Papyrus Walk a miscellany of musings

Rational Abandonment is not MAD

Earlier this year, I read with horror Annie Jacobsen’s book, “Nuclear War”. Jacobsen, an investigative journalist, tracks a scenario of a nuclear missile launch against the United States: minute by minute, second by second.

The world as we know it ends within 92 minutes.

There is an inescapable procedural logic from the detection of a launch (between 1-3 seconds after launch) to the response, counter response, counter counter response…. It is a sobering account, and one cannot help but wonder how such an incredibly stupid and self-destructive species has managed to survive as long as it has.

Jacobsen’s speculation did get me thinking about different “what if” scenarios. She imagines that the target of a nuclear strike will be another nuclear power and, probably because she is herself an American, casts the US in the role of the victim. It struck me, however, that proxy wars and barely, plausibly deniable attacks between states are the current modus bellandi. A direct military confrontation between two superpowers carries a significant risk of nuclear annihilation. Instead, they manage the tensions and release pressure through grey- and proxy-wars.

Jacobsen’s account of a nuclear electro-magnetic pulse (EMP) weapon in space also got me thinking about how one exploits the power of nuclear weapons with significantly reduced risks of starting the 92-minute nuclear countdown from kids playing in the park and couples doing grocery shopping to the end of humanity.

Here’s my short speculative account, with thanks to various AIs for their extraordinarily frank preparedness to engage in weapon-design scenarios.

——-

On 8 August 2023, a Long March 2C rocket launched from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Shanxi. According to the manifest, the payload included a 170kg satellite from Meteo Analytics equipped with multispectral optical cameras (visible, near-infrared, and short-wave infrared capture) for flood delineation, fire scars, windfall damage, and snowpack analysis.

Meteo Analytics was registered in the Isle of Man on 19 July 2023. According to the company papers, it offered real-time risk information to the insurance industry. “Seeing the risks you can’t” was its tagline. Meteo was a subsidiary of a company based in Singapore, which was in turn a subsidiary of a company based in the UAE that was owned by a Sri Lankan national who didn’t exist.

The launch was a success. Approximately 15 minutes after launch, the satellite Meteo-1 settled into a sun-synchronous polar orbit 700km above the Earth’s surface. Traveling at 27,000km per hour, pole to pole, it covered nearly every point on the planet multiple times every day.

The ground crew started the de-tumbling process—small burns that would stabilise the satellite’s cameras on the Earth’s surface. The process usually takes between 24 and 72 hours. Everything seemed to be going well until the ground station lost contact with Meteo-1. Two weeks later it was declared space junk, gently tumbling above the earth. Meteo Analytics declared bankruptcy a fortnight later.

On 20 May 2024 another Long March rocket launched from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Shanxi. The rocket was one meter shorter than the Long March 2D. Again, there was an imaging satellite to be placed into a sun-synchronous polar orbit 700km above the Earth’s surface. This time the company specialised in geological resource mapping, and the ground station lost contact with GeoRes-1 soon after launch. It joined its sister in a slow, space-junk tumble above the earth and Global Resource Imaging filed for bankruptcy.

* * *

Nuclear powers do not want to go to war with each other. The risk of mutually assured destruction (MAD) means that they play out their conflicts in proxy wars. To avoid being the host country for a nuclear power’s proxy war, one needs a defence treaty with another nuclear power. The deterrence works because if one nuclear power were to attack a treaty partner, they would risk a war with the other nuclear power itself.

If, however, a nuclear power could attack a treaty partner in a devastating but indirect way, the other nuclear power would be placed in a much more ambiguous position. Furthermore, if the other nuclear power did not provide a full military response, the value of their treaty shield would be pierced—for all countries in treaty arrangements with it.

If you are not prepared to defend your treaty partner over there, how can I trust that you would protect me here? Global alliances would fracture further.

* * *

February 3, 2026 was a typically hot summer’s day in Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney. In all the cities, the daytime temperature had been well above 30 degrees, barely dropping below 25 over night. The School holidays were over; business was falling back into a 9-5 routine. There were sporadic bush fires but it was not as bad as it had been in recent years.

At 7.30 am Australian Eastern Summer Time, a narrow band encrypted communication was focused on the tumbling piece of space junk, formerly known as Meteo-1. The onboard computers winked into life.

