Capehart tries to justify cluster munitions
On PBS News Hour yesterday, Jonathan Capehart said the following to justify the US sending cluster munitions to Ukraine:
This is war.
And President Zelenskyy […] is […] forced to fight a Russian president who's been ruthless, bombing civilian targets from almost minute one, with Zelenskyy pleading with the United States and the West, please send tanks, please send planes, please send us the most advanced military equipment you can give us, because we need it.
And so it—sending cluster munitions is—I think probably crosses a line for a lot of people. But when you are the Western alliance, and the big mantra is, this is authoritarianism versus democracy, and democracy must win, well, democracy has to have all the tools possible to make it possible.
And I was annoyed that the other people he was talking with didn’t respond with what seemed to me to be the obvious response:
By that argument, we should be sending Ukraine nuclear weapons. (Also, for that matter, biological and chemical weapons. But let’s set those aside for simplicity.)
Certainly “all the tools possible” include nukes. Certainly “the most advanced military equipment” includes nukes.
I’m not even doing a reductio ad absurdum here. It seems clear to me that Capehart’s argument applies just as well to nukes as to cluster munitions.