One of the main challenges of maintaining peaceful international relations is the escalation of distrust and the ensuing arms race.
The possibility that others might attack you is a reason to arm yourself. But this step will in turn be interpreted as a threat by the other, who will in turn arm itself (even more). Etc.
Aren’t there ways to simply invest in purely defensive weapons? So that your efforts to remain safe do not in turn threaten others? Which in turn allows others to also de-escalate?
In other words, are there military set-ups that are useless for offensive actions but good enough for defending a country?
If something is purely defensive and incapable of harming anyone else then it’s not really a “weapon” at all. It would be more like… I don’t know… A really big shield?
It’s a nice thought on paper but I don’t think a big shield being put up is going to convince any other country to stop producing more weapons.
It may actually lead to them producing more powerful weapons if they think they need to get past a big-ass shield now
You shouldn’t underestimate the damage you can inflict by whacking someone in the face with a shield, either.