I think where @fmkaplan and @NarangVipin I are getting our wires crossed on nuclear strategy is that Fred is thinking of the SIOP Kennedy was briefed on where we hit China just to be sure, to which USMC commandant Shoup viscerally objected. Fred is right, we had that plan. /1
@fmkaplan @NarangVipin But "counterforce," the idea that we could strike military targets *first* and hope for some sort of cease-fire and "intra-war deterrence" was built in to our strategy. This was not a Reagan innovation. It was aspirational but limited by bomber slowness and missile accuracy. /2
What looks like a "counterforce revolution" later is just better technology that lets us decrease the megatonnage we're throwing at the same targets, but the idea was still to hit military targets first, limit the damage, and then melt everything else if there's no letup. /3x
PS: The real problem is that SAC targeting was so robotic and relentless that the net effect was to destroy everything anyway, because SAC didn't listen to annoying guys like "Presidents" which is why GHWB disestablished it.
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