recent events show that instead, every country should have nukes if they want to be safe.
Russia attacked ukraine because they didn't. Iran got attacked because it didn't. North korea isnt attacked because they have. That's the moral of the story.
The point parent is in making is that this strike against Iran demonstrates, that yes indeed you do need nukes to be safe and that's one of the major risks of this action.
Going with your analogy, this would be the same as if police basically ignored all home invasion/trespassing laws such that the only houses that criminals entered were in fact those of undefended home owners. In this scenario, it would be demonstrated, by this policy, that yes home owners need to own guns to be safe.
To your point, if you don't want a world where it's safer for home owners to own guns, than you need to ensure there are policies in place to create a world where that was true. The lesson of Ukraine and Iran is that, if you don't have nuclear weapons, your sovereignty is always at the mercy of nations that do.
A world where every country needs nuclear weapons to remain sovereign is similarly undesirable (on a larger scale) to a country where every home needs to have guns to be safe. However we're on a path with nuclear weapons where that is unfortunately not the reality we are creating.
A handful of nuclear weapons won't keep a country safe. They would also need a credible second-strike deterrent.
Relations between sovereign states are fundamentally anarchic. There are no world police. The UN and other international institutions have little or no real power, and the Non-Proliferation Treaty is only enforceable through kinetic action by other countries when it suits their interests.
NK can have a handful of submarine-based missiles that threaten to wipe out say Seoul or LA for example, even after the first strike. It's not a guarantee by any means but it does raise the bar and would probably prevent a situation like the current one.
NK kept itself safe for decades with just a lot of artillery aimed at Seoul.
Second strike weapons are in some ways a holdover from Cold War strategic thinking which it's sort of acknowledged probably overestimated the penchant of any side to engage in a first strike.
The practical reality of nuclear war planning has generally been that no one will accept even a single city-buster landing - and no first strike option is really reliable enough to guarantee you didn't miss one.
>To your point, if you don't want a world where it's safer for home owners to own guns, than you need to ensure there are policies in place to create a world where that was true
So achieving monopoly on violence first. Which requires forcefully disarming all opposition just like what is happening right now. Is the Sovereign hypocritical because they arrest and potential kill people they don't like but they do not others to do so? According to many mainstream political theories, not neccessairly so.
The matter of fact is that if a major power really wants to destroy a smaller power, there's nothing a smaller power can do even if they develop a handful of nukes, especially at the cost of their economy. Much better just to work diplomatically with said major powers so that interests are aligned rather than demanding a absolute respect for sovereignity which does not exist in reality. So then the question is, why can the Shah or the Gulf States work with Israel and America, but not the Islamic Regime? Even worse so, it's one to turn a cold shoulder that America or Israel wouldn't care much, but to actively fund proxies that destabilize other allies is just warranting a response.
Except that police exists. We willingly relinquish the monopoly of violence to the state that protects us. The world nation stage is anarchic instead, there is no world police, and the strong dominate
Except you’ve been tricked if you think the ruler of police is to protect you. Despite the little sticker on their car, the Supreme Court has repeatedly decided that the police HAVE NO LEGAL RESPONSIBILITY to protect you out anyone. That’s just not their role nor responsibility. To think otherwise is to linger in a fantasy world.
I expect that the frequency of violent crime is predictive of police behavior towards crime.
When it's rare, then it's easy and reasonable to take a highly idealistic approach. When it's frequent you have to deal with uncomfortable practical issues like whether an officer should prioritize your survival, or their own. There's a line where heroics turn into suicidality, and that's largely driven by frequency.
the calculus that I, everyone I know and care about, and everyone that i've ever heard about, relies upon is that you're far less likely to need to police to teleport instantly to you if our divorced angry next door neighbor don't have a gun for his self defence
That's based on a misleading "fact." Many people claim that most victims of homicide knew their killer. That's true only when the relationship between the two was known. The most common relationship, by far, is "relationship unknown". [1] You are much more likely to be killed by a stranger or somebody who is "relationship unknown" than anybody else.
And furthermore most gun crime is committed by people who do not legally own the firearm being used. [2] I'm loathe to link to that site, but this is an issue that is poorly reported and so it requires exploring a web of data sources, which they actually competently do, on this issue at least.
You can also kind of sniff test this claim by considering that homicide rates are much higher in urban than rural areas, yet urban areas have dramatically lower gun ownership rates.
