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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 08/08/2008 : 11:35:40 [Permalink]
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chaloobi.....
Your points are well taken. Neither Iran , nor any nation large or small, could initiate a nuclear attack against the U.S. and escape massive retaliation as soon as the origin of the attack was positively identified.
However, I feel the real danger lies in the possible difficulty of positive identification of the origin of such a nuclear attack on the U.S. Given the apparent incompetence and corruption of our intelligence agencies, a really cleverly conceived Nuke attack might not be easily traceable to it's true origin.
For example, Iran buys, steals, or even actually builds a crude nuclear bomb. They devise an attack plan on the U.S. using existing terror organizations such as Al Qaeda or their ilk to achieve the actual delivery of the bomb.
Also, they utilize their own intelligence capabilities to learn whatever possible origin clues there may be in the actual material construction of the device (type of nuclear explosive, size, materials that may leave traces at the explosion site radioactive or not, etc.)
They counterfeit the modus operandi of another nuclear nation in every way they possibly can; including documentation forgery, materials, and style of construction - any trace remaining after an explosion that could provide a clue as to the origin of the actual device and would point to a source other than Iran.
They essentially frame another existing nuclear power such as Pakistan, North Korea (if they actually do have a few fission bombs) or even India or Russia as the builder of the bomb. The plan is to leave whatever clues that are possible to leave after a nuclear explosion, to point to an origin of the device other than their own facility.
And they actually deliver the nuke into the hands of the terrorists via a highly paid third or fourth party mercenary who effects the delivery to terrorist hands without knowledge of it's real origin. Al Quaeda gets an anonymous nuke and succeeds in smuggling it into the U.S. by one of many methods previously discussed here. Thus Osama bin Laden is enlisted to publicly (via Al Jazeera) take full credit for the attack.
If extreme care was taken in every step of such a process, Iran or any other nation or group that had actual possession of a nuclear device, might be able to get it delivered to American soil and detonated with few or no clues as to it's actual origin.
While researching educated opinion on sneak nuclear attacks on the U.S. for an earlier thread, I contacted a number of nuclear warfare authors and experts; and various versions of this scenario were suggested to me as possibilities.
It may sound like Tom Clancy (whom I did not contact), but it seems to me that such a "concealed origin" attack might actually be feasible, particularly with the arguably lousy intelligence services that we currently have! |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 08/08/2008 : 12:28:36 [Permalink]
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bng, It is possible to identify fissionable material and match it to the specific facility in which it was refined. Only a fraction of the material is actually consumed in the reaction, the rest is scattered.
Faking the origin of a nuke is very unlikely unless our gov wants to be fooled.
Not paranoid much are you? Hahaha! Get a hold of yourself. |
Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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pleco
SFN Addict
USA
2998 Posts |
Posted - 08/08/2008 : 12:37:06 [Permalink]
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Hell, even it anonymity could be guaranteed, they (Iran) still wouldn't do it. Why?
Because, if a nuke ever popped off in the US, the US would attack with or without evidence. It's been done before. |
by Filthy
The neo-con methane machine will soon be running at full fart. |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 08/08/2008 : 22:47:41 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
You completely missed my point. The entire effort of the Iranians would be to deliver a bomb to the terrorists whose radioactive detritus would be identified as coming from a reactor of any other country except Iran! They would want our scientists to come to the conclusion that the plutonium/U-235 was made in Pakistan (for example) because it actually was made in Pakistan! Not in the Iranians' brand new reactors!
Confusing identification of the source of the attack, not the source of the material, would be the primary goal. And the fissionable material would very likely come from another country anyway, because ths Iranians still may be some years away from producing their own, (How in the hell would we know with our lame intelligence, however?)
Or that it was from North Korea, for example, who has been suspected for some time of selling enriched uranium to the highest bidder! Or Russia with apparently loose controls on their nuclear arsenal. Etc.
The important part of the Iranian effort would be to conceal their involvement in getting the Pakistanian-made (or Russian, or Korean, etc.) explosive to the terrorists. This would have to be done by elaborate third and fourth party manipulations.
It appears fairly probable that Obama is going to get the nod of the electorate. He would be damn careful to absolutely conclusively determine the origin of an attack before ordering retaliation. It might not even be possible to really pin it on the Iranians, and he certainly would not risk attacking them without proof positive. And that is the way it should be!
As Pleco suggests; McCain, on the other hand would Bomb Iran, Bomb Iran within minutes of the news of an attack on the U.S. - with the dire consequences that would follow such a precipitous move.| Faking the origin of a nuke is very unlikely unless our gov wants to be fooled. |
I feel that it is just as likely that a Bush or McCain administration would "want to be fooled" just as much as the Bush neocons may have wanted to fool the US people with the very fishy smelling Anthrax caper, suggested in another thread current here in SFN! | Not paranoid much are you? |
No, I am not paranoid, merely not blithly indifferent to what I perceive as very real dangers in a pretty dangerous world.
