Here on the coast of South Carolina we have many shrimp boats. I’ve seen different cargoes placed on shrimp boats, for instance, a tractor-trailor full of marijuana and once someone brought a pickup from Key West on the back of a shrimp boat. I think a nuclear weapon could be carried on a boat. In my life I have spent many weeks fishing at the hundred-fathom curve. On a week-end with lots of boats going to international waters and back, no one keeps track of every boat coming and going. In my area, I think it would be very easy to go off-shore, meet with a ship, transfer a nuclear weapon, and take it right into Charleston Harbor.
- Please get a grip on yourself. All you are coming out with is a garbled rant that does not make any sense.
The question under discussion revolves about the question of: “If someone got the nuke, would they use it.”
This does not involve Agent Orange, as far as I know. Nor does it involve Depleted Uranium (DU).
As far as DU is concerned, the main danger of that element/compound in its DU state is that it’s a heavy metal, and in powder form, particularly near breathing apparatus, such as lungs, it can be bad news, as can the inhalation of any heavy metal.
In reality, it is no more radioactive than granite. But best not inhaled.
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I recommend that you stop using this “US’er” term. It is rude, insulting, obnoxious, and indicates that you have no class.
-
I am not an American.
You are comparing an herbicide with nuclear weapons. That’s pathetic. Yes, Agent Orange killed people. No, Agent Orange was not meant to kill people. Yes, public opinion will probably prevent wide-spread use of it in the future.
Now why don’t you continue your US bashing in another thread, so I can get back to enjoying this one?
Getting away from the question of whether terrorists could use a nuke on a US city, I think there is a real question as to whether they would use a nuke on a US city. Or at least a random US city.
Think of the 9/11 attacks: the places attacked were government buildings (the Pentagon, plus an attempt at the White House), and the World Trade Center (the symbolic epicenter of US capitalism). Many civilians were killed, to be sure, but I imagine the terrorists would argue that those civilians were regretable “collateral damage.” I am not agreeing with this logic, just recognizing that there is a certain hard logic there. Would al Qaeda (for example) nuke a US city simply for the sake of killing a large number of civilians? My hunch is that they would not, with the caveat that they might be able to justify it to themselves if they nuked a city that was a government center (such as DC) or the perceived financial center of the US (New York).
Running counter to this line of thought, I suppose, is the Intifada (not affiliated with al Qaeda, of course, and suicide bombers on Israeli buses. On the other hand, I can imagine (without necessarily agreeing with) a logic which regards those Israelis as an occupiers. Not sure that logic would apply to US civilians in US cities.
Any thoughts along these lines? What evidence do we have that al Qaeda, nasty as they are, would randomly kill civilians (in the absence of some symbolic target)? Do you think they would nuke, say, Milwaukee, if they could, or is symbolism the key to their targets?
jmizzou,
I think you should re-read my post, starting at the beginning.
Salaam. A
AOB,
If you want to take "US’er as an “insult” not even being one yourself, you make a fool of yourself.
Those US citizens who read my posts know why I do this as I explained it several times.
Reading your comment, you find DU nothing special.
Maybe you should go to Iraq to find out.
But a good start would be to inform yourself in order to protect yourself when you do go overthere.
Salaam. A
Answering the OP,
I can’t see what type of nuclear weapon you refer to.
But I think the question is:
Would there ever be someone who has such a weapon and then at the same time have the possibility to use it.
Salaam. A
I have no doubt that a raghead’er in possession of a nuclear device would seek to use it against the American populace.
Err…hope the term offends no one, it’s just that typing the word “M…u…s…l…i…m…” – even now I have to slow down and concentrate on typing each letter… is simply too taxing for me and the alternative is much easier.
At least, that explanation is NO less believable than the one offered by **aldebaran, **explaining his fondness for typing the word “USer” instead of “American,” when he says, quote:
As I said already many times, I don’t mean “all” when I talke about Americans. And while tuping this word, I did it letter by letter looking everytime again at my keyboard (on which no roman characters are visible, not on this one in any case) and then to the screen for control and a few times again.
