Our government is planning to use nukes? You have to be *&@#$ kidding me!

The BBQ Pit
1

From this article on Yahoo news:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060408/ts_afp/usirannuclearmilitary;_ylt=AlwUtU6HidgXUCk6qQm9YNKs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3ODdxdHBhBHNlYwM5NjQ-
(I hope I managed to get this link right.)

“A senior unnamed Pentagon adviser is quoted in the article as saying that “this White House believes that the only way to solve the problem is to change the power structure in Iran, and that means war.””

and

"One of the options under consideration involves the possible use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, to insure the destruction of Iran’s main centrifuge plant at Natanz, Hersh writes.

But the former senior intelligence official said the attention given to the nuclear option has created serious misgivings inside the military, and some officers have talked about resigning after an attempt to remove the nuclear option from the evolving war plans in Iran failed, according to the report.

“There are very strong sentiments within the military against brandishing nuclear weapons against other countries,” the magazine quotes the Pentagon adviser as saying."

I cannot believe that our government would EVER consider the first strike use of nuclear weapons. Even if they are tiny ones. Particularly on a third world country. If we did use them the US would become pariahs in the world. No decent society would have anything to do with us.

Congratulations!, We have just become what we are claiming that we are fighting against: A bully considering using weapons of mass destruction.

The use of nuclears weapons should always be the choice of last resort. They should NEVER be a first strike option. Don’t get me wrong, I can understand a “response in kind” planning. If WMD’s are used against us, then responding with WMD’s is warranted. (If very distastful.)

I am appalled and livid. I am proud of those military officers who seem to be as appalled as me. I am glad that there seems to be at least a few people with sense in Washington.

2

Well, I’m not surprised. Bush and friends have always had a hard on for nukes; I remember there was talk before Iraq that new anti bunker nukes would be needed to destroy Saddam’s huge stocks of biological and chemical weapons. :rolleyes:

Whether it’s war, torture or wiretapping, these people have demonstrated that they recognize no ethical, legal, or rational bounderies; this is just more of the same.

BTW note this :

That sounds remarkably like the claims that the Iraqis would love us for invading and throw flowers at our feet.

3

The following statement :

if true, is totally deluded in my opinion.

4

I’m sorry, but I don’t see the problem here. Firstly, when planning this sort of thing, you look at all options, from sending in the SAS / Delta Force at one end to nuking it at the other; and if a nuke is theonly way to do it, then it needs to be a nuke. Secondly, Iran wants to play with the bigs and as such should be prepared for the worst. I have big problems with allowing Iran to become a nuclear power.

My prefered solution would be to withdraw from Iraq and let the Israelis take care of it, just as they did with Osirak.

5

No, if a nuke is the only way to do it, you don’t do it.

So, say, France shouldn’t have been surprised if we nuked them to keep them from building nukes of their own ?

Yeah, then we’d have to hesitate before mass murdering them. Funny how nukes are only bad when other people have them. It’s OK for us to have them - and use them - but we can’t allow brown foreign heathens to have any.

They can’t.

6

Nuclear weapons produce such a horrific amount of carnage, I don’t ever want to see my country use them against another country unless we have been attacked with nuclear weapons. And even then, I’d really rather we didn’t use them.

Quartz, if this is how you truly feel about this subject, you’re an asshole.

7

The Chicago Sun is also now running this story, albeit heavily quoted from the upcoming New Yorker.

The Seattle Times has an fairly extensive story as well, and quotes The New York Times and the Washington Post as sources, but it seems you have to have a subscription to view those 2 sites.

I understand the need to think about this sort of thing, and even to plan it for Justin, but the reasoning behind it to make it seem palatable and workable is so whacked out that I don’t think it’s reaching too far to call it psychotic.

8

I’ve always felt that the carnage of nuclear weapons was always greatly exaggerated. At least as compared to the carnage of any other military action. Napalm? Land mines? POW camps? Sarin? I small tactical nuke destroys a big bridge or a complex and leaves some fallout. It’s not a particularly drastic change from bombing with conventional explosives.

