More Thomas Schelling
Fred Kaplan over at Slate.com gave Nobel laureate Thomas Schelling quite a dust-up earlier this week, criticizing Schelling for the “crucial role he played in formulating the strategies of “controlled escalation” and “punitive bombing” that plunged our country into the war in Vietnam.”
Tim Harford, who sang Schelling’s praises earlier this week, has responded today over at OpenDemocracy.net.
What Kaplan doesn’t mention is that Schelling contributed to the taboo against the use of nuclear weapons. In the 1950s the Eisenhower administration repeatedly insisted that there was no difference in kind between nuclear and conventional arms. Schelling emphasised the importance of pre-commitments, taboos and lines in the sand, helping to establish the convention that nuclear weapons could never be used in a situation like Vietnam. We should remember how much worse Vietnam could have been: better controlled escalation than uncontrolled.
LINK to Harford’s piece at OpenDemocracy.net.
LINK to Kaplan’s piece at Slate.com.