>You can also kind of sniff test this claim by considering that homicide rates are much higher in urban than rural areas, yet urban areas have dramatically lower gun ownership rates.
You should take a refresher on statistics and the difference between correlated and causative
And you should read the post I am responding to. The claim was that there was a correlation between gun ownership a region and your chances of being killed by a gun. When in reality the correlation that exists there is the exact opposite.
it's literally a hypothetical person. He studied marketing and made okay money for a while, but he's been out of a job for a bit over a year and a half now too :) His one good friend died a little while ago too.
I made a profile of a person that fits the profile of somebody that might be a little angry at society. Clearly I've struck a nerve here, and maybe thats something worth interrogating.
For what its worth, there are plenty of guys I know who are divorced, and it was probably the right decision, and they're great people. Most marriages end that way, in fact. It doesn't mean the "divorced jaded man who lost his social place in the world, struggles to find kindness or peers, and lashes out" is a stock character that will go away. It's a real problem
On paper that could work if people didn't have children.
Problem is it is impossible to combine:
- responsible storage of firearms
- immediate availability of firearms anywhere at home when faced with hostility
Also most gun violence is domestic so having firearms at home do not solve a problem but creates it.
Strong disagree. Education is key, as are not leaving children that are too young to be educated alone where a weapon (not just a gun) is.
Curiosity is the number one problem with kids and guns, and that's because we hide them behind a mystique and don't make them understand. But talk to any redneck kid, and guns aren't a big deal, because they've had the mystique removed through education and familiarity.
Not redneck here, but introduced and taught fun safety at a young age. Recently, my kids came down to ask me if they could play with their nerf guns. They had the guns aimed down, finger off the trigger, and already put on the safety glasses. I wiped away a tear knowing that they are responsible with toy guns.
Nice anecdotal stories aren't worth anything against statistics.
Also people can be responsible for years until they aren't. As much as you believe you couldn't hurt someone you love, there is no way you (pr anyone else) can be 100% sure that reality will never change. If there was a way to know, people would be stopped or would surrender their weapons before they commit crimes.
Like anything else, it's about safety. There's all sorts of dangerous stuff in a household, like a stove. You don't lock them up, you teach kids thst stoves are hot and not to touch them.
That said: lock up your guns. Your mid will probably survive a stove burn.
The police aren’t here to protect citizens, courts here have ruled on this. Police are an extension of corporate power & the wealthy. The LA Sheriff’s Department is filled with police gangs.
We’ve seen the footage of the police brutalizing peaceful protestors beating them with clubs, riding over them repeatedly with horses.
The police in this country are woefully undertrained compared to the rest of the industrialized nations.
Please note ICE is doing operations in blue cities against law abiding immigrants at hearings because to go after either actual criminals or the gun infested red areas would be a danger to life and limb.
Turns out, making yourself a more dangerous target works to an extent.
a different reason is that the red areas are currently in power, and have a say in where ICE deploys. its explicitly a civil war styled attack on blue state sovereignty, rather than anything about guns
> operations ... against law abiding immigrants ...
Putting aside ICE tactics, if their immigration status is not legal, then by definition they are not law abiding citizens.
Unless you are privy the status of any planned or ongoing ICE operations against criminals, you have no idea what they are doing in that regard.
Law enforcement at all levels needs checks along with better direction in carrying out their duties. However, allowing people to continue living in an immigration limbo is not a solution. Sanctuary cities leave illegal immigrants unprotected.
ICE must cast a wide net in blue cities because they are not sharing data on the criminal undocumented residents. They are shielding the illegal migrants who are already in jail or released on bond. Red areas are not shielding their criminal element and there is less need for such a wide net. Sanctuary cities ignoring the constitution and delegation of powers to do whatever they want is causing much of the escalation.
You will love this amendment (14th) from the US Constitution then, it’s a banger with it’s opening text that describes how states are responsible for protecting the people in their borders and giving them due process, citizen or not:
> All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
You know because it’s hard to make a case about being a country of rights, due process, law and order if you don’t extend that to the people within it’s borders.
The blue cities are enforcing the Constitution as sanctuary cities are legal laws of those states. The red states and federal government are violating it.
>” The blue cities are enforcing the Constitution as sanctuary cities are legal laws of those states. The red states and federal government are violating it.”
The 14th Amendment is federal law that the States must protect the people within their borders through rights, due process, etc. by their own state laws. The Supremacy Clause is irrelevant.