I’d personally just’d live them be. This pre-emptive bullshit is getting out of hand. If Iran wants to use nukes to institute a world theocracy, then we’ll defend ourselves, but for now that’s about as real as Star Trek.

I just hate all the anti nuclear fud. Weapons or energy it’s not that different from everything else. I strongly suspect I lost my father to radiation from improperly stored waste (although I will never learn for certain), but you don’t see me parading around and dissing nuclear power. It’s the safest, cleanest form of energy we have. It’s not very cheap but it would get cheaper if we used it more - something Iran is trying to do. So what if they make a few nukes on the side? We have nukes, Russia has nukes, France has nukes. We’re not too worried about those are we?

Imagine how the people of Iran feel? The entire non-muslim world dislikes them. The non-muslim world that does not believe in their god. The non-muslim world that not only outnumbers them greatly but also has nukes. So muslim fundamentalists will have nukes. Well? A Christian fundamentalist has nukes too.

Wake me up when Tibet will start building nukes - then I’ll be worried.

9

From The New Yorker:

If you think that Muslims hate the US now, wait until the Chimperor starts nuking Iran. If you hate paying $2.80 per gallon for gas, before 2007 you’re going to think $5.00 gas is a bargain. Of course the true tragedy will be the thousands of innocents that will pay for Bush’s insanity with their lives. Not only is Bush a moron, not only is he incompetent, not only is he a war criminal, he is certifiably insane.

Did Chimpy and Rumsfailed learn anything from Iraq? Remember how the Iraqis were all buying flowers to throw at the feet of their American rescuers? Now the Iranians are going to rise up and overthrow their leadership if W starts thowing nukes at them? I’d like to see this bring regime change in America , but that requires not only an intelligent electorate, it requires honest elections.

It will be interesting to see how Bush’s apologists spin this one. Bush is about to engage in mass murder and make the United States a pariah like the world hasn’t seen since Hitler. Somehow Faux News will blame this on the Democrats. Rash Limpballs will be bursting with pride. Sean Crappity will ridicule those who express concern about the operation.

10

Regarding exaggeration of nuclear desruction: this may be indeed true, but “nuclear” has now acquired a tokenistic cachet, like the stock market hitting 10,000 or something - meaningless yet emotionally significant. They might indeed be small and tactical, but they’re nuclear regardless, and to use them would open the tinderbox that would lead to World War III.

I think there would be some justification for some kind of action against Iran, had the assholes not invaded Iraq on a false pretext. They’ve hamstrung themselves: any action against Iran will be seen as the final confirmation of a declaration of war by the west on all Muslims, regarless of any tactical necessity.

Anywasy, trying to be optimistic, I hope this is a controlled, deliberate leak to put the shits up Ahmedinajad.

Though you can never tell with the bellicose dickheads running your country. I wouldn’t put anything past them. For all our sakes get rid of them, will you?

11

. . . which, of course, worked so well in Britain and North Vietnam and 1991 Iraq.

Seriously, has this EVER worked ANYWHERE? Ever?

12

Didn’t it work against Serbia in 1999?

13

Well, this isn’t quite the same circumstance as your question, but the roughly three month NATO bombing campaign of Yugoslavia in 1999 seemed to have put enough pressure on Milošević to accept foreign troops in Kosovo. A bit more than a year afterwards, he was defeated in an election.

14

I would agree qith Quartz that the fact that the U.S. is factoring nuclear weapons into its war plans is simply par for the course. The USA is a nuclear power. All nuclear powers consider contingency plans for the use of their nuclear weapons when they’re sketching out how wars might be fought. If you don’t like it, vote in a President who promises to dismantle all nuclear weapons.

What I find much scarier is the idea that anyone in Washington is stupid enough to think a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will cause the Iranians to cast aside their government. That is quite honestly the stupidest thing I’ve read since I was suckered in to reading “Hannibal.”

15

And I was surprised as hell that it did work.

As for nuclear weapons, of course they’re being used in a plan somewhere. That’s what the planners do. And, I think, if we really are going to try to take out the Iranian facilities (which does not sound like an easy task), it would be a lot easier if we had something like the now-scrapped nuclear bunker busters.