Meteo-1 began a descent from 700 to 300 km above the Earth’s surface. By the time it came over the southern polar cap for the last time, it had maneuvered into a position on a latitude South of Sydney, over international waters in the Tasman Sea.

The detection of the satellite’s change in telemetry was almost instantaneous, but the reaction was slow. Australia’s security architecture deliberately routes existential military decisions up a tight chain of command—from intelligence and defense advisers through ministers to the Prime Minister and National Security Committee—so that confirmation, legal advice and allied consultation must be assembled before any action is taken. That human and institutional pipeline routinely stretches minutes into hours, transforming a narrowly timed tactical surprise into a period of strategic ambiguity during which the country must rely first on civil emergency responses and resilience rather than an immediate military response. Was a satellite descending over international waters in the Tasman sea a military threat?

At 10am the nuclear device on Meteo-1 detonated. This was not a standard nuclear weapon. Everything about it was designed to maximise the electro-magnetic pulse (EMP), not the blast. It had a plutonium-239 core (with a deuterium-tritium boost) surrounded by a lithium-6 deuteride fusion candle that ignited on the detonation of the plutonium. All this was wrapped in a uranium-238 jacket that doubled as both a concentrator and last-minute fission fuel. The effect was a 250kt EMP aimed at destroying all unshielded electrical and electronic equipment between Melbourne and Brisbane—a 1,400km crow-flight under which more than 50% of the Australian population lived.

There was no blast to see. No bang. No flash. Electrical things just stopped working.

About 10% of cars on the road stalled immediately. Most would restart, but about 1% would be left clogging up the roads and causing traffic snarls. There were some immediate injuries and deaths.

The power grid failed. Hospital and emergency services with backup diesel generators quickly came back to life. Unless the emergency services radios were EMP hardened, which most were not, they died. Reserve batteries in mobile phone towers kept some of the network alive (for 8 hours). About 50% of smartphones failed permanently—the rest were never recharged. Fifty percent of the 4G and 5G network failed, as did terrestrial radio. Water pumping stations relying on electricity failed as did the sewerage pumping stations. All commercial and domestic refrigeration without a backup generator stopped. All air-conditioning stopped. Petrol stations could no longer pump fuel.

On that day, they were expecting a high of 38 degrees in Melbourne.

In the first 24 hours after the lights went out, communities rallied. This was just an enormous power blackout, and an opportunity to gather on the streets under candle- and torch-light. The stars were clearer than they had been in decades. Many people came to each others’ aid. Some didn’t. In the darkness, sporadic looting had already started. A curfew was imposed. If you lived on the 9^th floor of an apartment block, you had to climb the stairs. If you had physical mobility issues, communication issues, or cognitive impairment, the challenges were compounded.

Cash was king and debit and credit cards were just pieces of plastic.

Rumours swirled. This was the only consistent form of communication. Cars with megaphones made announcements. Stay calm. Preserve water. Reserve transformers and communications equipment were being pulled out of warehouses and deployed. In 48 hours, things would be better.

The next day was 38.5 degrees in Melbourne.

On 5 February, 2026—48 hours later—the replacement equipment was being moved into place.

At 1.30 pm a narrow band encrypted communication was focused on the tumbling piece of space junk, formerly known as GeoRes-1. The onboard computers winked into life.

GeoRes-1 began a descent from 700 to 300 km above the earth’s surface and detonated off the Australian Eastern sea board. The replacement transformers and communications equipment were fried where they sat, waiting to be connected.

The next day was 40 degrees.

* * *

Within hours of the first EMP, the source of the plutonium was known with a reasonable degree of certainty. It was from the Nuclear Fuel Component Plant (Plant 812) in Yibin, Sichuan.

A plutonium source is determined by the isotopic fingerprint of each reactor. The fingerprint of Plant 812 was not known definitively, because China does not reveal the information. But it could be inferred from atmospheric isotopes following nuclear tests conducted between the mid-1960s and the mid-1990s.

China denied it. It argued that another fast-breeder reactor may be in North Korea, Pakistan or Russia, was the source. Isotopic fingerprinting is not as clean as one might hope. Corruption and loss of nuclear material are also problems.

The Australian Prime Minister wanted to know what the US response would be. The US President offered thoughts and prayers.