When I was a child, albeit a precocious one, the US was in the grip of a kind of isolationism of the majority that continuously mocked the concerns of the minority regarding the ambitions of Adolph Hitler, and his march through Europe in the late 30's.
I would ask my Dad, a rabid Hoover Republican, what was "Hitler" all about. "Forget about it, son, it's a tempest in a teapot! Nothing bad is going to happen" Most of the country was blind to the looming threat of the Third Reich. Something bad really did happen, WWII!
Roosevelt had a very difficult task in rallying public support for involvement in the raging European war and the danger to Great Britian, until Pearl Harbor. After that dramatic event, the minority became a majority almost overnight! And I do not feel that it is "conspiratorial" to at least consider that Roosevelt knew in advance of the forthcoming attack (intercepted code) and did nothing to prevent it. And a damn good thing it was, in retrospect! Pearl Harbor was the impetus that began the slow machinations (four years) that inevitably defeated the Axis powers from conquering a good deal of the world! Few historians argue that an Axis victory would have been harmless to the US.
There aren't nearly as many American ostriches today due to 9/11, and the world's balance of both terror and power is a great deal more complicated. But to underestimate the malevolence or just plain insanity of Arab ideologues and their collective potential to cause us harm is just plain naivély foolish!
I certainly do not advocate preemptive action of any sort with respect to Bush's "Axis of Terror" nations and groups; but neither do I feel that the American people or their leadership should ignore what is blatantly obvious - that there are dangerous crazies out there!
A Bush/McCain simplistic solution is to attack before you are attacked - the Bush Doctrine. This, of course, is a desperately flawed tactic which can only end in disaster - possibly for millions!
But an equally simplistic view that there is no problem can be just as disastrous with equally catastrophic consequences of perhaps a different sort. McCain would undoubtedly go the neocon route - the application of overwhelming force is the only Neocon solution to this kind of problem. I am reasonably sure that Obama would be fully aware of the dangers posed by religious and political extremists in the Arab world (and elsewhere); but much more skillful in applying both persuasion and military force to the solution of the problem! | Hahaha! Get a hold of yourself. |
I do, as often as I can! Sometimes, it's a bitch finding the damn thing, tho'!! I almost always laugh like you suggest when I succeed, though! |
| Edited by - bngbuck on 08/08/2008 22:55:23 |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9687 Posts |
 Posted - 08/09/2008 : 03:11:10 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by bngbuck
A Bush/McCain simplistic solution is to attack before you are attacked - the Bush Doctrine. This, of course, is a desperately flawed tactic which can only end in disaster - possibly for millions! |
It already has.
The geo-political distrust of USA is going to take a long time to repair.
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Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 08/09/2008 : 06:41:26 [Permalink]
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bng said:
No, I am not paranoid, merely not blithly indifferent to what I perceive as very real dangers in a pretty dangerous world.
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If you aren't paranoid, then you are being willfully ignorant.
Detail for me, exactly, how you think Iran would get weapons grade fissionables from Pakistan, and why we would not be justified in retaliating against Pakistan if their nuclear material was used in an attack against us?
Such an action on the part of Iran, IF they were willing and able to do it (which is highly doubtful), would benefit them in no way, even if we blasted the shit out of whomever they were "framing".
I'm not advocating anything like ignoring that part of the world, but before you will convince me that Iran has intentions of nuking anyone your argument will have to improve beyond the doddering paranoid delusion it currently is.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 08/09/2008 : 15:20:29 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
| If you aren't paranoid, then you are being willfully ignorant |
That's my boy! Atta boy, Dude, get them deprecatory adjectives rolling! Argumentum ad insultem!
If you're not merely a simplistic blockhead, you are being wilfully stupid! (argumentum retalitorium!) | Detail for me, exactly, how you think Iran would get weapons grade fissionables from Pakistan, |
Buy it! In 2007, they had already been blocked 75 times. The article does not detail how many times they may have succeeded. Eventually they will succeed , if they have not already, in trading goods, services, wet work in India, and/or money for U-235 or plutonium.
Any nation with sufficient desire and sufficient resources will obtain nuclear weapons one way or another. It cannot be prevented!
Without the experience and data base of a CIA agent, I cannot "detail" for you "exactly" how Iran might obtain nuclear material from Pakistan, or any other nation for that matter. Why don't you "detail" for me exactly why it is impossible? (I know, you asked me first, nya,nya, nya!) (Sticks tongue out!)
