After reading this, I am left wondering whether most tourists really are prohibited and how I might find that out. The US has visa waivers with 39 countries, including Germany, Japan, Holland, England, Australia, Canada and many other countries. It seems plausible to me that most tourists actually enter under the visa waiver program.
That said, it is a curious fact that a tourist without a visa can legally shoot at a range but the same person, if they come back as a student, can't.
I'm of the opinion that civilian prohibitions on nuclear weapons are ultimately unenforceable.
Sure, if you can stop them before it is complete, and it's hard to build one of these in secret, then you have a solid case. This is why you do your development and build in some facility in international waters or some other difficult to control place. This is starting to sound supervillain-ish, but sometimes you just gotta be that way.
The instant they have a functional nuclear explosive device, however, they are now a state-level actor and outside of conventional law.
Nukes are the Sam Colt of international diplomacy.
And much like the Torment Nexus, someone will eventually build it, because if they don't then someone else will, and then you'll be behind the ball.
> To be specific: in a scenario where you need light weapons (or, to take it to the theoretical extreme, nukes), would laws actually get in your way, whatever they are? That would be by definition a situation where the law no longer matters. Insurgencies and war-making efforts succeed or fail for lots of reasons — and “darn it, the government said we’re not allowed to have RPGs” is never one of them.
>
> “What about nukes” is an interesting theoretical question. In practice, the idea behind it never matters. If you reach a situation where it’s useful to have weapons way outside of today’s status quo, that’s exactly the situation where you’ll to be able to acquire those weapons no matter what the law says.
After reading this, I am left wondering whether most tourists really are prohibited and how I might find that out. The US has visa waivers with 39 countries, including Germany, Japan, Holland, England, Australia, Canada and many other countries. It seems plausible to me that most tourists actually enter under the visa waiver program.
That said, it is a curious fact that a tourist without a visa can legally shoot at a range but the same person, if they come back as a student, can't.
I'm of the opinion that civilian prohibitions on nuclear weapons are ultimately unenforceable.
Sure, if you can stop them before it is complete, and it's hard to build one of these in secret, then you have a solid case. This is why you do your development and build in some facility in international waters or some other difficult to control place. This is starting to sound supervillain-ish, but sometimes you just gotta be that way.
The instant they have a functional nuclear explosive device, however, they are now a state-level actor and outside of conventional law.
Nukes are the Sam Colt of international diplomacy.
And much like the Torment Nexus, someone will eventually build it, because if they don't then someone else will, and then you'll be behind the ball.
Well said. Wrote up a similar idea at https://opensourcedefense.substack.com/p/osd-233-what-about-nukes
> To be specific: in a scenario where you need light weapons (or, to take it to the theoretical extreme, nukes), would laws actually get in your way, whatever they are? That would be by definition a situation where the law no longer matters. Insurgencies and war-making efforts succeed or fail for lots of reasons — and “darn it, the government said we’re not allowed to have RPGs” is never one of them.
>
> “What about nukes” is an interesting theoretical question. In practice, the idea behind it never matters. If you reach a situation where it’s useful to have weapons way outside of today’s status quo, that’s exactly the situation where you’ll to be able to acquire those weapons no matter what the law says.
Is there even a law that prohibits the manufacture of a nuclear weapon? Like is that a thing that the government has bothered to legislate?
I'm vaguely tempted to file a form 2 with the ATF for a nuclear weapon and see what happens.
Ha, turns out it is in fact illegal just in case you had some U-235 lying around. Although a (disclaimer: very unofficial) reading of the law indicates that simple possession of fissile material isn't illegal, as long as you didn't import it. https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/34046/is-there-any-specific-law-outlawing-private-nuclear-weapons/34047#34047