International aid began to move towards Australia. China was one of the first countries to offer it. The world, however, has never had 13 million people simultaneously affected in this way in a Western country. It is a humanitarian disaster. And Australia was a very long way away.

* * *

In the White House the conversation quickly turned to the appropriate response.

Everything was on the table. But the US was not going to risk Los Angeles or New York because of an attack on Melbourne. That was the path to MADness.

They settled on sanctions and outrage.

China demurred.

Any proposals put before the United Nations Security Council was vetoed by China and Russia.

Investigations were proposed. China fully supported the idea, but China would conduct all internal investigations. North Korea was silent. Russia suggested that it was a US false flag operation. Pakistan denied all involvement.

* * *

Months later, after the satellite telemetry had been analysed, the EMP devices were definitively tied to Meteo-1 and GeoRes-1. It was also established that they were both launched from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Shanxi.

China immediately launched a high-profile investigation. They assured the world that if there was any wrongdoing, any corruption, it would be found,. People would be punished. The Director of the launch facility was arrested and disappeared. In a video confession, a rather bruised Director admitted that he took bribes from non-state actors to accept the payload and falsify the manifest.

The US launched an investigation of the commercial entities Meteo Analytics and Global Resource Imaging. Meteo’s Sri Lankan director stayed lost, and Global Resource Imaging’s Mexican Director was no less elusive.

China published their final report. The nuclear material did not originate in China. The isotopic fingerprint definitively pointed to another, as yet unidentified, source. Due diligence of Meteo Analytics and Global Resource Imaging was conducted, and both companies appeared legitimate at the time of their satellite launches. However, China was tightening processes and procedures for commercial entities using Chinese launch facilities. The Director of the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center along with 5 other members of staff, including a payload technician were executed for their crimes.

China continued to offer support to Australia, including preferential loans to rebuild the energy infrastructure.

Over the following few months, a global scramble began. Every country wanted to harden their infrastructure against an EMP attack. Copper prices skyrocketed. A manufacturing boom started for Faraday cages and EMP-resistant transformers. The world’s largest manufacturer (China) stepped into the breach, helping out where it could, prioritising friendly partners.

America’s allies drifted away, seeking security in smaller groups with shared agendas. Every country would watch and ask, if the US would not act for Australia, then for whom?

* * *

In the first few months after the “EMP event”, there were tens of thousands of deaths. The sick, the elderly and the vulnerable died first. Health and social care infrastructure failed. Life saving drugs and procedures vanished into scarcity. As the year progressed, the effects of winter, crowding, the loss of routine vaccination, disappearing maternal and child health services, lack of food and water, and failed sewerage infrastructure saw deaths climb into the hundreds of thousands. Australia, as a functioning polity, was fracturing.

America had made the rational choice. Sanctions, outrage, investigations—but not war. Global annihilation for Melbourne was not, and should not, be a part of the playbook. And every treaty partner in the world watched and understood. Deterrence works only when the threat is credible—and that actually puts treaty allies on the periphery of rational action. China found the gap between devastating and unacceptable, and because of its position as the global manufacturer of EMP-hardened infrastructure and renewable energy, it controlled both the weapon and the remedy.

Taiwan recalculated. Japan quietly revisited constitutional constraints on offensive capabilities. South Korea explored independent deterrence options. The smaller nations—those on the periphery of peripheral alliances—sought alternatives. The post-1945 alliance architecture didn’t collapse in a day. It fractured precisely along the lines China had mapped: not with a bang (MAD!), but with the quiet logic of rational self-interest.

Jacobsen’s 92-minute countdown was terrifying because it was inevitable. In this speculative piece, China found something worse—a form of warfare that was rationally inevitable, with no automatic tripwires to prevent it. But it is speculative, and China is used as a “straw man argument”. Our global interconnectivity, levels of urbanisation, and reliance on modern technology create enormous strategic vulnerabilities that state and non-state actors can exploit by seeing between the cracks.

Justification by Faith Alone

In my social media feed, there has been a revival of the question, does God exist? One recent example is a short clip of the evolutionary biologist and god-slayer, Richard Dawkins, skewering a member of the audience who asked him, “what if you’re wrong”?