It is one of the most difficult for me to write correctly. Don’t ask me why, it simply is. So therefore I use US’ers and I explained this already a few times.
That “M” word --sorry, can’t spell it well-- is one of the most difficult for me to write correctly. Don’t ask me why, it simply is. It’s weird that I can write long, rambling paragraphs, spelling most other words correctly, but choke on that particular one. No offense, though.
Anyway-- I think we need to keep nukes out of the raghead’ers hands, or else bomb the crap out of 'em if they get one.
Hard to figure. It is difficult for “normal” people (you know who you are) to get into the head of a nutter.
Some people/groups are crazy enough to use a nuke. The idea here is that they understand the world is so screwed up that destroying it is the first step to an improved future with people liike them in charge.
On the other hand, openly having a nuke is a “threat in being” that can be used as a bargining chip for just about forever. North Korea seems to be playing that game.
On the third hand, a tiny nation/group with only one nuke would be in danger of loosing it to a coup d’main. That is to say, they may feel they are in a use it or loose it scenario.
All in all, the open nuclear powers seems to be less of a threat than a surprise detonation by a small previously unknown group.
Forget about a dozen nukes in a dozen US cities. One anywhere in the CONUS would be a huge blow to the US and so the world economy. It would recover of course, but it would set us back many, many years. Think of the electronic damage alone. The environmental cleanup.
Heluva mess.
(I wonder if we have aplan for that in a file cabinet somewhere.)
Not quite. See if you can follow me here. An ICBM, is, essentially, a really large missile. Now, assuming that it isn’t being launched from a submarine or cruiser, which present their own problems, detecting an ICBM launch is going to be practically impossible.
Unless it was launched from somewhere within radar range of a NATO country (or NATO base in a non- NATO state) we wouldn’t have a clue. Were you under the impression that every square foot of the planet is under constant US satellite surveillance?
In the worst case scenario, it is possible that the missile wouldn’t be detected until it was almost in US airspace.
A submarine launch could potentially even worse, especially from a nuclear sub. (Diesel subs, like those the Russians sell off every now and then, can’t stay submerged for long enough to get too close to either seaboard.)
ammo,
Being severly dyslexic myself, I understand your troubles completely.
But you failed to describe you new discovered bird. Now they are already flying with nukes on them?
I tink you were on that Hollywood island… You know, that with those dinosaurs .
On the other hand… There is a good chance that you by accident discovered the newest US development in their race to be and stay The Most Fast To Use Nukes on this globe.
Salaam. A
Some of this has been covered before, but, first of all, the leadership of most nations know better than to directly attack the US. There are a lot of flaws with the US right now, goodness knows, but we do have a kick-ass military machine right now and we’re capable of deploying significant conventional firepower anywhere in the world in less than 24 hours - never mind our more exotic and questionable items.
Second, assuming some Bad People have a nuke no, they would not “launch” it in the sense of loading it onto a missle. The WWII nukes were what - around 400lbs? That’s large, you’re not going to smuggle something like that into the country under a trench coat, but the US border is huge and many parts sparsely defended. It could be done by land, sea, or air - and further I do not care to speculate.
You’re using the assumption that our attackers have a grasp of both our national psychology and our system of government - which is not a given.
This is why the study of history is important. For instance, the Japanese (aside from Yamamoto, who had lived and studied in the US for a number of years and thus knew us from experience) sincerely believed that if they struck a massive blow to our military we’d back down in fear and be happy to sign a treaty giving Japan the Pacific in return for leaving us alone. Boy, were they wrong. Which is precisely why Yamamoto used the term “waking the sleeping tiger” in reference to the planned attack at Pearl Harbor. Kick us in the teeth we’ll come back up swinging. Some folks understand this about the Americans, some don’t.
