Rethinking the unthinkable – revisiting theories of nuclear deterrence and escalation

Abstract

By the 1970s and especially into the eighties, the ideas of these thermonuclear Jesuits would have so thoroughly percolated through the corridors of power [...] that, at least among fellow members of the congregation, their wisdom would be taken almost for granted, their assumptions worshipped as gospel truth, their insight elevated to an almost mystical level and accepted as dogma. [...] [for they were the men who pondered mass destruction, who thought about the unthinkable, who invented nuclear strategy]. (Kaplan 1983: p. 11)