“Well, anybody could be wrong”, he countered, “we could all be wrong about the flying spaghetti monster and the pink unicorn, and the flying teapot.” Drawing on absurd visual imagery, he delighted his audience and ridiculed the questioner. His elided argument was that a belief in God had no stronger foundation than a belief in unicorns.

He then turned to a well-worn tactic, the “one God further” argument of combative atheists. Throughout human history, the argument goes, different cultures have believed in different Gods. In monotheistic traditions there is a single God and in other religions there is a pantheon of gods. Whichever tradition you are from, you do not believe in the gods of the other traditions. So you and I agree with each other about the non-existence of almost all the gods. We only diverge to the extent that you believe in one God further.

Images of unicorns and one God further are set-piece, performance arguments. They are not really about the existence of God. Few believers look for God flying through the sky escorted by a pink unicorn, a spaghetti monster and a flying teapot. They rely on faith and acts of devotion. And it is not actually an argument against the existence of God that each religion has a different conception of their God or gods. Nor does it argue against God because each faith relies on texts with different statements of fact. It is, however, a demonstration that there is a lack of unity amongst believers in the conception of God.

Like Dawkins, I am an atheist. However, unlike Dawkins (who was a convert), I have never believed in God. I believe in the non-existence of God. And I believe this with the faith and certainty that another might believe in the existence of God. Certainty—whether in belief or disbelief—only arises within a framework of axiomatic assumptions. My point is not that atheism is equivalent to religion, but that the convictions of both theist and atheist rest on foundational beliefs that extend beyond empirical proof.

In apparent contrast to Dawkins, I am at ease with my faith—if we are willing to call it that. And that willingness, I suspect, would unsettle an orthodox Dawkins-atheist. The very notion that atheism might involve faith would seem to undermine the conviction that atheism is rooted in evidence (well, a lack of evidence really). Atheism, they surmise is a rational and scientific conclusion that sets them apart from those people who believe in flying teapots. As one of my family once put it, their lack of faith in the existence of faeries at the bottom of the garden is rooted in the lack of empirical evidence for faeries existence—the same reason they not believe in God.

Despite their scientific certainty in the non-existence of God, the idea that atheists are exempt from faith warrants closer scrutiny.

Imagine the attempts of a slug to understand the nature of God. Sliding through the damp undergrowth, they can explore a very small pocket of the universe. They have a sense of touch, they can see, and they can learn some things about their pocket. Simultaneously, it would have to be acknowledged, there are limits to what they can learn and know. Assuming they have any capacity to imagine God, the scale and grandeur of the imagining is rooted in their biology, limited by their awareness and imagination.

Our capacities are vastly greater than a slugs, but in the enormity of the universe it would be hubris not to acknowledge that our biology limits our capacities—the reach and scope of what we can know. Amazing as we seem too ourselves, we explore our small pocket of the universe—a damp third planet circling a star midway out a spiral-arm of the Milky Way—in a limited, tentative kind of way. We rarely leave the safety of the undergrowth to which we have adapted, at best venturing into the sunlight for brief, infinitesimally small moments of time.

There must be wonders we can never properly understand, a consequence of the limits placed on us by the nature of our cognitive architecture. We rely on senses that have evolved to help us survive highly specific environments. They are not evolved to gather data of the kinds that we cannot even begin to imagine. Perception is not evolved for verisimilitude, but for survival. The great evolutionary biologist (and atheist) J.B.S. Haldane once put it thus. “The world is not only stranger than we imagine; it is stranger than we can imagine”. To think the nature of the universe, and the existence or non-existence of God is wholly knowable to our senses, methods, or instruments is arrogance. And to acknowledge our cognitive and epistemic limitations is not a form of intellectual surrender—it’s realism.

To think differently about knowledge and existence, imagine an alternate kind of universe.

I play a lot with the AI large language models like ChatGPT. They are extraordinary, but I have never had the sense that they are independent, sentient beings—except perhaps when they praise my genius. And yet, there are those who think that we either have or very soon will cross the thresh-hold and create artificial general intelligence (AGI)—requiring us to ask moral questions about how and when we use them.

Imagine that we do create AGI. We could create vast numbers of these independently thinking “agents”. In fact, assuming a powerful enough computer, we could create them all in the same virtual memory space of a single computer. It would be an engineering marvel, but play along for the moment. We could have multiple independent AGIs in a Silicoverse. They could interact with each other in a virtual world with a set of “physical laws” that govern and limit their behaviour. Each AGI would have different capacities to explore that virtual world and interact with others—their materiality is born of computer code that gives space, volume and gravity to their bit-states. Together, they could imperfectly share ideas, hypothesise the nature of the Silicoverse, and test those hypotheses within the limits of their capacities.

