Strategy and Doctrine
Second Strike Doctrine
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Second strike, or retaliatory strike capability, is a nuclear strategy doctrine under which a power builds and postures its nuclear forces to survive an adversary's first strike intact enough to deliver a devastating retaliatory blow, which is what deters the adversary from attempting that first strike at all. The RAND strategist Albert Wohlstetter's 1958 paper The Delicate Balance of Terror was highly influential in shaping this thinking within the US strategic establishment.
Facts
Core ClaimA nuclear power that can absorb a first strike and still deliver a devastating retaliatory blow deters an adversary from ever attempting that first strike. 1 Origin Year1958 marks Albert Wohlstetter's influential RAND paper The Delicate Balance of Terror; the broader second-strike concept was not fixed to this one paper alone in the sources checked, so this date is recorded as the doctrine's most influential early articulation rather than an uncontested single origin. Cross-Tradition Connections
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Second Strike
Wikipedialead paragraphQuote, lead paragraph
In nuclear strategy, a retaliatory strike or second-strike capability is a country's assured ability to respond to a nuclear attack with powerful nuclear retaliation against the attacker.
2. Wikipedia: Albert Wohlstetter
Wikipediacareer/RAND sectionQuote, career/RAND section
highly influential in shaping the thinking of the Washington foreign policy establishment, particularly in its emphasis on the looming threat of Soviet attack
Wikipedia: Mutual Assured Destruction
WikipediaAssociated With: Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD), lead paragraphQuote, Associated With: Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD), lead paragraph
a full-scale use of nuclear weapons by an attacker on a nuclear-armed defender with second-strike capabilities would result in the complete annihilation of both the attacker and the defender
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