More recently, judging from the videotapes and transcripts I’ve seen from Al Quaeda, they apparently thought that the US would dissolve into race riots or some such and fall apart after the 9/11 attacks. Compete misunderstanding of our internal race relations. Yes, we have some serious problems with ethnic tensions in this country, but unlike many places such ethnic tensions do not (normally) turn into violence here. Disasters - either natural or manmade - tend to bring Americans closer together and put those tensions on hold. As a result, the 9/11 attacks made us more unified, not less.
Even some of our closer allies do not really understand our cultural quirks and reactions. I recall reading numerous statements shortly after 9/11 that folks hoped these attacks would make us more “humble” and “reflective”. Sorry folks - the overall psyche of this country is such that attacking us will NEVER make us reflective and humble. At best we’ll hunt down those responsible and kill them. More likely, we’ll turn into bullies - well, surprise, surprise. I’m sorry if folks don’t like this (and I don’t feel it’s one of our better qualities), but that is the way we are for better or worse. The US is capable of being enormously generous - our tendency to lend personnel and other support during disasters half way around the world (even when those involved are declared enemies, such as during the Chernobyl mess during the Soviet era) is a reflection of that - but we can be real assholes when it comes to war. I absolutely hate what happens when the US goes to war, we’re far too clever at coming up with new ways to generate hell on earth. Among other things, it was the US that invented the concentration camp, trench warfare, the machine gun, and the landmine. Between 1860 and 1865. Those are NOT 20th Century inventions, they are US products from the 19th Century. Not the sort of export to be proud of, really.
We’re also weird in that, at least over the past century, we haven’t fought for land and resources as much as we have fought for abstract concepts like freedom and democracy. Whether we should have done so is fodder for more debate, but please do NOT assume the US is going to react like your country or like some other country. When you consider us in historical context we’re awfully strange in many ways. Even though we’re considered as “western” nation with strong ties to Europe do not make the mistake of thinking we’re going to jump the way Europe does - we’re NOT European, either. I’ve run into any number of folks who assume that, since we speak English we’re no different from the British (oddly enough, none of those folks are from the British Isles…) We are what we are - a unique culture with good and bad points just like anyone else.
The key here is if we were so inclined. The question is - what would provoke us to commit genocide?
Leaving aside the Indian Wars of the pre-20th century (which were wars of outright conquest), since 1900 we have acted with some restraint even when absolutely enraged. Again, take the example of Japan - which, by the way, did NOT attack an actual US state, Hawaii at the time not being an official state but rather a territory (and let’s not open the can of worms on how that came to be…). By the time the dust settled the US had demanded and received the complete and unconditional surrender of Japan. We owned the islands. Is Japan today part of the US, or it’s own independent country? I mean, we gave it back. No, I don’t think the occupation was pleasent for the Japanese and I’m sure there’s still resentment over a lot of it, but the fact is if we had wanted to keep Japan we could have. But we didn’t. That’s awful weird. Name some other time one country has utterly defeated another and voluntarially given it back to the defeated. Not only that, instead of imposing war reparations we help them rebuild their country. We did such a good job on their economy that by the 1970’s we were worried about them buying up assets in our territory.
Again, more recently - after 9/11, which was the first time the US mainland had been attacked since 1812, when went to Afganistan to clean house. Did we turn the country into a parking lot? No. (Although I think everyone realizes that yes, if we wanted to we could have turned the mountains into valleys and sterilized the place) In fact, we got quite schizophrenic about bombing the country and trying to feed it at the same time. OK, that’s weird. But I’d like to make the point that, even when MIGHTILY provoked - part of our largest city reduced to rubble, thousands dead, and our national captial attacked - it still did not trigger genocidal reactions. We were aiming at the leadership of Afghanistan while trying to preserve the average Afghani who, frankly, probably did not (and still does not) give a damn about the US. Did we succeed? I don’t know - it’s not like that sort of thing has been tried much before. But underline the fact that, despite a direct attack on the US we did NOT launch the missiles, stuck strictly to conventional tools of warfare, and did not indulge in wanton massacre.
Gee, how much more provocation can you get beyond 9/11?
No.
