I don’t think so.
This isn’t unprovoked
And just how would we prove that it was from Iran? They could plausibly deny it.
Do you have any basis for that?
This is global politics and there will be a bit of posturing and then I very much doubt that anyone will be that bothered.
Too bad they assume a 1 megaton nuke. Nobody wants one that big. A good tac-nuke would be in the kiloton range, not megaton. But then again, the UCS has always been full of loons.
Hey, remember this thread? http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=273463&page=1&pp=50
“Axis of Evil #2: It is time for Iran now.”
Me, September '04: “Remember me when our boys are bombing Teheran.”
Iran’s political culture has serious problems. It remains to be seen whether they want to abandon their class structure & tradition of illiterate, manipulable peasants. Building the Republic on a basis of “Islamicism” instead of on one of liberalism & equality gave them the structure of democracy without the assurance of the educated base necessary for sane & sound democracy.
It is conceivable that at some point Western liberal democracies will have to foment revolution in Iran. That could, but might not, mean war. That could, but might not, mean the USA. That said, the current US administration may or may not have the will to wage war, but based on how things have gone in Iraq in Afghanistan, they don’t seem to have a good grasp of alternatives for encouraging reform in other sovereign countries. I fear a bloody confrontation between two governments that are big on war, but not good at political conversation.
I was in Europe around the time of the Pershing II controversy, and I remember the protests. I talked to a lot of Europeans while I was there, and every one of them was opposed to the deployment of nuclear weapons. Now, this is not a scientific poll; just casual conversations between two Americans and several people we hung out with. And back then the controversy was about the deployment of weapons that (it was hoped) wouldn’t have to be used. Still, my impressions from the people I talked to is that nuclear weapons are not popular there. And if we were to actually use nukes first?
Nobody would be that bothered if we used tactical nuclear weapons? You’ve joking.
The U.S. embargoed goods from going to Japan and Germany in WWII. It does not stretch the imagination to think that other countries may do the same to us. Especially the Japanese, since they were on the receiving end the last time we used nukes. Of course the governments can’t dictate what the people will buy or not buy. If we used nuclear weapons, the outpouring of ill-will will be overwhelming.
We’re not talking mini nukes, we’re talking bunker busters. Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator: Questions and Answers
From 2003: Boycott of American Goods Over Iraq War Gains
These were symbolic protests. I think that the protests would be greater if we actually used nuclear weapons.
Eh, they wouldn’t do it. Boycotting the US would be economic suicide and they know it.
As far as Hitler and his crowd were concerned, there was such a thing as “Jewish Physics.” I suppose nukes derived from Jewish physics (Would that be all of them? Not sure.) could be described as Jewish nukes.
Anyway, that’s a historical note that is way off topic. Carry on.
Anyone notice that the Iranians have backed off the rhetoric lately? How much of this reflects the fact that developing nuclear weapons is proving to be much harder (and more expensive) than the mullahs thought. In any case, the USA is NOT about to pick another fight-we are too bogged down in Iraq as it is. Rumsfeld (sepite his blunders) is not a stupid man. He is certainly aware that attacking Iran with nukes ENDs any hope we have of ever reconciling with the islamic world.
The very thought that your leaders feel they can act with impunity due to their economic might makes me sick. (Though I suppose it’s why we’re all suckling at China’s teats these days.)
When Ireland was first independent, the economic policies of DeValera were extremely anti-British, and the country suffered dreadfully as a consequence. Whether you agree with what he did or not, it’s called “principle” and hopefully, if it were to come to it, we would act on it.
If the fucknuts running your country launched pre-emptive nuclear strikes on anyone, I’d lobby as hard as humanly possible to hit your economy right in the nuts, and damn the consequences.
If we attack their nuclear sites with heavy-duty conventional weapons, and the Iranians then claim that we used tactical nukes, how hard would it be to prove otherwise? Would a tactical nuke leave a signature distinct enough from whatever isotopes were already present at the site to be easily detectable?
Even if it did, and the west was convinced that we didn’t use nukes and the Iranians were full of shit, would the Iranian citizenry and those of other Islamic countries believe it? Would the effect be any worse then if we had used tactical nukes?
What odds are you giving?
There is so much ignornace packed into the above statement that I’m not certain where to even start.
First of all, the US does not have a “bunker-busting” nuclear device in its arsenal. The reason for this is simple; getting a weapon, even one propelled at incoming ICBM-launched RV velocities (~19,000mph) it is essentially impossible to penetrate more than a few tens of feet into the ground and maintain an intact RV. Considering the delicacy of a nuclear device in comparison to a conventional one–if the primary shell is distorted or even on of the explosive blocks doesn’t detonate precisely, the whole thing will be a fizzle–it is merely a matter of digging deeper and reinforcing more to protect a shelter against direct attack.
Second, we’re not talking about “tactical”-sized weapons here; owing to absorption by the surrounding earth, this would be a 100kt+ class device. The result wouldn’t be a contained explosion like underground testing, but rather a massive crater, activating and dispersing tons of radioactive debris. Assuming you could make your penetrator such that the device inside would survive impact, the thermal pulse and other blast effects would be attenuated but hardly nonexistant; if the target is in a populated area you are going to see massive destruction comperable to a ground burst.
