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This week, and tbh the last few years, have proven to me that the potential for nuclear conflict is all but certain now that militaries and governments are realising that decisive battles or overwhelming missile exchanges are infeasible.

In an age of a few hundred warheads per country rather than many thousands, there are simply too many targets to hit all at once, especially with improvements to aerial defenses and early warning systems that necessitate multiple launches to saturate a single target. If you're unlucky, your entire arsenal could be depleted and your enemy will strike back along with anyone who now realises your "deterrent" has been entirely spent.

Similarly, both Iran and Israel (beyond the initial strikes) are now in a stage of ammunition consumption aimed at maximising attrition for the other and minimising it for themselves. Iran could spaff out hundreds of missiles in an hour but would also run dry within a few days at best, before losing its entire offensive potential which would make it much safer to repair or build new airbases, or even occupy territories outside of the cover of interceptors.

A limited or tactical nuclear strike, however, keeps your nuclear arsenal intact for any response whilst limiting said response - If Israel were to nuke an Iranian nuclear facility, they could reliably get away with it whilst only compromising trade and tourism that would be hit by sanctions. For an Israeli prime minister convinced the alternative is capitulation to Iranian nuclearisation, that may be worth the cost.

Iran also limits the use of strategic and advanced weapons, not just because they will fare better against air defenses that are exhausted and damaged, but because those weapons have ranges and capabilities that could pose a risk to a new threat, such as the Diego Garcia air base, or anywhere the US may want to launch attacks from. Keeping open the Strait of Hormuz keeps neutral powers out of the fight, too, but offers a future deterrence that may be wasted now.

Without the promise of a phyrric exchange that would make any victorious army inherit an irradiated hellscape now gone, countries have minimised warheads and developed some that offer variable levels of power ("dial-a-yield"). This only further encourages their use once you realise that some of the lowest nuclear bomb yields are comparable to already-deployed conventional weapons!

Israel has already dropped the equivalent of 6 nuclear bombs on Gaza, more or less depending on what yield you choose. In theory, the level of suffering and devastation could have been less if they did so, as modern thermonuclear warheads create much less fallout than older designs. Whereas in Gaza right now there are toxic chemicals and metals in the soil, dust, and water to ensure that even if the war stopped today and aid was flooded in, we would see generations inflicted with cancer and genetic disease. That is the abhorrent level of suffering we have to contend with without nuclear weapons.

So, while we live in a post-MAD age where nukes were seen as unthinkable, we have now entered another age where their use does not guarantee a chain reaction, and where wars are fought on doctrines of attrition.

Perhaps a less doomer (though bleak) outlook is that nuclear weapons are no longer universally effective deterrents? NATO still felt like they could encroach on Russia (and even directly support a war with it), India and Pakistan still felt comfortable with days of skirmishing and ballistic exchanges, and Iran struck Israel twice before now despite not having any deterrent beyond conventional missiles. Nukes arent obsolete, but if they do not deter enemies and do not immediately defeat them, then proliferating them may not be as cost effective as once considered.