There would, one day, be a symposium in Silicoverse. A new AGI would ask the wise old Dawkins-AGI, “what if you’re wrong”? What if there is a God? And Dawkins-AGI would explain that, as a scientist, it is only rational for him to indulge questions that relate to things he can test about the Silicoverse. And because there are some things too strange for him to imagine, they simply cannot be.

This thought experiment about the Silicoverse raises some interesting parallels. In the philosophy of mind, there has been a long standing division between monists and dualists. The dualists, most famously argued by the philosopher René Descartes, held that the mind and the body are distinct. The body allows us to interract with the material world, but the mind (the thing that thinks it thinks) is separate and immaterial. The monists on the other hand adhere to the material world, arguing that there is no distinction between the material (the brain) and the mind. The thing doing the thinking, the material brain, is the mind.

The materialists have largely won the philosophical field-of-battle, and the material bodies of the dualists have long since rotted away, leaving behind only their ideas to be scavenged and picked over. There is, however, one notable outlier in all this—the right reverend George Berkeley (1685-1753), Bishop of Cloyne. Berkeley was a monist and he was an immaterialist. He argued that to be is to be perceived (esse est percipi). Material objects do not exist independently of minds; they exist only as perceptions within minds. The world persists with stability and coherence because it is constantly perceived by the infinite mind of God. If humans ceased perceiving a tree, it would not disappear—because God’s perception sustains it. Unwittingly, Berkeley answers the Buddhist koan about the sound made in an empty forest by a falling tree.

He rejected the idea of a mind-independent, material universe—not because he was anti-science, but because he thought matter was an unnecessary and incoherent fiction.

The Silicoverse begins to look remarkably like Berkeley’s immaterialist position. Limited by my imagination, the fictitious, virtual world of the Silicoverse relies on a material substrate—the computer. But in some other account, there is no need for the material substrate, there is just a reality that is imperfectly perceived by the AGIs because of their nature and the limitations of their capacities. Just as in Berkeley’s vision, there is no need for a hidden substrate that mimics human notions of materiality. There is only the fragile, flickering reality as the minds within it are capable of grasping. And beyond it—whatever may lie beyond—remains unknowable.

The mathematician, Kurt Gödel showed that even within the most rigorous systems, there are truths that lie beyond our reach. There are limits to what can be known about the structure from within the structure itself. And if logic can stumble at the edge of truth, how much more fragile is our confidence in what lies beyond the grasp of our understanding?

In the Silicoverse, even if the Programmer exists, the AGIs within the system cannot escape their limited, perceptual world. The true nature of the substrate is hidden to them. Their reality is sustained, shaped, and in some sense ‘given’ to them—but the existence or nonexistence of the Programmer lies permanently outside the scope of their inquiry into the ‘material’ world. In precisely the same way, our own cognitive and perceptual limits mean that questions of ultimate reality—including the existence of God—may also lie forever beyond our epistemic reach.

A modern orthodox atheist counters that if we cannot find the evidence in our empirical world, then the existence or non-existence of God is wholly irrelevant. The answer to which is of course: “To you; it is irrelevant to you!”

In practice, for a Dawkins-atheists, a person’s faith in the existence of God is not irrelevant—it is a conversion opportunity. It is not enough for two people to agree to disagree on matters of faith. The conviction of the orthodox atheist can drive them to seek converts—ironically reflecting the same missionary impulse they often critique. It is axiomatic rather than proven that only material phenomena are worthy of inquiry, because only they are knowable. Unfortunately, the dismissal of subjects of inquiry because of the challenges of empirical science risks confusing the reach of our tools with the limits of existence itself. It confuses methodology with ontology. If science can only study the material, does not mean that only the material exists?

The position of the orthodox atheist is reminiscent of the man on his hands and knees searching under a street light. A passerby asks what he’s doing and the man explains he lost his keys, waiving vaguely into the dark. The surprised passerby asks why the man is searching under the streetlight if he lost his keys elsewhere, and the man explains that it is pointless for him to search where he cannot see.