It's an interesting analogy. I'm opposed to guns in every household because we have the police which is meant to give security to people. There, we allow gun use, but under stricter conditions. The majority agrees that this is right, so the system works.
What is "the police" on the level of countries? There is no majority that agrees that, e. g., the NATO can serve as the police. It feels like on this level, we live in an anarchy with only very few actors who don't really want to live together. So maybe nukes are an option, although I don't like it.
A community where every household does not have guns is safer than one that does: but not for a simple reason like “because we have the police which is meant to give security to people”
A safe community isn’t one where people are held in check by police. People are not roving around thinking “oh I’d break and enter and murder and rape but for the fact a police officer might shoot me.”
People in such a community lack guns but they do have things like a working public health system, decent education, daily encounters with other people that are positive and so on.
The threat of police shootings is not what makes a safe society safe.
Constructive, open and fair trade is the equivalent at an international level. Cooperative and trusting. Not staring down the barrel of each other’s guns.
> A safe community isn’t one where people are held in check by police. People are not roving around thinking “oh I’d break and enter and murder and rape but for the fact a police officer might shoot me.”
That's also not necessarily the point I'm making. Suppose you are in a society where a small part of people are bad actors, for whatever reason. They will break and enter, murder, and rape. You want to protect the rest of the society against these bad actors. You can now equip everyone with weapons so they may defend themselves. That also enables the bad actors to use said weapons because we don't know who really know who is a bad actor (at least not the ones that didn't commit any crimes yet). Or you give weapons only to a small part of society, where you enforce strict gun laws.
The alternative is to reduce the number of bad actors and this is, in part, fulfilled by the conditions that you are describing. But how do I reduce the number of state leaders that are willing to shoot each other? I guess it's what you are saying, namely constructive, open, and fair trade. But we're not really making progress in that direction it seems.
> A community where every household does not have guns is safer than one that does
Except this isn't borne out in the data. Look at deeply conservative places where guns are literally everywhere, and you'll see very low crime rates compared to cities with strict gun control.
And why? Well, as a criminal, I'd be loathe to try something when there's a good chance the victim is armed.
In your perfect community scenario, a single armed criminal would wreak havoc, completely unopposed.
Grew up rural Alberta with rifles around the house all the time, in plain view. For shooting game. Not a word was ever uttered about "defending ourselves" with guns... From who?
Hell, we left our door unlocked when we left the house unless it was overnight.
Good grief. Nothing is sadder than people valorizing social/cultural breakdown.
AR-15 is relatively popular for hunting in the US though?
I don't lock my house or my car habitually, never had a problem, never felt the need to keep a weapon either, but I know plenty of people that live in the city that have been robbed or assaulted and do feel the need to carry though. I can't really blame them for not relying on police.
Sportsmen use long guns like 30’6 for big game hunting (elk, deer, antelope) out west. Shots over 100 yards require a large cartridge like that. AR-15 are used in the southern states for wild hogs and varmints, or coyotes. Not exactly trophy hunters. I’m just saying the popularity of the AR-15 is not driven by hunters.
I'm citation heavy, but it's also a fact I wouldn't cite as I think/thought it was fairly common knowledge. Here [1] is some random report on it. There's a huge difference in criminality rates between urban and rural, and this applies to most of everywhere in the world.
As someone with roots in a rural area, there’s a lot of crime in such places that is simply never found out (sparse population == fewer opportunities to be caught), is an “open secret” that never gets resolved, is quietly swept under the rug, etc, sometimes even involving local law enforcement. As a result, there’s plenty in the data worth questioning.
This is definitely true, and that report works to control for it. The reason there's no homicide data listed on that report is because it's based on the National Crime Victimization Survey. It surveys people on their victimization instead of relying on police reports. Police reports would make the differences appear even larger.
Although on this topic I'd also add that urban areas have a similar issue. Criminals know that the overwhelming majority of crime goes unpunished, while people have a reality deluded by shows like CSI. Homicides, for instance, have the highest clearance rate, by far. And it's 47.5%. [1] Vehicular theft has the worst at 6.6%. If you end up with your window busted out and everything that's not strapped down stolen, there's no real point reporting it to the police unless necessary for an insurance claim because you're never getting that stuff back, and the thief is never getting caught.
The stability of society and the law based facilitation of peace are absolutely within the mission of police forces and highly facilitative to the prosperity of a society.
