Nuclear deterrence cannot cover every crisis

A nuclear arsenal resembles a sledgehammer: decisive for a narrow class of threats but unsuitable for most day-to-day coercion and crisis management. Its deterrent value depends on the threshold at which leaders are genuinely willing to use it. If that threshold is territorial survival or an opponent's first nuclear strike, the arsenal cannot credibly answer most conventional provocations. Navies therefore need a graduated set of tools that can observe, signal, negotiate, and intervene without jumping immediately to catastrophic escalation. The analogy explains why strategic deterrence cannot replace conventional forces merely because both are labeled deterrence.