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Dallas/Fort Worth - London Heathrow (looks like 50% over land and 50% over water give or take. http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=DFW-LHR&RANGE=&PATH-COLOR=&PATH-UNITS=mi&PATH-MINIMUM=&SPEED-GROUND=&SPEED-UNITS=kts&RANGE-STYLE=best&RANGE-COLOR=&MAP-STYLE=

Iceland is west of Finland.

You're right, sorry, I got confused

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?MAP-STYLE=&MARKER-STYLE=default&PATH=KEF-RVN&PATH-COLOR=red&PATH-MINIMUM=&PATH-STYLE=&PATH-UNITS=mi&RANGE=&RANGE-COLOR=navy&RANGE-STYLE=best&SPEED-GROUND=&SPEED-UNITS=kts

Still...

There are 8 other nations (known) with nuclear weapons

The only one which poses a credible first strike threat is France. This is one reason why several U.S. administrations have been very cosy with France despite the latter working its own foreign policy often in ways inimical to the U.S. interests normally prioritized by the administration.

France has (a) an entirely self-developed nuclear arsenal (force de frappe) from secured supplies of Uranium ore to the ultimate delivery systems (notably their strategic missile Rédoutable submarine platform and the M-45/M-45bis/preM-51 missiles themselves) (b) noteworthy successes in counterespionage (c) an effectively official policy of nihilism in the decision and authorization chains (d) a frequently re-declared escalation policy that underlines their (official) willingness to undertake a nuclear first strike (e) a no-negotiation/no-admission policy with respect to target pre-selection, since France is small and has few obvious targets (Paris, Brest, the rest...).

All the other declared nuclear powers have agreed protocols with respect to target pre-selection; the Russians aren't aiming at U.S. installations, the Chinese aren't aiming at Russian installations, the Americans and Brits according to the latest Mutual Defence Agreement won't aim at anyone without mutual agreement and both have agreed to aim at nobody for now (incidentally the Americans may be able to enforce this in the Brits because the latter use so many U.S.-sourced components in their strategic weapons delivery platforms, despite building warheads themselves, and there are occasionally public arguments about the lack of information sharing in the U.S.->U.K. direction that probably has something to do with the U.K. supplying France with nuclear weapon expertise initially in the 60s and subsequently over the years, and the strength of the entente cordiale). The French don't play this game: they have at least 64 warheads in the water at any time in range of a variety of targets in declared nuclear states, probable nuclear states, and non-nuclear states, "so don't get any funny ideas about a state-sponsored terror attack on Paris".

The French strategic nuclear arsenal is the most recently tested (cf. the Rainbow Warrior incident -- ne fuckez pas avec les Français); the missiles have fully global ballistic range (they recently showed off a 6500 nautical mile precision track); their 2 deployed strategic submarines are the stealthiest nuclear-powered platforms and the forthcoming ones (if they don't have problems, which they may) are even more fit for the designed purpose.

The only declared nuclear state more likely to do a first strike in anger is the USA and that's only because it already did that in the 1940s.

Note that 64-ish warheads is insufficient to totally destroy the USA, but it would certainly wreck the economic and military might of the country even if the targeting policy avoided major metropolitan areas not colocated with military assets. (A trade of Paris or Brest (or the rest) for the top twenty or thirty U.S. downtowns might appeal to the French decisionmakers though).

You just have to remember that the French attitude towards MAD was always different than that of the two superpowers. It is much more aligned with the longstanding Swedish policy of inflicting the maximum possible damage in the face of an overwhelming invasion or an attack against which there is no possible defence (e.g. a surprise!); the French just have a longer list of likely attackers than Sweden (and there is some overlap...), which lacks overseas territories for example, and France has never flirted seriously with "official neutr

OK, I did. On the Great Circle Mapper the distance between Reykjavík and Amsterdam airports is 1270 miles. Anchorage (Ted Stevens International!) to JFK in NY is 3385 miles (2.66x farther). It would make more sense to say "Iceland is close to Amsterdam in the same way Tulsa is close to New York" (1235 mi).

Sure, North Korea could come up with some primitive missiles in a few years... that's why the US must deploy interceptors in Europe, instead of Japan, Taiwan, or South Korea.

Never fails, log on to Slashdot to read the ignorant talk about geopolitics.

The US already has deployed inteceptors to the Pacific. Before interceptors can go in, radar has to go in. This is what is now being talked about in Europe.

As for North Korea coming up with a missile in a few years, a few years has already come and gone. They already have the missile, as does Iran since they have bought all of the NK missile designs.

Same goes about Iran: the US has huge military presence in Turkey, Kuwait and United Arab Emirates, why not use those bases?

I dunno, maybe because a missile from Iran wouldn't fly over those countries??? Great Circle from Tehran to NYC

The shortest path from NY to Tokyo: here.

The rule is called ETOPS, Extended Range Twin Engine Operations / Engines Turn or Passengers Swim

A typical flight from NRT (Tokyo/Narita) to JFK (John F Kenedy Airport, NYC) mapped here.

As you can see, the great circle distance goes over the north pole. Even if you turn on ETOPS-120, most of the ride is north of the 48 contigious states. It does go over Alaska, but I think they would be able to maintain supersonic speeds until it starts to cross over populated areas of Canada (the last 10% of the flight).

It turns out there are extensive rules about this known as ETOPS. There's more information available in FAQ at the very cool Great Circle Mapper.

For those, like me, who had trouble visualizing the flight path, here's the great cirle route. To my surprise, the most direct route is mainly over land.

That's Russia, actually. Maybe this map will clear things up a little.

Looks like it goes right through Canada, quite a bit of America, and China(?)

Except that 3 is irrelevant, for the fact that the flight path looks like this: http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gcmap?PATH=jfk-tyo (thanks to an earlier poster).

Only a few hundred miles of a New York<->Tokyo path is over US soil, at least if you divert ever so slightly north of Alaska. Most of it is uninhabited areas of Canada, the Arctic Ocean, and Siberia.

Google searching for 'great circle route' provides a better illustration.

Here is the flight path from New York to Tokyo:

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gcmap?PATH=jfk-tyo

Range: There are very few destinations that are more than 10,000 km apart. What are we talking about? 15 flights per day worldwide? Only so many people want to fly betwen Sydney and New York.

Most of Asia (bar Siberia) is further than 10,000km from most of the population of North America. It's 10097 km from Tokyo to Chicago. Forget NYC, Toronto, Miami, Houston, etc. There's enough of a market for planes with >10,000km range that they exist at all. It's not like planes with that range are cheap to design.

Check the great circle mapper at http://gc.kls2.com/

-Isaac

No they don't...