Third, there is a definite difference in scale between conventional and nuclear weapons. The firebombing of Tokyo killed around 100,000 people in a single night, but required several flights of over 300 B-29s in a coordinated effort. The bombing of Hiroshima, on the other hand, killed 60,000-80,000 by direct effects, and left residual radiation that resulted in uncounted higher incidence of chronic illness and birth defects for a generation or more. This required a single (modified) B-29 and a single device which, by modern standards, is barely even a tactical firecracker (est. yield 15kt). Nukes are very compact for their damage and require little in the way of logistical supply or planning in comparison to the same scale of damage available from conventional weapons. This makes them very different in use and reprecusion than even the most horrific of conventional munitions.
Given multistage thermonuclear weapons, there is no upper limit to the size of a device, and once you have the fundamentals of implosion-type weapons down, there’s very little increasing cost in scaling up the weapon, up to the point that you can transport it. Indeed, the reason US and Soviet arsenals are currently limited to <1MT weapons isn’t because they’re too costly to build or large to handle, but because the ICBM has become the preferred method of delivering said weapons and it is advantageous, from both an economic and strategic point of view, to mount several medium sized devices on one booster than one large one. Shelling an urban area or strategic target with multiple dispersed devices, or having an ICBM carry devices for different targets such that knocking out a single vehicle won’t protect a significant target is the best approach for the superpowers, although the same logic does not necessarily apply to a small nuclear power, depending upon their intended method of delivery.
The notion that tactical weapons are “cleaner” that strategic is just plain wrong, too. Indeed, although it has not been a part of the avowed policy of any of the major nuclear powers, one method of battlefield denial is to salt a battlefield or logistical channel with short-term highly active isotopes, either by the use of a jacketed weapon or by enhanced radiation (i.e. neutron) weapons. Even if the weapons aren’t deliberated salted, the typical use for a tactical weapon is a ground, near ground, or submarine application which will (like a bunker buster) maximize fallout, whereas most strategic nuclear applications call for an air burst to maximize damage and shock.
Talking about nuclear weapons as being broken neatly into groups like “tactical” and “strategic” is a misnomer as well. It has long been recognized by theorists and war planners that there is no scale at which one can use a nuclear weapon that will not conceivably escallate to a strategic exchange. When your opponent can wipe out a tank division, an airbase, or a naval battle group with a single missile, there’s really no recourse but to light one off yourself. And if you’re going to lob one back, why not a few? Or a bunch? Or everything you’ve got? After all, if you wait too long, your opponent might eliminate your ability to retaliate; better to get him before he gets you. In game theory terms, there is no Nash equilibrium, no limitiing range or cycle which defines an upper limit for how many or what size weapon you should use. Use it or lose it. This alone makes nuclear weapons unique; the scale of damage that can be waged by one command authority, without check or reflection, is fundamentally different than anything that can be done with conventional weapons. And to assume our opponent shares our views on the cost and value of a nuclear attack is damnfoolishness that already lead to one-near exchange.
Finally, the issue is one of proliferation; we (the United States) wish to inhibit proliferation, but if we do so at the point of a gun, particularly a nuclear one, we not only relinquish the moral high road but we give impetus to proto-nuclear nations to develop their capability in order to oppose us. This was a losing game in the beginning of the Cold War–when we threatened the Soviets not to develop or deploy nukes at risk of our displeasure, but were ultimately unable to stop expansion–and its even worse now that we are having to cope with increasing numbers of nuclear-capable powers. Diplomacy at the point of a sword–a Pax Americana–has been ineffective in the past and unlikely to succeed in the future, unless we are willing to follow through on threats to annihilate anyone we suspect of developing nuclear capability. The consequences of that foreign policy I will leave to the reader to imagine, but you can bet that if people around the world resent the US now, they’re not going to be awfully pleased when mushroom clouds start appearing arbitrarily around the globe.
As far as letting Iran have nukes; we may ultimately not have a choice in that regard, but it’s certainly something we’d like to discourage. A nation run by fundamentalist deists who speak in terms of reigning fire upon their enemies isn’t someone we’d care to share such an apocalyptic capability with. On the other hand, turning that mirror back on us doesn’t offer a much better view of things. It’s one thing to talk in terms of retaliation; its quite another to make plans to use one not even to preempt an attack but to prevent another power from even obtaining capability.
Stranger
Stranger On A Train, awesome post.
Up until today, I had been absolutely certain that there would be no American military moves against Iran. I believed that there were sane, logical people in the Bush administration, who had learnt the lessons of Iraq and (lest we forget) Afghanistan. I believed that the US public would never tolerate another episode of insane jingoism, let alone fall for the lies about “serious threat” and WMDs for a second time running. I believed that this time the Bush adminstration would not start a (second) illegal war, attempt to engineer regime change in a region they know nothing of (again), or use hideous and illegal weapons against their stereotyped enemies (twice in a row).
I am a gullible idiot, and if anyone wants me, I’ll be out pricing radiation suits.
