How long before some uses a nuke weapon again?

Great Debates
#1

What is your opinion about how long it will be before someone decides to use a nuke device in some form of attack again and who do you think will do it? I have 4 ideas about the user:

  1. The US: doubtful, considering the global impact and PR crisis that would arise, but its hard to count the United States out.
  2. Iraq: first, they would need one… and its unsure if they have one or not. I wouldn’t put it past them, but even then, they would have to have a means of transport, unless they use it in the middle east.
  3. North Korea: most likely, given the tension. They are the only country that seems to give the global impression that nukes are a viable option.
  4. Terorists: it could happen, I think that this is the wild card option.

As for time frame, given the destailization of the world right now, I would say within about 5 years.

::drops the puck::

#2

Sorry about the grammer… some should be someone

#3

Lets hope no one does. If any COUNTRY uses a nuke I am positive the entire UN would turn on them and most likely remove the countries governing forces.

The only REAL possibility of anyone using a nuke would be terrorists. For the most part anyone who would blow themselves up in trying to hurt others seriously would be stupid enough for using a nuke (if they ever get one)

Lets just hope people start getting a clue. Weapons of Mass destruction are NEVER a good idea.

I think we should bring back the gladiator arena and just solve disputes with paid gladiators.

-x out

#4

Hi, Deity,

What an unpleasant thought to entertain. Don’t you know that if you speak the name of the unspeakable you conjure them up?

Well D, if you must jerk me from a throbing hangover from Fat Tuesday and into the cold grey light of this new morning where the brilliant ungodly flash of atomic explosions must be considered, I’ll make this prediction…

**[ Within this month Saddam Hussain will explode a bomb that will scatter radioactive metals across the sands of a desired route that leads into Baghdad. Thankfully, no one will be hurt, but then at long last, even the most simple-minded of the Peacenicks will come to realize that Uncle Saddam is a very, very, bad, bad, man. ] **

#5

I’ve changed my mind in the last week on this, and not for the better.

When we go to war against Iraq, I believe North Korea may play its games and force a confrontation. With the USA over-committed in the Middle East (five, possibly six carrier battle groups in one part of the world), Bush will have no choice but to use the long-range bombers now being deployed to Guam (and possibly from Diego Garcia) to shore up US Defenses and prevent them from being overrun as the North Koreans come over the DMZ.

However, if North Korea is not stopped by the bombers and/or North Korea raises the ante, Bush will find himself in a corner and order the subs just off the North Korean coast to launch nuclear weapons.

I so desparately want to be wrong about this, but my gut feeling is the possibilities of a nuclear confrontation is very high, possibly approaching the level of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

We will know before the month is out.

#6

I can’t believe we would use a nuke in a first strike against North Korea–unless there were a hardened underground bunker where, say, we KNEW they were storing their own nukes, or were the Beloved Leader was hiding, etc. We have extremely powerful conventional forces at our disposal, both in the air (bombers) and on the ground (the thousands of troops in S. Korea and the heavily mined DMZ), and the PR disaster wouldn’t be worth using a nuke. On the other hand, N. Korea does not have similar air power at its disposal, and may use a nuke as a long-range weapon, or to soften ground forces either before a ground assault on the South or to prevent a US counter-invasion of NK.

#7

Either India or Pakistan.
But everyone listed in this tread is dumb enough to use them.
I want the Soviet Union back–it was safer!

#8

Any second n

#9

So if the US uses an a-bomb, then the whole world will turn on us and remove our government? Unlikely.

I don’t believe anyone thinks that the conventional forces in S. Korea at this time could withstand an all out attack by the N. Korean army.

I don’t know when the next nuke will be used, but I think once it is used it will not be ~60 years before it is used for the third time.

#10

Actually, South Korea has a very potent - and pretty large - army to fight in addition to the relatively few 37,000 US troops. I don’t think that North Korea would win quickly - as KJI might think in his little propaganda Bizarro World.

It could be like 1950 all over again, where the North Koreans bombard Seoul and push forward briefly - thus wrecking one of the most important cities in the world, that’s not like 1950 - and only after the allies regroup in the South will there be a SK / US victory. But, I don’t think long-term the North Koreans can win the war. When the US Navy and the air resources get mobilized fully, the North Korean troops - though numbering over a million - will be sitting ducks. In the event of a conflict North Korea will be in for a world of pain towards the end. Of course, the South Koreans might just wish to not fight a war in their most populous and prosperous nation. Therein lies the dilemma.

On the OP: within two years especially if dirty bombs count. Did I say that? Shit. Hope I’m wrong.

#11

ARGUENDO

I’m starting to wonder if a nuclear first use policy, which I normally oppose on principle, might be justified by the nature of a potential conflict with Kim Jong Il. Dabbling in Wolfowitzism for a moment. Utilitarian calculus would have us attempt to factor out any ground war in South Korea. If that means using some of the new “usable” nukes Bush and Co. are touting, so be it. But, of course, that’s just wrong for a whole bunch of reasons. Any thoughts?

I’m just askin’…

#12

Well, I think the most likely scenerio for a nuke in the near future is North Korea trying an attack on the South in the next year or so while the US is busy in Iraq, after they realize they can’t beat the South Korea conventially. South Korea maintains and army of ~570,000, plus 37,000 US troops there, in comparsion to the North Korea’s 1 million soldiers. But the US and South Korean forces are much better equiped, would gain air supority very quickly, have large minefields the North would have to cross, and of course would be fighting a defensive war, which is always easier. Seoul would get pounded though. The use of a nuke by North Korea would end up with the US responding with a larger nuke strike on the North.

The next most likely case for the use of a nuke would be a conflict between India and Pakistan in the next 10 years.

#13

I’d guess that a nuclear weapon will next be used between 10 and 20 years from now.

This is just a gut feeling based on the perception that availability of nuclear weapons is going to increase with time, and there really isn’t any way to stop it at this point.

#14

I’d guess that the U.S. would be the next (and still ONLY) country to use a Nuclear bomb in a military strike.

  1. The U.S. and Israel have both publicly stated that they would retaliate with whatever means necessary if Iraq uses chem/bio weapons. Of course, we would only be told that Iraq tried to use these weapons. It would be just as easy to fake intelligence that Iraq was going to use a wmd, and poof! there goes Bagdhad. But the U.S. would never fake intelligence… right? …try asking the Inspectors…

  2. The U.S. is currently developing mini-Nukes and ground-penetrating Nukes. There are plenty of bunkers on our target list right now. Maybe we could actually get Saddam this time. Why would we spend money on developing new technologies if there is no possibility to use them?

#15

heh heh heh that was funny, McDuff
…McDuff …?? Hello??

#16

Actually, I believe we’ve had them for years. Tactical battlefield nukes (to disrupt enemy positions, rather than to level cities) have been part of the arsenal since the beginning.

#17

How bad is the fallout from a mini-nuke?

#18

It’s mini-fallout.

Sorry.

I do know this: if you could get a nuke to penetrate far enough into the ground before exploding that would do one of two things. One, it would contain the blast and limit the fallout. Two, it would cause the bomb to throw up all the material above the explosion in a huge plume of fallout.