The LA Times has a splashy op-ed titled, "I was a Minuteman III nuclear launch officer. Take it from me: We can't let Trump become president".
The Times only identifies the author as "a Republican national security expert and former Minuteman III nuclear launch officer". John Noonan, among those other things, works for Bill Kristol at the Weekly Standard. Kristol has sought to recruit a third party alternative to Trump.
In some alternative universe in which the Los Angeles Times practiced ethical journalism, that minor fact would have been mentioned. But we live in this universe instead.
Noonan claims that Trump is unfit based on, what he admits, is an anonymous rumor.
"Donald Trump, who also had some deep thoughts on nuclear weapons. That is, “if we have them, why can’t we use them?”
MSNBC reported recently that Trump asked that dreadful question three times in a recent foreign policy briefing. The Trump campaign denies the story. And to be fair, it came from an anonymous source."
And was reported by MSNBC. Which is to the left of even the rest of the media. But why let that stop us.
But consider Trump’s words in a town hall event during the primaries: “Somebody hits us within ISIS, you wouldn’t fight back with a nuke?”
Which of course we can't do because nuclear weapons exist to never be used.
" The very point of nuclear weapons is that they are never used. We have them to dissuade hostile powers from attacking us, and vice versa."
Harry Truman would beg to differ. I'm not a Minuteman III launch officer, but I am aware that WW2 happened. It ended with the use of nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear power.
The concept of weapons that are never used as a deterrence is a contradiction in terms. For them to be able to act as a deterrent, there has to be some potential for them to be used. That was the point that Trump was making.
When a weapon can never be used, then it might as well not exist.