I was once involved with a project that returned determination of land ownership from people's physical custody to the courts and the resulting drops in assault and homicide rates (for the entire country) was in the double digits over a period of months.
> Sometimes even a minute or two is the difference between you being alive or dead.
This is especially true when you are likely to have guns in the home. I'm countries with virtually no private ownership of guns, it is extraordinarily unlikely to be in life threatening danger in your home.
People who rob you with baseball bats and axes, and don't even think about the possibility that you'll have a gun, don't feel the need to kill you at any suspicious twitch. The axes and knives and baseball bats are there to have clear superiority, and they know you can't really harm them. So, unless you actually try to fight, you're quite safe from a physical perspective.
Conversely, if people with guns think there's a decent chance you have a gun too, they'll be terrified of any move you make and have a high chance of misinterpreting any gesture you make into violence. So there is much higher tension.
Of course, there is a possibility that you're being attacked by a crazed murderer - in which case you're probably going to die either way. But this happens vastly, vastly less often that robbery.
You can take a look at crime stats from even the poorest European countries. The proof that lack of gun ownership in no way causes more violent crime is evident. Everything I just added above is an explanation of why this happens, but the fact it happens is not up for debate.
In properly safe countries this is of course not true. But sadly the world stage still seems to be on the development level of ”lawless neighborhood” so there’s some merit to the idea (not that it is necessarily the best way forward though).
North Korea wasn't attacked because they have rocket artillery trained on Seoul. That's why nobody stopped them from developing nukes in the first place. Kim doesn't need nuclear weapons to cause nuclear-scale damage.
Hahaha, and what do you think's going to happen to Iran if this stuff is successful? They already have more refugees living there than in any other country in the world except Turkey [1], owing to US adventures in other parts of the world. And they have more than 3x the population of North Korea on top. For that matter they also have more than 3x the population of Syria.
The goal is to overthrow the Iranian government (again) and try to install a puppet regime (again). Conveniently enough, even if you happen to think the nuclear pretext is the goal - it still entails the exact same thing. Destroying some facilities is obviously not going to change their nuclear skills, capabilities, or ambitions. On the contrary - if there was internal doubt about developing a nuclear weapon within Iran, that doubt is now completely erased.
There was never any doubt about developing a nuclear weapon within Iran. You don't enrich to beyond 60% in a secretive bomb-proof bunker with any other goal in mind. This "oh now we've convinced them to build a bomb" line is nonsense.
They began enriching to 60% as a response to Israeli attacks on the country in 2021. Before that it was never higher than 20%. 60% is just below weapons grade and was meant to send a message. Similarly, the reasons their nuclear program is completely underground should be completely obvious at this point. Israel has been trying to get somebody to invade them for decades, has been assassinating anybody they can find, and so on.
Before this there was every reason to doubt Israel's claims, which they've been making for 30 years, about Iran imminently having a nuclear weapon. But at this point there's a practically 100% certainty that they will be aiming to create nuclear weapons as quickly as possible.
I'm not sure that's entirely true. We naturally always try to paint the "enemy" as an unhinged maniac ready to unless destruction on the entire world at a whim, but in reality I don't think this is pretty much ever the case. A population with the industrial and intellectual capability to develop a nuke in the first place is going to have grander ambitions than going out in a blaze of glory. I think even ultra-fundamentalists like the Taliban mostly just want to build up their own little vision of a utopia.
I think a part of the reason North Korea plays crazy is because they have to. If the US didn't think they'd push the big red button, then we'd invade them in a heart-beat. Mutually assured destruction only works when you believe the other guy will push the button. So you need the bomb and then you also need to make sure everybody thinks you're willing to actually use it.
Sorry for the repetition but I'm just going to repeat this every time it comes up. Maybe some day I'll make it a bot.
North Korea has enough conventional rocket artillery within range of Seoul to level the city. This is how Kim was able to run his nuclear program to completion in the first place. It also hasn't changed.
I think GP is right, sadly. The logical conclusion from Ukraine, Iran and North Korea is, get nukes. UN designations of illegal wars turned out to be BS, the only thing that may work is nukes.
Let's hope NATO doesn't get compromised, else I see 30 new nuclear programs starting soon.
We all hooray (well, some of us) the "good" countries having nukes, to bring peace and stability. But it only takes one funky election to get a crazy person in charge of such "good" nukes. And if you 10x the number of nuclear powers, that's 10x more shots at that.