Well, that’s kind of the problem we’re facing now, isn’t it? Al Qaeda, without question, is our enemy and would attack us if they could (and they still could). They lost the support of the Taliban, so now they’re scattered across the globe. So far, we seem to be taking the “investigate” approach. The problem, of course, is that we will likely not be working either with complete or 100% accurate information which might lead us to military action of questionable justification - like in Iraq. Which leads to a demonstration that, while the US may desire the backing and opinion of other nations, if we are determined to do something we don’t need to have it. (Of course, there are also consequences to going it alone, as we have seen and will continue to see.)
During Gulf War I we played by the UN-imposed rules - which were the ONLY reason we did not march on Baghdad and get rid of Saddam then. By not doing so, Bush the Elder paid a serious politcal price at home it may have contributed to his loss in the next election. What was the difference with Gulf War II? Well, for starters, we had been attacked on our home ground. This makes us really, really cranky. If the US is convinced (rightly or wrongly) that someone is a threat and we’re still burying our dead and cleaning up the mess from an attack we are not going to stop simply because France doesn’t approve. (Gross over-simplification, yes) Don’t want us to attack a particular country when we’re so pissy? Well, you’re either going to have demonstrate that country’s innocence (yes, I know, it was tried) or point us to a different target. I’m not saying that’s right, I’m saying that’s how it IS.
Someone woke up the sleeping tiger. Even when the tiger has been largely benign and friendly for years, they’re still dangerous. Just ask Ray Horn. You may have to wait for an answer, though, I’m not sure he’s recovered enough to speak yet. But the metaphor chosen by Yamamoto, while metaphorical, contained very little hyperbole.
Quite true. We’re pretty damn brutal when you just kill about 2500 of us. A nuke could take down easily 10 times that. You think we’re nasty and paranoid NOW???..
That does NOT mean we’d retaliate with nukes!
That choice would certainly be on the table, of course. And there is NO question that the US is capable of using nukes on another country - we are, in fact, the only country for which that is an undisputable fact. We have done it. Of course, the world in 1945 was a very different place. For starters, only we had nukes - and damn few of them. There was NO chance that we would unleash a nuclear armageddon. Now there is. And we would factor that into any considerations about retaliation (and there WOULD be retaliation). It does us no good to wipe our our adversaries if it results in all our deaths. We are not, as a society, suicidal.
Even though our home soil was attacked, our civilians killed, and our capital attacked on 9/11/01 we did not, even then, unleash the full fury of our conventional forces on those we held responsible in a rush of bloodlust. Even if ONE nuke went off in this country we may not nuke in return - if we could take the adversary through conventional weaponry we probably would. If, for example, the Taliban/Al Qaeda had used a nuke instead of a couple of jumbo jets on New York City we might still have used conventional weaponry because we wanted JUST those responsible, not the uninvolved average Afghani, and nukes just are not discriminating enough between leadership and civilian (one can argue the bombs we did use aren’t discriminating enough, either… but it’s still a relatively new approach to warfare and I would almost say it still needs perfecting, although I don’t really want there to be much opportunity to “perfect” better weapons on the field).
Now… multiple nukes? All bets are off. I haven’t run that scenario through my mental computer yet. Not sure I want to (but, since it’s been brought up, I probably will. Oh, well, who needs to sleep well at night?..)
Which indirectly leads me back to something mentioned at the beginning of this already lengthy post. The structure of our government. There are numerous countries in this world where the central government IS the linchpin of the system. If you take down the Big Man, or eliminate the captial, chaos reigns. That is not, however, how the US government is constructed. The US states were once independent and sovereign nations, and still retain the machinery to function as such even today (this has been discussed in a number of other threads on the SD). Even though we do have a national government, the Federal government in Washington, DC, most governmental functions for day-to-day needs reside in the the 50 states and the several territories/protectorates. If a nuke vaporized DC it would be an enormous loss but it would NOT cripple the country - aside from contingencies put in place during the Cold War for just that event, the States themselves are capable of deciding to render aid on their own, retain military capabilities, and so forth. And the various states have a long history of rendering aid to each other without requiring the intervention of the Feds. As a very recent example - Nevada and Arizona lent fire fighters to the recent California blazes on their own, at the request of one state to another with no need or desire to get the Feds involved in the transaction. Back to 9/11 - with the New York City police and fire departments decimated, it was the state governments, and the local city governments that sent reinforcements from their own police and fire departments to the city to help out. Again, the Feds were not in any way involved in that - indeed, I don’t think the Federal government would be able to order such a thing even if it wanted to. Yes, we have a centralized government. We also run concurrently a DE-centralized governmental structure.