I would imagine it would involve the enlistment and extreme remuneration of a Dr. A.Q.Khan and his confederates, for example, who has given ample evidence that he is not above corruption! Jesus, Dude, you are so naïve! Fucking Bill Gates could buy his own personal Atom Bomb, if he wanted to! Enough money can buy any material thing that exists, one way or another, legally or not!. Period! Human beings are, almost without exception, corruptible! And that means corruptible by cash!why we would not be justified in retaliating against Pakistan if their nuclear material was used in an attack against us?
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For the precise reasons that I have clearly presented in my previous posts! Under a rational administration, (Obama), we would not retaliate against Pakistan even if we had proof positive that it was their nuclear explosive used in an attack, until we had absolute proof positive that it was Pakistan that attacked us, not some other country or group using materials stolen or smuggled from Pakistan.
Once having proven that the government of Pakistan was complicit in transferring nuclear explosive to another country like Iran (for example), we would likely deliver surgical strikes against nuclear reactors and weapons facilities in both countries! | Such an action on the part of Iran, IF they were willing and able to do it (which is highly doubtful), would benefit them in no way, even if we blasted the shit out of whomever they were "framing". |
What benefit did Bin Laden and Al Quaeda derive from the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York? The same answer can be directed to your question! The fact remains, they did it! And it appears today, that it did not benefit them one whit, if anything, it diminished them! But maniacs do not learn from their failures, they are maniacs! | your argument will have to improve beyond the doddering paranoid delusion it currently is. |
My doddering paranoia pales alongside your pitiful babbling, adolescent innocence and naïveté which assume that there is no such thing as malevolence in the world! You would have been a perfect member of the America First Party of the '40's, before Pat Buchanan hijacked it into another brand of Republicanism! Isolationism is a pretty lonely position today! |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 08:06:34 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by pleco
Hell, even it anonymity could be guaranteed, they (Iran) still wouldn't do it. Why?
Because, if a nuke ever popped off in the US, the US would attack with or without evidence. It's been done before.
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That's what I'm thinking too. Woe to all the little and/or wannabe nuclear powers and any nation even suspected of giving material support to terrorsts. The response methodology of the US would be 'kill them all, let Allah sort them out.' The simple minded logic would be something like this: All existing and potential threats have been eliminated and probably even the guilty party too. |
-Chaloobi
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| Edited by - chaloobi on 08/11/2008 08:07:45 |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 08:49:52 [Permalink]
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bng said:
| My doddering paranoia pales alongside your pitiful babbling, adolescent innocence and naïveté which assume that there is no such thing as malevolence in the world! You would have been a perfect member of the America First Party of the '40's, before Pat Buchanan hijacked it into another brand of Republicanism! Isolationism is a pretty lonely position today! |
Yep. Doddering paranoia is your problem. In addition to shifting your goalpoasts, inventing strawmen, and the dozen other childish uses of informal fallacy.
Definitely losing your touch there bng.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 14:14:53 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
Yep. Doddering paranoia is your problem. In addition to shifting your goalpoasts, inventing strawmen, and the dozen other childish uses of informal fallacy.
Definitely losing your touch there bng. |
Cognizant of and respectful as I am of your elevated professional status and expertise in the disparate fields of geriatric psychiatry, the removal and re-erection of playing field structures, constructing innovative products from agricultural by-products (both straw and bullshit); and your mastery of the art of invalid argumentation by merely loudly bleating unsubstantiated and uninformed opinion; I am now earnestly attempting to obtain medical attention from a dodder specialist who counsels senile paranoiacs.
When I complete therapy, would you consider training me in your unparalleled methods of offering personal opinions without providing substantiation? That way, I could be certain to avoid dispensing claptrap if I were to detect any hint of your methodology in my posts when I edit them for content. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 15:56:25 [Permalink]
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bng said:
| That way, I could be certain to avoid dispensing claptrap |
As you are already a master of claptrap dispensation, I'm afraid I can offer you no advice. I freely acknowledge that your skill in this area surpasses mine. By several orders of magnitude.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 16:16:19 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
| I freely acknowledge that your skill in this area surpasses mine. By several orders of magnitude. |
Thanks for conceding. It's a shame that you have no compensatory skills to offset your admitted deficiencies.
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 16:35:46 [Permalink]
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I'd put my skill with vulgar pejoratives to the test against anyone.... It makes Kil cry when I exercise this skill here though.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 18:01:26 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dude
I'd put my skill with vulgar pejoratives to the test against anyone.... It makes Kil cry when I exercise this skill here though.
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Nothing stopping you from enjoying yourself that way in PM's however. |
Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
Why not question something for a change?
Genetic Literacy Project |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2008 : 21:21:29 [Permalink]
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The POINT is to showcase the skill in front of an audience Kil!
Besides, I do occasionally exchange PMs with bng. They have all been quite civil actually  .
Besides, ya have to admit, the old guy has a certain gift with words and (as he says) claptrap. It's amusing to poke him from time to time and observe the reaction.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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What's wrong with this nightmare scenario?