GP is missing one very relevant example of Libya.
Gaddafi was persuaded by the west to abandon his nuclear programme, and 8 years later he was dead in a ditch.
Considering that his own population was vehemently opposed to his authoritarian regime, I don’t think it’s fair to say Gaddafi’s fate was tied to the end of the nuclear programme. I certainly hope he wouldn’t leash nuclear weapons on his fellow countrymen.
Thanks for picking up that minor spelling mistake. Can’t correct it now, unfortunately, but at least the message is understandable.
I do disagree with your premise that Gaddafi’s death was a natural consequence of the Western intervention. Whilst watching the events unfold at the time, I’d say he would be ousted and killed irrespectively of any intervention — either by the populace or by the various factions vying for power.
Let's hope NATO doesn't get compromised, else I see 30 new nuclear programs starting soon.
I don't intend this as a drive-by zinger, far from it, but I think you're being hopelessly optimistic. Every country with the science and engineering muscle to make it happen will be pursuing a nuclear program. NATO, former Warsaw Pact, some assholes who managed to cobble together a broadly recognized country by virtue of force of will, you name it. They're all going to be seeking to create nuclear weapons.
>recent events show that instead, every country should have nukes if they want to be safe.
More recent events show that it doesn't matter. India-Pakistan endless fight.
And Ukraine. Imagine they had nukes in 2022 and russian army advances. Should they nuke russian cities? It would not stop troops and give them more motivation to fight, to revenge. Should they nuke russian troops? To many nukes need for such large frontline.
Does it matter? The Russian parliament, most of it's wealthy citizens and all the critical industries would be dead.
Like...that's the whole point of MAD. You might as well ask "well why didn't the US and Soviet Union go to war? Obviously they won't launch..."
The entire point of a nuclear deterrent is it stops people asking those sorts of questions, because ultimately it's a gamble. The only guarantee you get is "don't invade my territory and I won't launch". As soon as you start not doing that, you get to ask if you think it's a 1% chance, or a 2% chance, or or or... You get to find out when your capital and most populous city do or do not explode. And you get to roll those dice over and over again.
Like I said: what % chance of Washington DC, and New York City being obliterated would you take for a chunk of Mexico? Obviously if Mexico launch you're going to blow the hell out of it's capital and probably some other targets, but you aren't going to be doing that till after those two cities are gone.
> Russia attacked ukraine because they didn't. Iran got attacked because it didn't. North korea isnt attacked because they have. That's the moral of the story.
They always immediately stop their conflicts once the building opposite of the one with the nuclear command center blows up. So... it seems to work for them
with the lack of a war happening between them? neither side invaded or killed 800 of the other's citizens and US/china didnt step in to back their horse with bombs
I think it was meant like not (A has nukes and B has nukes) rather than (not A has nukes) and (not B has nukes). Strange wording, I felt the same way too.
That's what they meant: that's what war looks like when both parties don't have nukes. It's usually the defending party which benefits from nukes the most; and both parties having nukes makes every war a very dangerous affair (if it goes unchecked, as opposed to limited like India-Pakistan).
both have nukes and that acts as a strong deterrent for both of them not to escalate (which they didnt). the countries not having nukes are still in much worse situation
I mean israel gets attacked even though they have nukes, but some rockets are not the same as a regime-changing war
> both have nukes and that acts as a strong deterrent for both of them not to escalate (which they didnt).
Your original point was that nukes prevented attacks. India vs Pakistan rejects your hypothesis.
You then proceeded to move the goalpost from "$(country_without_nukes) got attacked because it didn't [had nukes]" to "yeah countries with nukes get attacked, but attacks don't escalate" which is also an absurd argument to make.
It's a particularly silly point to make in light of India Vs Pakistan because it was described as an electoral stunt to save face, which means nuclear nations still attack themselves even for the flimsiest reasons.
It's not. the world is not a binary system to make simplistic black/white arguments. Nukes certainly act as deterrent for escalating a war. yes , attacks will exist , but we are not escalating with russia for a reason. you are being pedantic , but the argument for deterrence still stands strong.
> It's not. the world is not a binary system to make simplistic black/white arguments.
I agree, simplistic comments on the line of "$(country_without_nukes) got attacked because it didn't [had nukes]" are silly and don't pass the smell test. Don't you agree?