The point is - even if you cut the head off the US Federal government it won’t destroy the united states which is, indeed, why the official name of the country is the United States of Amercia - think of it as a phrase and not a proper noun for a change. Think of it as “the alliance of 50 sovereign nations of North America and the Hawaiian Islands”. Destroying Washington, D.C. would no more render this country non-existant and helpless than blowing up Belgium would negate the multiple alliances of the European Union. If you want to destory the US of A on a military level you’re going to have to take out the equivalent of not one but fifty nations, many of which - such as California or Texas - would be considered major players on the world stage and fully equal to many European and Asian nations even if they weren’t part of this strange creation in North America.
I’m not sure some of our adversaries really understand that, particularly those using a “Big Man” form of government.
Hezbollah’s primary grievance is with Isreal itself. They’re ticked off at America mainly for being an ally and supporter of Isreal, not because Amercia is America.
Al Qaeda, however, views the entire non-Muslim “West” as its primary enemy, and thus is much more aggressive towards the US as a nation.
I could see Hezbollah, at least in theory, nuking Isreal, but not the US. Al Qaeda, however, if they had a nuke, would see the biggest bang for their buck, making the US a much more likely target.
No, it’s not. The Potomac river is navigable and has ocean access. You don’t need a container ship to transport a nuke. Know how many boats capable of transporting such a device go up and down US waterways every day? I don’t - but it’s got to number in the thousands.
Apparently, flight training is not an insurmountable obstacle.
Neither, for that matter, is obtaining a suitable aircraft.
I don’t think they would randomly choose a city - but their reasons for choosing a particular city may or may not be obvious or sensible to those of us living in the US. It might have to do with access. It might have to do with some particular grievance the majority of the US is barely aware of.
Would someone be willing to nuke the US? I’m sure you could find a number of such people. I hope none of them have access to such a device, however.
>sigh< NO! You have that wrong. The purpose of the attack on the World Trade Center was to kill people. LOTS of people. That was NOT collateral damage, that was INTENDED damage. Al Qaeda considers those we call “civilians” to be legitmate targets of agression. They’re stated aim is the destruction of the United States (and the rest of the West) including the deaths of the “infidels” - basically, not anyone just like them.
You bet.
Well, why did they bomb BALI, of all places? Bali is in Indonesia, in a Muslim-majority area.
They bombed Bali because 1) they could and 2) they could kill a lot of unarmed “evil” Westerners (in this case, mostly Australians).
Hell, yes, I think if Al Qaeda had the means to kill every man, woman, and child in, say, Milwaukee they would. If they could kill everyone in freakin’ Hales Corners, WI they would if the plan had a reasonable chance of working. Symbolism is important, yes, but their stated aim is our destruction as a civilization. Being able to kill a lot of people in a very short time frame is just as important as blowing up buildings or symbols.
And is someone else gonna post or do I get all of page 2 to myself? 
Sure, I’ll bite.
First of all, Broomstick, do you have a cite on what Al Qaida was thinking would happen to the U.S. after 9/11?
I’m not disputing you – I am in fact quite ignorant on that topic – but it sure sounds interesting, and I’d like to read more about that.
So: WOULD some crazy outfit or individual use a nuclear weapon on the US, if they had it? Sure they would. I don’t think that’s any question after 9/11.
The next question in my mind is: what form would this attack take?
I don’t see a terrorist outfit getting a missile system capable of hitting the continental US any time soon. This requires an infrastructure that many COUNTRIES don’t have, much less a slavering bunch of religious homicidal maniacs.
