I think there is very little doubt that the Israelis will act to prevent the Iranians fromm going nuclear. *******
http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/963901/posts
I think Iran would strike back
So much “depends” regarding what happens next.
*******How sucessful they would be I am not sure. According to Tel Aviv’s Jaffe Center for Strategic Studies [& re the OP]
http://www.tau.ac.il/jcss/tanotes/TAUnotes83.doc
I wonder if Israel would consider a preemptive nuclear strike?
Israel won’t… they will wait for their American enforcers to do something about it first…
If Israel does use nukes it would have to nuke several different installations… and even the US would have to condemn them. If they do something as stupid as using nukes then I hope the Arabs wipe 'em out of the map… they will have deserved it.
Well sure the US would condemn them, and cut off all aid, probably diplomatic relations as well.
And the Arabs wouldn’t do a darn thing simply because they can’t. There is only one nation on Earth that can take on Israel and the US isn’t going to go to war with Israel over Iran.
The problem is that the US never does anything to pressure Israel into more reasonable atitudes, they always side with Israel for right or wrong … then americans wonder why the WTC was attacked.
That’s partly true, but not totally. The US has often pressured Israel into concessions during peace talks, and opposes the building of the security fence. The US has also voted for many resolutions condemning Israeli behavior, such as the Osirak reactor bombing.
As for the WTC, read bin Laden’s own statements. The Palestinian cause rarely comes up in them. His main beef was the US presence in Saudi Arabia and the sanctions and bombing of Iraq during the 90s.
Its true that the palestinian issue doesn’t figure to highly with Osama… still staunch support for Israel is a major reason why the US is portrayed as “evil” by fundamentalists. I think if the troops in Saudi Arabia were mostly of other nations or of muslim religion it wouldn’t bother Osama as much. Then again these fundamentalist types tend to not see grey areas.
Yeah, Israel is part of it, but first, there’s nothing we can do about that. The fundamentalists don’t just want us to be more evenhanded. They want us to stop all support for Israel, period. Nothing less will satisfy them.
Another thing that angers them that we can’t do anything about is our culture seeping into theirs. Movies, media, clothing, customs, language, it’s catching fire all around the world and they consider it to be a bad thing. That is the big conflict, cultural conflict between fundamentalism and the more carefree West. Even in America we have that conflict on a less violent scale. But even we still have things like bombing of abortoin clinics and preachers constantly rambling on about what we wear and what we watch on TV, and our tolerance for gays, blah blah blah.
If Israel were to be foolish enough to pre-emptively use nukes on a Muslim country it would totally inflame the region. It would only be a matter of time, I suspect, before Islamic radicals obtained nukes from Pakistan and retaliated in kind.
Personally, I don’t think they are waiting for Israel to strike first to do that and I don’t think they can increase efforts that are already pretty much at maximum.
It’s hard to inflame a region that already wants to see Israel destroyed. What are they going to do, destroy Israel twice?
Nonsense. Islamic extremism isn’t even remotely close to being at a maximum either in the region or in Pakistan. It would be vastly increased if Israel were to use nukes. Then a scenario where Islamic radicals managed to obtain Pakistani nukes would become entirely realistic and maybe even likely.
They rhetorically want to destroy Israel… but realistically most know that is not feasible or desirable to try. Remember that keeping their people inflamed against the US and Israel is a very effective means of keeping their minds from protesting their own corrupt governments. Even if the USA dissapeared suddenly most civilized countries wouldn’t want to allow widespread carnage in the sensitive Middle East. (Thou in places like Africa its not an issue…)
I’ll concede that point then.
Don’t they realize or care what Israel’s response would be? Israel can take out the entire Arab world plus Iran.
I know they don’t care about their own lives, but what about their dreams of Islam reigning supreme over the world? Not exactly possible if the Muslim population is cut in half in one day.
My biggest worry is Pakistan suffering some kind of coup and falling into the hands of religious rulers. That would means nukes with islamic clerics.I would imagine that India already acts as a check on Pakistani ambitions.
Still secretly sold nukes are hardly “checkable” and they might not involve aggression against India at all. Pakistan might also play the MAD game with Israel. (MAD = Mutual Assured Destruction) We barely survived the Cold War… I dont want to see a Lukewarm War in the Middle East based on a regional nuclear race.
Thou I wouldn’t blame Iran for wanting to acquire their own nukes… nukes now are a guarantee against US presidents trying to get pork barrel and votes.
If the Iranian people had a say I’d agree with you. Since they don’t, I don’t believe anything the Iranian leadership does has any legitimacy whatsoever.
As for MAD, if Israel feels they are about to be imminently destroyed, they will simply destroy their enemies. The Samson option.
If Iran builds nukes and just holds them as a deterrent, that’s different, then you have geniune MAD. But if Iran uses them, as many suspect they will as soon as they get them, we have Samson. And Israel will not and should not limit their retaliation to just Iran. If Iran believes they would do that it would encourage them to make a sacrifice for the sake of Islam. What’s 10% of the Muslim world in exchange for Israel? But if it’s the entire ARab world plus Iran, that could change the calculation a bit.
In the “near” future? Hell no.
Right now the US Army appears to be right at its limits in both available combat units and logistics units to keep them going.
Posted by adaher:
No they can’t, adaher. Only the United States, and possibly China, has that many nukes.
Israel supposedly has more nukes than China. Estimates range from 200-400. China’s range from 20-100.
And now Israel can mount them on subs. I don’t think China can do that. That gives Israel worldwide reach. If a terrorist nuke originates from North Korea, Israel can just park a sub 100 miles from their coast and cut loose with several warheads.