Well then you should explain how it doesn't make sense. Focusing on how he didn't mention the case where both countries have nuclear weapons is not convincing.
So far… trading a more devastating consequence for a decreased likelihood on average will always appear to work until it doesn’t. There may become a time when the use of nukes is tolerated and expected and the only way to win a conflict is to carpet nuke your enemy.
What I’m saying precisely is that quite often things will appear to be one way for a long time even if the underlying premise is wrong. E.g. the chicken who thinks the farmer is nice because the farmer feeds, houses, and provides safety until the inevitable untimely end for the chicken.
Similar situations which are assumed to be impossible have risks pushed right up to the edge until it becomes inevitable. Sure Pakistan and India narrowly averted this time but what if they didn’t. Take for example the concept that US housing market couldn’t crash simultaneously across the US, this enabled cheap debt which pushed the market to the edge until one day it went over the edge.
There is additionally the problem of victory disease, it looks like you’re winning right up until you fail.
There is a survivability bias, we wouldn’t be discussing the viability of MAD had it not worked out thus far.
If Iran gets a nuclear weapon they’ll be able to avoid being invaded while being able to constantly needle Israel, to the point the survival of Israel would be at stake. Similar to how Israel is needling Iran now but with proxies. At that point Israel must make a choice, peacefully collapse or escalate and I’m confident they’ll escalate. I don’t think it’s a question of if but a question of when, once the threshold has been crossed the once unthinkable becomes routine.
Additionally the inaction of a strong adversary is often seen incorrectly as sign of weakness, but it is the cornered rats that lashes out. We can cross Russia’s and Chinas red lines all day every day, right up until they think they’re a cornered rat and then we can’t. How confident can we really be that we know exactly where that limit is. Because the bellicose are more often promoted the people marking these assessments are more likely to have an overly optimistic on the location of that limit. It appears to me China and Russia have a wait and see approach to the US which appears to be in terminal decline, and yet again the west is taking that as a sign of weakness.
When you have morons in charge not even MAD can save you.
As a peer mentioned, nukes not being used has nothing to do with them not being tolerated. It's all about there being no win condition. A single modern nuke can wipe a city out of existence. Even more so when you consider that most are on rockets that split into multiple warheads both to increase destruction and to sidestep any sort of missile defenses. Scale that up and you can wipe entire countries out of existence.
If you enter into a scenario against a nuclear opponent where they go nuclear (which you going nuclear would certainly do) then you may well defeat them, but they're simultaneously also defeat you. This is a big part of the reason that Russia is so paranoid about the US surrounding it with military bases. The only possible way to treat to sidestep this problem is with a massive decapitation strike where you try to nuke your enemy into oblivion before they have any chance to respond with their own nukes. Realistically, it's probably impossible, but but it remains the Achille's Heel of MAD / mutually assured destruction. And drones/internal strike issues are certainly going to be causing some consternation.
Well, there's also missile defense, but I think that's a dead end. We're talking about the offensive goal being to shoot a bullet at the side of a massive barn, and the defensive goal being to shoot down that bullet. It seems impossible to imagine a state of technology between near peers where the latter becomes easier than the former.
Iran has been attacking Israel for the last 30 years and everyone seems to agree that Israel has nukes… so clearly nukes don’t actually work as a deterrent, unless (again according to many comments here) you attack a genocidal state who’s only goal is to kill everyone but not use the only weapon at your disposal that can actually accomplish that goal.
Iraq also attacked an allegedly nuclear capable Israel without fear of a nuclear reprisal.
> Iran has been attacking Israel for the last 30 years
Please give dates, locations, and number of casualties. Iran has made many aggressive statements and funded and armed Palestinian resistance organizations, but actual conflict between Israel and Iran has been mostly clandestine and not officially acknowledged, with a few exceptions where Israel and the US unilaterally attack Iran.
It's the prisoners dilemma: best scenario is nobody has nukes. But if your enemy get nukes, you better get them ASAP. A Nash equilibrium is set where everybody should either have nukes or be strongly allied with someone with nukes.
Regarding guns: if you have easy access to weapons, everyone also has access, so the Nash equilibrium is "get a weapon". If weapons circulation is restricted, the Nash equilibrium is "don't waste your money on weapons".
Russia attacked ukraine because they didn't. Iran got attacked because it didn't. North korea isnt attacked because they have. That's the moral of the story.
It's "make nukes first, ask questions later"