They’d do better trying to seize a pre-existing missile launch facility that was already prepped and ready and aimed at Washington, frankly, and even then, that could be awkward in ways I can’t begin to imagine.
I mean, if I was designing a missile launch facility, I’d sure want some sort of failsafe to keep armed loonies from commandeering it and getting the US mad at MY country!
This leaves the option of simply obtaining, moving, placing, and detonating a bomb. This would be the easiest option, I would think, and therefore the one the terrorists would pursue.
Our first possibility would involve obtaining a fully functional bomb. Then we just have to transport it to its target and go boom, right? Unfortunately, fully functional nuclear bombs aren’t easy to come by – them what has them tend to be kind of chinchy with them. Sure, North Korea’s making lots of noise in that direction, but any sane dictator must sooner or later come to the ultimate conclusion: if I make a habit of selling nuclear bombs to crazy people, sooner or later, the U.S. Marines are going to come over here and rip my dick off and feed it to me.
I would think, at least, that this would be a matter of some concern.
Our second possibility involves the terrorists obtaining fissionable materials and building their own bomb. This, unfortunately, is a very real worry; there are any number of uh-oh scenarios involving missing plutonium. The only limiting factor here involves the know-how of the terrorists, and the availability of the elements of a nuke. Oh, yeah, and getting it into the country.
This brings us to our third possibility: the terrorists infiltrate the country, buy houses, marry pretty American women, have a few kids, get good jobs, start living the American dream…
…and quietly attempt to locate and assemble the portions of the bomb, and then simply load the thing in the back of Achmed’s Toyota Camry, and drive it downtown… and THEN go boom.
Likelihood? Unknown. I’m only speculating. But I think I’m not the only one speculating in that direction.
I do think it unlikely that we’d launch nukes at anyone in retaliation, even if we had damn good evidence that a national entity was responsible; the political “fallout,” to pardon the pun, would be inadvisable, unless World War Three was already in full tilt boogie mode.
…which is also a possibility that has crossed my mind. Why, precisely, would Osama Bin Laden NOT just detonate the thing in downtown Islamabad, and then blame the evil crazy Americans, the only nuclear power that hates Muslims? Lots of people would believe it. Hell, most of Islam seems to believe the damn Israelis are behind the 9/11 attack!
Maybe we aren’t necessarily the ones who should be worried.
Broomstick had a nice, long, interesting analysis there at the top of the page. However, I think it neglects the fact that if there were widescale nuclear armageddon, the U.S. could effectively cease to exist as the nation it is today (governmentally and politically) if the panic were bad enough for martial law or other such restrictions to be imposed (which isn’t out of the question). Once stuff like that gets imposed, I don’t see how it’ll ever be rescinded.
The old “the terrorists have already won” scenario, basically…
My sources are basically translations of bin Laden videotapes translated after the 9/11 business. For short while you could get them on CNN, then, after our government decided that it might be a bad idea to transmit bin Laden stuff, from the BBC and various other sources. I would suggest viewing several translations of a particular tape to help even out biases in translation.
I’m not sure where to go about getting these things today - I’m relying mostly on memory from 1-2 years ago. But there are some fine search engines available on the Internet these days. Some Arab news outlets provide English translations on the Internet as well.
Naw, all much too elaborate.
A “dirty bomb” is sooooo much easier to obtain materials for, build, and detonate. Radioactive cesium, for instance, can be obtained from legitimate medical equipment. There have, in fact, been several dozen deaths from junkyard scavengers coming across it in dumps (and no, it’s not supposed to be in those dumps but accidents can and do happen). Collect enough, wrap it around a conventional bomb, detonate - you could kill some people and certainly cause consternation and panic. You can do the same with just about anything radioactive.
But yeah, I guess the thread deals with honest-to-goodness fission bombs. Very hard to build from scratch, particularly if you don’t want to kill your own workers. However, since it was done once it can be done again.
What it comes down to is - do you want to spread panic and kill a few dozen people, or do you actually want to destroy a city or two and kill thousands at a time?