so anyway because these seminars just can’t stop taking digs at the DPRK, China, Russia, etc. To me this whole thing is exhausting. Coming to school everyday is exhausting, and not because of the assignments.
I feel like I have to do extra work compared to other students because I am on my own. I cannot rely on fellow students or even my professors as my existence in this school is a contradiction. My being goes against what this university seems to stand for (see the library display) and I am unable to be my authentic self unlike my fellow students. They can be honest and have support but I can’t. If I spoke up in class against any misinformation/propaganda I would get clobbered. I can’t seek mentorship, proper mentorship, and support from my professors because if they knew they would pull away. I can only rely on myself and it’s so hard.
Yes, you all help me with whatever I ask so much and I appreciate it more than you could possibly know, but it’s different. I have no one in my physical vicinity and that sucks. Sure, I told my political science professor about how I wanted to teach Marxism, but thats as far as it can go, he doesn’t know more than that except for what I write in my papers. I see reactionary nonsense and know I have no one here in my corner. If students dogpiled me in class my professors would shut it down but that doesn’t stop them from doing it outside the class too. I can only be myself in secrecy and in my papers/assignments. That’s not feasible in the long term and it’s already taking its toll. I will graduate, but I wont come out unscathed. I’ll keep my head down to avoid physical harm, but the mental scars will be deep and prolonging, if that makes sense.
Anyway thats the end of my notes. Apologies for the personal rant at the end. If you’re curious about what transpired with the library display and what my professors had to say about it, look out for an update post in comradeship soon.
For those interested, one of the seminars was covering the paper “Beyond the pivot” by Kevin Rudd and it was the only seminar that had a proper and well thought out critique of the article.
Also, please feel free to point out any spelling/grammatical mistakes! My keyboard is ass and I want to make sure my posts aren’t too insane to interpret.
This is just false. I don't understand how your professor can just say something that is demonstrably wrong and not get challenged in class. And if no one else does it then you should. It is irresponsible to let a lie that big slide. Ukraine never had nukes. The Soviet Union did. The fact that they were stationed in Ukraine does not make them Ukraine's as Ukraine never had the codes or the technical infrastructure to be able to use those nukes, Only Moscow did.
The "security guarantees" that Ukraine got also stipulated that Ukraine would remain a neutral state and that went out the window in 2014 when they became a US puppet state after the fascist coup.
As someone living in Germany i have to tell you you are being lied to. The Greens don't give a shit about the environment, they turned off Germany's nuclear power plants which resulted in a massive upsurge in use of coal and gas. They are also not just "less about peace" they are straight up warmongers, unhinged foaming at the mouth calling for Nazi level rearmament and all out war with Russia over Ukraine and China over Taiwan. They are US puppets and NATO cheerleaders.
I also have to say i don't get the impression at all that your professor is anti-war or afraid of use of nuclear weapons as he claims, else he wouldn't be doing apologetics for US bases and US nuclear umbrella over other countries. He seems to just be a paranoid russophobe and a dyed-in-the-wool supporter of US imperialism. The fact that someone like that is allowed to teach this class just shows how much of an indoctrination mill western universities are when it comes to anything remotely political.
Stuff like this is said in every class unchallenged because no one knows it’s wrong. I would call it out but I’m honestly not brave enough. I was more confident during my first semester (same professor) but the energy in this class is different, it’s more hostile. The students are, not the professor. During my first semester I did call him out on his anti-China statements quite a bit (especially when he claimed Trudeau loved China). Honestly, my safest bet is to bring his mistakes up in office hours to avoid student ridicule.
I did roll my eyes during the “Green Party” discussion. While I don’t know their history I do know their actions now. He did downplay their warmongering and lack of environmental care but thats just how it goes in this class. He usually makes statements without context because the context criticizes western imperialism, its unfortunate but with this being my second class with him I’m not super surprised.
With his anti-war stuff, maybe I used the wrong term but it’s how he describes himself. He condemns war and thinks it doesn’t make sense, but he seems fine with whatever the US is doing. Then again maybe he avoids criticisms because he’s a professor an must remain neutral? But that doesn't work since he takes a lot of opportunities to shit on both Putin, China, and North Korea. I actually called him out on his anti-China statements during our office hours together, he said something bout him being neutral with China and I straight up said “no you’re no, you talk a lot about China in class. Come on…” His anti-war sentiments go out the window for me considering how he acts about the Ukraine war, he’s not against the library display which glorifies the thing he supposedly condemns and he’s also fond of the Ukrainian scholar who was invited to give a talk about the war. He’s not an outlier either, my history professors so far seem to be on the same page too (shitting on China, Russia, the Soviet Union, supporting the war in Ukraine, etc.).
Unfortunately, you’ll find that every post I make here about my classes will have some amount of errors, there’s just no way to avoid it. It really does feel like a propaganda machine especially due to the fact the school itself approves of Ukrainian Soldier poster displays with the OUN flag. It goes deeper than just the staff…