Professor David Gibbs teaches this as the case that poisoned nonproliferation forever.
Libya disarmed on a promise. Libya got Sirte.
North Korea refused, built the arsenal, and now receives letters instead of bombers.
Ask an Iranian hardliner what forty days of American munitions proved and you'll get the same syllabus.
"That could lead to a whole wave of nuclear proliferation."
Which is the trap in the whole enterprise.
The war was sold on stopping a weapon that intelligence assessments kept saying wasn't being built, and it has made the argument for building one unanswerable.
David's other point deserves its own seperate post.
In 1983, a hundred million Americans watched The Day After in a single night, and it rattled Reagan enough to shape policy.
Three years later at Reykjavik his aides had to talk him out of abolishing the arsenals entirely.
His read on the Gulf pivot lands hard too.
American bases were meant to protect their hosts.
They painted targets on them instead.