16

I think that if they could, the loonies would go nuke (in the name of freedom and democracy). They’ve already shown us they will do damn near anything, and not even bother to plan for contingencies or backup plans. Nukes were supposed to be a deterrant, as in MAD during the cold war. We had nukes, the Soviets had nukes. Both sides hoped the other wouldn’t make the first move. Fortunately, neither side was willing to go down that path. On the other hand, Bush WANTS to give nukes to India… I suppose so they can attack Pakistan more easily(?). The jury is really still out on whether Iran has any interest in nuke weaponry. By pushing, demanding and threatening, we will only ensure that they DO want them. Iran will be Iraq all over again, only worse.

17

I would agree with you except…

I can’t believe that there are a group of people in the pentagon who threaten to quit every time nuclear weapons are brought up. This seems to me that they are a little more serious about about using them than they have been in any recent past.

I do agree with you that a sustained bombing campaign is a terrifically bad idea. Then again, I HAVE always thought, however, that the best way to endear yourself to a country is to bomb the shit out of it.

18

Firstly, I do not consider the threat to US interests by an Iranian nuclear energy program to be as near as great as the administration and some of the folks around here claim it to be. Nevertheless, I will take a moment and put myself in the shoes of military planners.

Given that so much of its ground combat forces are involved in policing Iraq, making an extended ground campaign in Iran a moot point, it’s not very surprising that US planners might consider the ‘quick fix’ of a tactical nuclear assault on Iranian targets. IIRC, consideration of nuclear attack by the US was made during both the Korean and Viet Nam wars. Besides which, I suspect that the release of this information was no accident and intended to send a warning to Iranian leaders that all possible options are being considered, a “Mad Dog” strategy, as it were. Thing is, I don’t doubt that the current adminisration would much hesitate to act if its bluff were called.

Those who would, however, claim that the use of tactical nuclear weapons as first-strike tools by the US is a legitimate tactic, are, IMO, fucking idiots. This whole thing is stupid for the same reason the invasion of Iraq was stupid: it does more to endanger our national interest than to enhance it. It would be a sad day indeed if the US became not only the only nation ever to have used nuclear weapons in combat but the first to deploy them in a first strike.

Despite what a couple of idiots here might say, most people don’t differentiate, in purpose or effect, between tactical and strategic nukes; they are a level of horror that we, as a supposedly civilized society, have so far shied away from, and for the US to actually use such weapons in an unprovoked attack, IMO, will earn it the permanent emnity of the rest of the world. Consider: a few video images of Iranian children or elderly women with radiation burns, or sickness from fallout, will be sufficient to negate any concievable tactical advantage the use of such weapons may provide. And make no mistake, if even the smallest special weapons in the US arsenal are used, some Iranian civilians will suffer their effects.

I have no personal choice but to consider the rest of the world justified in taking action against the US to counter this threat, should it come about.

19

I think that if some manaical theocratic regime is threatening to use nukes, then all of the good countries of the world will unite to defeat that tyrannical regime, by any means necessary. Unfortunately, that manaical theocratic regime is us.

20

IMO this is all a big media bluff by the Administration to get Iran to cooperate. The US has no real intention or desire of getting involved in a war with Iran. The problem (again IMO) is that this sabre rattling usually relies on the other country being similarly disinclined to throw down with the US, however in this case I’m not so sure that the theocrats actually running Iran would consider a scrap with the US all that bad.

Theocrats calculation: Logically the US will probably not commit significantly more soldiers to the MENA theatre given the rising tide of public US sentiment against the Iraqi occupation. So what can the US or Israel do other than throw bombs at hard targets? Conclusion - not much. Re Israel Iran is too far away for Israel for it to attack Iran’s hardened installations with any efficiency or in any kind of sustained fashion.

So, real world if they are willing to take the hit what do they have to lose? A delay in our limited ability to go nuclear with a bomb or three? So what? On the other hand the PR gains for Iran with the Islamic world if attacked would be incalculable and world opinion would likely shift harshly against the US.

Conclusion - 99% chance it’s Bush Administration bullshit- On the off chance it’s not we still come out ahead in the end.

It’s all win-win in the end for Iran whichever way you look at it.