I did write and then delete a sub paragraph in there where I observed that there is a debate to be had about whether nuclear weapons have improved the world by preventing major powers from directly fighting, or made it worse by enabling bad actors with nukes to get away with whatever they want because the consequences of stopping them are always worse than letting them.

Two thought experiments on that: 1. What happens in Ukraine if nukes didn’t exist? The likely answer IMO is “we’re probably already in World War III to get Russia out.” 2. What if Hitler (and most of the major former Allies) had had nukes in 1938, or if he’d waited a decade to make his move until he did? The likely answer is, he probably doesn’t ever invade France and the USSR, but France and Britain probably don’t directly declare war to keep him away from the Czechs and the Poles, either. OR the central European countries along with Belgium and Holland put themselves under a French and British nuclear umbrella much like NATO today, and Hitler wouldve cynically picked on everyone who wasn’t, much as Putin is doing today. Is that a better world than our having consigned the Nazis to the ashbins of history when they went too far? That is... highly questionable.