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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   1952 thread views

Transnational Thursday for January 18, 2024

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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I thought Japan was ‘in theory 36 hours, but they’d have to get all their people in a room together so more like a week in practice?’

I definitely agree that if Iran decided they needed a nuclear weapon now, they could have one in less than a year. But 3, 6, and 8 months are very different timeframes with very different implications.

This is one area where if Kishida stays in power in Japan things will stay interesting. Abe talked about Japan hosting nukes but Kishida has been powerfully in favor of nuclear de-armament his whole life and has helped lead international efforts in that space. He was actually the Congressional representative from Hiroshima so it's personal for him and his constituents. That said, his reputation as a lifelong dove in general enabled him to finally boost defense spending without any real complaints, whereas when Abe tried to do the same he understandably made everyone nervous. So Kishida's anti-weapon, anti-war credentials ironically makes the citizenry trust him more to be responsible with actually wielding weapons and war. Nukes are still totally unthinkable for now, but in a situation many steps down the road with a lot of other factors changing plus a national emergency, he's still the highest potential leader they've ever had to facilitate an unthinkable situation.

My estimation for Japan is basically, 1 week to finalize a design (assuming they don't already have one on file), a second week to gather the necessary materials/personnel, and then 4 - 6 weeks to actually build, test, and deploy a handful of functional bombs.

The timeline for Iran is a lot hazier simply because the available information is far less reliable. Though I do agree with you regarding the implications.

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