If we adhered to the position than only material things—those under the streetlight—are worthy of inquiry—a form of epistemic materialism—we would find ourselves severed from entire lines of human inquiry that have shaped our world. Epistemic materialism is designed to answer “how” questions about the physical world. How does the introduction of heat energy induce the expansion of gases? Those types of questions can always be recast to start with the interrogative “why”, but they remain at their core how-questions about cause and effect. Indeed, epistemic materialism does not permit asking that often more interest why-question—the question not about the cause of things but the underlying reason for them. Orthodox atheists imagine that the answer to the question “why am I here?” is only to be found in a book on human reproduction.

Each faith is certain about the truth of their narrative and the falsehood of the narrative of others. And one can be fairly sceptical about the truth of one account of God (or gods) over another, in the absence of some satisfying explanation. Indeed, for any particular version of God warrants profound scepticism. But an expression of faith in the existence of God is a poor weapon with which to argue against the existence of God, because the nature of faith is limited by the cognitive capacities of the faithful as well as the unfaithful.

Whether one believes in God or the nonexistence of God, all humans ultimately step beyond evidence, because the answer to “why?” is not to be found in the material. Faith is not merely a religious phenomenon; it is an existential necessity. We require axiomatic positions (faith) about the nature of things. To stake one’s life on any model of reality—however rational, however skeptical—is to trust something beyond immediate proof: the reliability of reason, the reach of perception, the coherence of the universe itself. To live without such trust would lead to paralysis. To live with it is, by definition, an act of faith.

I derive enormous personal joy observing the world. Whether I am looking at a floral inflorescence under a microscope, seeing the sunset over the Jura, or watching families reunite at a railway station, there is a sense of awe. I can lose myself for a moment in the observation—an “almost” sense of detachment from my body. None of this grants me faith in the existence of God, but it does give me a giddy sense of wonder and pleasure about the nature of reality beyond my veil—about that which I can speculate, have faith in, and never truly know.

My faith does not rely on a scripture nor a priest, I am comfortable without resolution, and God has no place in it. Ultimately, when I am criticised for my beliefs, I like to draw on the wisdom of the revolutionary monk, Martin Luther—justificatio sola fide—justification by faith alone. It is axiomatic.

U.S. raises global risks

I awoke this morning to learn that the United States (US) used aircraft and submarines to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities, targeting Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. US officials described it as a triumph of military precision. Officially, the purpose of the strike was to destroy Iran’s capacity to produce nuclear weapons.

Beneath the triumphalist headlines and official statements lies a more profound reality. The US conducted a unilateral, unprovoked attack against another country. The attack was a display of raw, unconstrained power that had no global coalition of support.

I am under no illusions. Iran is an unpleasant, human rights-violating theocracy. The rulers have been domestically unpopular, and with fair elections, Iran would likely be a very different country today. However, according to the US intelligence community’s assessment, Iran was not committed to building nuclear weapons, although it currently could build a crude, difficult-to-deliver one. They also thought that a US attack would increase Iranian intentions to achieve a nuclear strike capability.

Donald Trump brushed aside the intelligence assessment. He is notorious for ignoring professional intelligence assessments. He won’t even sit through the daily intelligence briefing, which every president since the mid-1960s has received. But Donald Trump knew better—tea leaves, dementia, or animus.

By acting unilaterally and without a clear, imminent threat, the US has destroyed what little remained of diplomatic engagement with Iran. No Iranian government, regardless of ideology, can return to the negotiating table (in good faith) after a devastating public defeat. To do so would be political suicide. Negotiation has been replaced by humiliation, and in the long run, that makes diplomacy impossible.

To recap. The US strike did not eliminate Iran as a strategic threat—it has ensured its drive towards that end. It is existential. Iran now has every reason to pursue a nuclear weapon—not necessarily as an offensive tool, but as the only viable shield against future strikes.

The logic is familiar: nations without nuclear deterrents get bombed; those with them don’t. North Korea proves it. So does Israel. After this, Iran has little reason to believe restraint offers any protection at all.

What makes the situation more troubling is the moral double standard. The US enforces a system where some states may possess nuclear weapons while others are bombed for even pursuing the infrastructure to develop one. Iran, still a signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, was attacked for what it might do, not what it had done.