In all seriousness, the straw that broke the camel’s spine was the line about the sustained bombing campaign leading to a popular uprising. I wish I had the documents that the various newspapers quote, because I expect that little gem was probably followed by an explanation of how are invisible pixie battalions would overwhelm the Iranians while a lovable black manservant taught the Ayatollah to dance, thus winning hearts, minds and feet. The idea that dropping bombs (especially nuclear ones, which a) have tremendous symbolic value b) are still fucking nasty c) will legitmise their use by every other aggresive international-law-breaking country in the world [Hi there, Pakistan, China, India, North Korea]) will encourage a population which already detests the US and the values it unashamedly seeks to impose on the Middle East to rise up and overthrow a leadership whose chief selling point is their opposition to “American Imperialism” (and I was SO close to not putting quotes around that) is about inspired as their continued refusal to believe in the Iraqi civil war. How could such a piece of idiocy make it into an officially compiled report, presumably intended for serious consideration? I would rather put a retarded chimp in charge of US policy (oops, too late!) then have whoever ordered (or wrote) this piece of festering, rancid, warmongering, incompetent rubbish remain in his current post uncensured (and, for that matter, untarred-and-feathered).
The very idea that military strikes can remove Iran’s nuclear capibility (already greatly overestimated) is laughable, given that the Iranian nuclear program 1) survived the Israeli bombing of the Osirak (is that right?) reactor and 2) is generally believed to have spread out and gone underground since then. Overt military action will only strengthen the Iranian’s case for nuclear weapons, and increase their own will to acquire them before “the West” tries another illegal invasion (aren’t those permanent bases in Iraq gonna be useful come 2007 and pre-election Invasion #2!). This document seems to me to be so abhorrent that it truly warrants a popular uprising, a statement so dripping with arrogance and ignorance that it should be a modern “L’estat, c’est moi”, a signal to the hordes of Americans who still believe in the last tattered fragments of idealistic politics (not to mention ethics or international law) to revolt and string up their erstwhile masters by the heels. Maybe Iran can encourage the lovers of freedom and democracy in the oppressive theocratic state that is America with a sustained bombing campaign! That would be sure to win them friends in the region! Arlington County, Virgina, and Washington D.C. would be a good start…
I weep for the human race.
(That was very cathartic. I apologise for the stream of invective. Guess they call it the Pit for a reason, huh?)
To be quite honest, I’m not surprised the Iranian nuclear program survived the bombing of Osirak, given that Osirak is in Iraq.
Osirak was the then-centre of the Iraqi nuclear program, actually. But the broader point remains. The current Iranian program is an entirely different animal. In any event, the underlying scientific knowledge required to build nuclear warheads has become fairly common. The other obstacles are “just” technical issues which can be overcome with time, effort, and money. I don’t know that there’s a moderate to large-sized nation on earth that couldn’t obtain them if they really wanted to in this day and age.
I’ve yet to figure out where, if anywhere, these guys draw the line. I’m not ready to take John Mace’s bet, but if I really believed there were a better than even chance this crew would use nukes on Iran, I’d probably take a leave of absence from my job so I could spend my days badgering my Congresspersons and anyone else I could get to listen about the impending doom. But would I say there’s not so much as a 5% chance that the Bush Administration would nuke Iran? No, I wouldn’t. And 5% is pretty damned scary. (Give me odds, John, and we can talk.)
But even without nukes, this saber-rattling is likely to get us in a lot of trouble. The Iranians will call our bluff, if bluff it is. And if we attack Iran, “the southern half of Iraq will light up like a candle,” according to one of Hersh’s sources - like you needed anyone to tell you that. Think April 2004 was bad? If we bomb Iran, next door in Iraq it’s gonna be helicopters and the Embassy roof all over again. The Iraqi Shi’ites regard Iran as their ally and close friend, and they’re 65% of the Iraqi population. We’ve been in a deteriorating quagmire on account of the Sunni insurgency, and Sunnis are more like 15-20% of Iraqis.
What’s that line from Less Than Zero that the narrator keeps repeating, something like “I wanted to see how bad it could get,” or some such? If somebody doesn’t back down, we’re gonna find out, and this crew doesn’t know the meaning of “back down.” Unless Congress passes a law barring attacks on Iran without prior Congressional approval, and even then, this Administration’s pretty much said that if it has to do with war, fuck Congress.
I think that, even with a conventional bombing of Iran, we could pretty much lose whatever residual support we have in the Middle East. There’s a lot of Arab-Persian and Sunni-Shi’ite stuff between Iran and the Arab nations in the region, but if we bomb Iran, my bet is they close ranks. Wonder how high gas prices would go if the Middle Eastern oil producers took their 20 billion barrels of annual exports off the world market? I’m thinking the $2.75/gallon I’m paying now will look awfully inexpensive.
If we’re lucky, “Bandar Bush” will call up the President and tell him what the score is before any of this comes to pass. Can you think of anyone else who is both in a position to talk sense into Bush, and has a decent likelihood of being willing to in such a circumstance?
“Was over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!”
- “Germans?”
– “Forget it. He’s rolling.”