Marc Ambinder Profile picture
Jul 3, 2018 9 tweets 3 min read Read on X
A week out from publication of The Brink, about NATO’s almost-accidental war with the USSR in 1983. Up at 3am to do East Coast radio interviews. @WICN905 is first! No shame here in asking you fine people to buy the book. It’s a bracing read and it’s relevant. #newbooks #nato
The reviews have been humbling. The book shows how Reagan figured out how to handle the Soviets without compromising his principles, how spies telling truths saved the day, how intelligence and diplomacy mattered and why we must pay urgent attention (even today) to nuke cmd/ctrl
There are similarities between Reagan and @realDonaldTrump - and significant differences, too. Reagan prepared, hard, and continuously and ceaselessly (if imperfectly executed) sought to understand what the USSR truly feared and needed from arms control agreements.
Real brinksmanship was the result of a mismatch between his political objectives and the unrelenting machine that the nuclear command and control system (and its priests at the time) had put together. Aligning the two and building domestic support for treaties was the hard part.
Huge differences between now/then: Trump has an affinity for Russia/Putin and is hostile (!) to NATO. But both countries rampaging forward with nuclear modernization. Arsenals get more deadly. Trigger fingers, more itchy. Decision/deliberation are subordinate to hasty responses.
and the US has still obligations to defend NATO from aggression. Those will outlast this President. In the Baltics. In Crimea. In Britain, even.
BTW: Reagan did not EVER want a summit for the sake of a summit even though he impulsively (I mean this as a compliment) wanted to use his political skills to convince Russia that he meant no harm. He rejected summits for their own sake and insisted on deliverables.
NATO unity was no sure thing, even in 1983, but Reagan knew how important it was to project a unified posture, to involve allies and court them, and to understand the threat of war from their perspective.
For a good sense of the stakes, read @steven_pifer, especially on the INF treaty's current fragility and desperate need to think about how to renew START (which expires in less than 3 years). brookings.edu/blog/order-fro…

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More from @marcambinder

Aug 14, 2022
So, nuclear classification issues. For the @NNSAHruby equities - National Nuclear Security Administration, part of the @ENERGY department, @CherylRofer has a great explainer. As @wellerstein and others have explained exhaustively, a lot of information about nuclear weapons is.
Born classified. That is, by statute, not by executive order, it is protected national defense information. NNSA and DOE declassify various bits ... like, "the yield from this test was x" or "ablative laser refraction is used to help develop more precisely implosion technologies.
These documents don't usually make their way to the White House. They have to do with the technical specifications of nukes, their vulnerabilities, the science of the Super, etc. The most sensitive category of Restricted Data is probably Sigma 14.
Read 19 tweets
Nov 4, 2021
Thread: this isn't a pattern from the noise. During the last few months, the Biden administration has aggressively ramped up its cyber defense and cyber offense efforts, throwing attack groups for a loop.
(1) There was a still-secret national security decision directive ordering a whole-of-government offensive counter cyber intrusion campaign. # (2) Acknowledged offensive Cybercom operations targeting major ransomware firms (reuters.com/technology/exc…)
(3) Aggressive moves to curtail the use of spyware. (See the NSO story today.
Read 9 tweets
Nov 3, 2021
If voters "just knew the truth" is seductive and reductive and gives the media omnipotence (also, weirdly, does the same for the anti-media (the GOP machine)..while giving voters zero agency and treating them like dolts.
The right wing anti-media machine exists. It's powerful. It's asymmetrically powerful. It hurts Dems sometimes. Grieving about it makes a lot of consultants rich. The account that it's *dispositive* fails to plausibly explain so many counter-examples and is unpersuasive.
How much coverage did the VA media give to Youngkin's ties to Trump relative to the GOP gaslighting on schools? I'd be interested in a qualitative and quantitative breakdown. A few selective online headlines from @WashPost don't count. Also, the polls were right this time.
Read 5 tweets
Nov 3, 2021
Others are thinking: If Dems in Congress had passed really the popular stuff that helps eveything, and could point to it, rather than having to rely on/mess up their anti-Trump /cultural messaging - and Dems mess this up regardless of what side you're on ....
Of course there is no single reductive answer as to why... but only the absolute fact that Dems lost to a candidate they had every reason to think they could beat...
The limits of Trump's stench. Macker's campaign. Frustration with Dems in Congress. Gaslighting from the right. Fairly good campaign by Youngkin. Dems lost the salience wars.
Read 4 tweets
Mar 25, 2021
The #AspenInfoCommission on the infodemic will be extraordinarily valuable and the commissioners are first-rate. I wish I was had been selected, but seeing the caliber of the scholars and thinkers who were, I don’t feel put out. I feel obliged to help, where I can.
My focus continues to be on pragmatic intervention: what the ordinary person can do to model good information processing habits, mindful social communication, and effective claim reviews and fact-checking. For a subset: information operations, response matrices, org dynamics.
I see criticism of the commission for adding a few high-profile public figures with deep intuitive knowledge of the press and communication. I know that Aspen is Aspen and is going to Aspen, but I see value in the perspectives.
Read 4 tweets
Jan 18, 2021
A Threat About the Nuclear Transfer of Power: When President Trump departs Joint Base Andrews at 8:00 am on 1/20, he will be accompanied by a military aide and an emergency actions team, never more than 2 doors or 2 minutes away... for the last time.
Simultaneously, as Joe Biden and Kamala Harris begin their day and prepare to depart for the U.S. Capitol, two teams of military aides -- with two other satchels -- will shadow them.
As VP Pence departs in a motorcade from the Naval Observatory, a FOURTH team from the White House Military Office will ride a few cars behind him.
Read 26 tweets

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