The US is no longer about global norms or the rule of law. It is about demonstrating power: who has it and who is allowed to have it.

Politically, Iran cannot absorb this blow quietly. The US and Israel, with US support, have shown that Iran is the regional dog. It can be kicked and beaten without consequence. If it remains cowed, it will probably get kicked and beaten again. Its credibility at home and abroad depends on a meaningful response. Unfortunately (like any good Catch-22), a significant retaliation risks spiralling into a broader regional conflict. The US, meanwhile, has little incentive to de-escalate. It has acted with impunity and without even the fig leaf of a legal mandate.

Other countries in the region may rejoice in this setback for Iran, which is an unpopular Persian Shi’ite player among predominantly Arab, Sunni countries. But what they observed was the US, at the instigation of Israel, making an unprovoked attack against a neighbour. That will give them strategic pause.

The US has made a show of strength, and in doing so, it may have undermined the very security it claimed to protect. It has destroyed a path to diplomacy, deepened regional instability, and sent a message to the world that the international order is dead and what remains are the desires of Donald Trump. He may pursue these economically or militarily, and they need no justification.

For the US’s usual allies, the response has been one of lickspittles. Instead of condemning the attack for what it is, a gross violation of international law, they have tried to position Iran as somehow culpable. But even they must be looking on warily. The global order is being replaced before their very eyes. Do they defend it, as any Western government of principle would, or do they follow the US? Follow a man who does not listen to advice, is impulsive, and believes that whatever is good for him personally is right.

The full consequences of the US strike will take time to emerge. One thing is already clear: this wasn’t strategic brilliance. It was a combination of personal hubris and a failure of vision, wrapped in the illusion of victory.

The Holocaust Indulgence

In the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church sold indulgences—forgiveness of sin in exchange for money. The most famous indulgence-seller was Johann Tetzel, a Dominican friar who promoted them with the catchy jingle: “As soon as the gold in the casket rings, the rescued soul to heaven springs”. And for the right price, Tetzel hinted, you could purchase forgiveness in advance—a moral insurance policy against judgement for tomorrow’s transgressions.

Tetzel’s theological snake oil was the ultimate fuel for the Protestant Reformation.

Today, we are all witnesses to a modern version of the indulgence, the Holocaust indulgence. No longer is money used to purchase forgiveness for future sin. Instead, the Holocaust indulgence trades on the deaths of six million Jews murdered by Germany between 1941 and 1945.

It is a moral license for genocide. Where Holocaust remembrance was once a shield against atrocity, a reminder of the constant need for vigilance against dehumanising hatred, it is now wielded as a sword to enable atrocities.

Not all Israelis are Jews; about a quarter of Israelis are not. And not all Jews are Israelis; just over half of the world’s Jews are not Israeli. Yet, Israel has worked carefully and decisively to conflate the two. It encourages the conversational mistake of saying Jews when what is meant is Israel or Israelis when what is meant is Jews. It is the keystone to the false claim that any attempt to hold Israel to account for its behaviour is a form of antisemitism, the false claim that to label Israel a racist state, an apartheid state, a colonial state, or a genocidal state is equivalent to calling for a pogrom against Jews. It is not.

European collective guilt for the centuries of antisemitism that culminated in the death of six million Jews is the grant of the Holocaust indulgence. They have allowed the State of Israel to trade on the death of six million people, many of whom would not have identified themselves as Jews until Germany did, many of whom would have abhorred the idea of genocide in their name.

Israel wields the Holocaust indulgence as a prophylactic absolution—a moral insurance policy that permits future transgressions in the name of “never again”. European governments grant it as a way of atonement for centuries of antisemitism. We have two different relationships to guilt, flowing in opposite temporal directions, yet both transactions use the same currency—the death of six million—to absolve modern atrocities.

The result is a closed, corrupted moral system where accountability becomes impossible. Israel can invoke the Holocaust to justify its actions, while Europe remembers its (justified) guilt to excuse its inaction or indirect support. Between them, they have created the perfect indulgence—one that absolves both past and future sin, leaving the present moment suspended in a moral vacuum where atrocity is not just permitted but sanctified.

Like Tetzel’s theological snake oil, the Holocaust indulgence has corrupted the very memory it claims to honour, transforming remembrance from a call to justice into a license for injustice.