It is useful to have a shorthand for “big nuclear powers committed enough to actually launch their mutually-assured destruction mechanisms”. “Nuclear war” doesn’t do the job because it requires the launching of nukes (not just the possibility) and because it includes small-scale one-sided nuclear strikes (such as North Korea vs South Korea).
Additionally, I think it’s likely that big non-Western powers would use the opportunity to perform violence on their neighbors, making it a true world-wide war zone, even if it’s not technically the “same” war officially.
Yup. I think such an eventuality ought constitute a state of “world war”. After all, Japan and the USSR had a non-aggression pact until 1945.
It is useful to have a shorthand for “big nuclear powers committed enough to actually launch their mutually-assured destruction mechanisms”. “Nuclear war” doesn’t do the job because it requires the launching of nukes (not just the possibility) and because it includes small-scale one-sided nuclear strikes (such as North Korea vs South Korea).
Yup. I think such an eventuality ought constitute a state of “world war”. After all, Japan and the USSR had a non-aggression pact until 1945.