but it was startling because it seemed to reject restraint symbolized by Korea for areas of not vital interests. In the event of a similar Korean incident, the Dulles's doctrine implied much more than bombing the North Korean armies with thermonuclear weapons. We seem to be resolved to launch "a full-fledged strategic nuclear bombing attack on China!" And "we should probably have to include the Soviet Union as well." The Dulles's doctrine, Brodie concludes, "of course, is a preventive war, save that we have waited for an excuse, a provocation," and hence of time not entirely of our choosing. Effects In theory, as the Soviet Union had no desire to provoke an all-out nuclear attack, the policy of massive response likely deterred any ambitions it would have had on Western Europe. Although the United States and NATO bloc would be hard-pressed in a conventional conflict with the Warsaw Pact forces if a conventional war were to occur, the massive response doctrine prevented the Soviets from advancing for fear that a nuclear attack would have been made upon the Soviet Union in response to a conventional attack. It can, however, be argued that aside from raising tensions in an already strained relationship with the Soviet bloc, massive retaliation had few practical effects at that time. Before the development of the US nuclear triad, the threat of massive retaliation was hard to make credible, and was inflexible in response to foreign policy issues, as everyday challenges of foreign policy could not have been dealt with using a massive nuclear strike. In fact, the Soviet Union took many minor military actions that would have necessitated the use of nuclear weapons under a strict reading of the massive retaliation doctrine. A massive retaliation doctrine, as with any nuclear strategy based on the principle of mutually assured destruction and as an extension the second-strike capability needed to form a retaliatory attack, encouraged the opponent to perform a massive counterforce first strike. This, if successful, would cripple the defending state's retaliatory capacity and render a massive retaliation strategy useless. Subsequent developments such as thermonuclear warhead miniaturization, accurate silo-based ICBMs, accurate submarine-launched ballistic missiles, stealth technology applied to cruise missiles, and GPS munitions guidance have resulted in a much more credible second-strike capability for some technologically advanced nations. Still, if both sides of a conflict adopt the same stance of massive response, it may result in unlimited