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Iranian Heavy Water Nuke Plant Goes Online Today
avtchillsboro writes "According to an article in the NYT, an Iranian heavy water nuke plant goes online today. From the article: 'An Iranian plant that produces heavy water officially went into operation on Saturday, despite U.N. demands that Tehran stop the activity because it can be used to develop a nuclear bomb. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad inaugurated the plant, which Tehran says is for peaceful purposes. The announcement comes days before Thursday's U.N. deadline for Iran to stop uranium enrichment — which also can be used to create nuclear weapons — or face economic and political sanctions.'"
The real problem is that Iran is not letting international inspectors see their installations. Remember what happened to Iraq in a similar case?
Future conversation:
UN: Stop enriching uranium or face political and economic consequences.
Iran: Do so and we will stop selling you oil. China will buy it if you don't. Continue your threats and we will use our position in OPEC against you.
UN: Uhhh....
Iran has money to burn, and UN sanctions don't seem to be particularly effective ways to convince to governments; it's the proletariat who suffer. In the meanwhile, Iran's government gets to play the "it's us against the (non-Muslim) world!" card again. Jihad, anyone?
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
With Israel a known (suspected within 99.999%) holder of nukes, Iran sees themselves as the logical counterpoint. They do mean to make weapons, of this I have no doubt.
Peaceful purposes? The iranian prez has said Israel should be wiped off the map. He doesn't strike me as a man with peaceful intentions.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
One quote that might interest people from the interview is this:
Mohammad Saeidi is a practical man. Sidestepping the political, ideological and historical aspects of the nuclear dispute with the West, the vice-president of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation is focused on a set of problems that must be solved logically if the country and its people are to develop to their full potential. "The country's oil and gas reserves will last a maximum of another 25 or 30 years," he says. "Therefore we have to provide other resources."
If you are an American, please don't support your current administrations drive to cause yet another war by believing their propaganda about Iran. Really, you should trust your politicians as soon as they find the WMD that they told you existed in Iraq.
Please don't let Bush plunge the world into the Realm of $200 a barrel oil prices by attacking Iran.
I alway wondered if radioactive oil is as useable as the clean crude. I suppose we could always use it to lube the current nuke plants ;)
lick the cancle button (at least thats what our Chinese QA says)
Iranian Heavy Water Nuke Plant Goes Online Today.
How long before it feels the slashdot effect?
Iran will win this one becasue they have the oil, so easily it's not even worth having the contest.
The Iranians and Osama could both just crush Bush in any contest physical or mental, not that Bush could ever find either of them. Iran (any OPEC country) or China (who has all our money) can completely and totally destoy our economy at any time.
It's really quite depressing to be an American these days, and I can hear Hezbola (a branch of the Iranian government) laughing from here, which doesn't help.
I for one am staying away for Israel, becuase they are already nuked, they just don't know it yet.
- Adam L. Beberg - The Cosm Project - http://www.mithral.com/
(T>t && O(n)--) == sqrt(666)
Naive of me, but did anyone RTFA? It says that Iran can now produce heavy water, not that they have a nuclear reactor. FFS, I thought the NYT had higher standards of journalistic integrity than to use a misleading headline.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
It is my understanding that Iran would like to build a uranium nuclear device. While these are impressive--and definitely make a big boom--they are not nearly as deadly or frightening as a plutonium nuclear device. The reason? Deliverability. While a plutonium nuclear explosive can be squeezed down to a pretty small size (to fit on the tip of a cruise missile, for example), a uranium device has to be pretty massive.
Essentially, while a plutonium device is a ball of plutonium surrounded by concentric spheres of perfectly timed explosives, a uranium device is the equivalent of a 5-inch diameter gun which fires a uranium slug at a uranium target. The advantage of a plutonium device is obvious: it's small. The disadvantage of a plutonium device is the fact that it's very, very difficult to get the timing right so that you don't incinerate the plutonium before it goes critical. Meanwhile, a uranium device is dirt-simple to develop once you have the material. However, these things are huge. So huge, in fact, that you need something the size of a B29 in order to deliver it. We're talking several tons here.
Incidentally, the US developed one of each during the Manhattan Project, culminating in the two dropped bombs: Little Boy and Fat Man (no prizes for guessing which is which). While the Plutonium devices needed to be tested to make sure it worked, the scientists didn't even bother to test a uranium explosive at full scale. They just dropped the sucker.
Basically, this boils down to a pretty simple reality: even if Iran develops a uranium device, they can't deliver it. They can't put it on a missile, and I think it's a 100% certainty that Israel (or anyone else, for that matter, though Israel is the most likely target) would shoot down anything the size of a B29 flying in from Iran. If I had to guess, I'd wager that's why the Bush administration doesn't seem terribly worried about Iran. North Korea is a different matter, but Iran just isn't as big of a threat as everyone seems to be making it out to be.
And as an aside, it's certainly tempting to say "well, they could just put it on a boat and hide it and float it to a port and explode it." However, there are a couple of problems. First of all, each nuclear device that Iran develops will be a sort of force-multiplier for its power in the region. So if it develops--say--three devices, that means that losing just one is going to be a dramatic blow to its power. If you say that there's a 50/50 chance that the device will actually make it to its target, there's just no way to rationalize that risk. Much better to use the threat as leverage. The Iranian leaders don't subscribe to Western modes of thought, but they're aren't utterly irrational.
LR
Iran has no problem currently providing its population with power from other sources, so yes, when a country that doesn't need nuclear power says it's going to start enriching uranium, people understandably get suspicious.
1. Diplomacy, so far has failed.
2. Air strikes, don't know where all the facilities are and many of those we do are located so far underground that conventional weapons are useless. Not only that but Iran would no doubt cut off oil supplies which would cause an oil crisis.
3. Military invasion, not enough troops because of our excursion into Iraq. The only possible alternative is a draft.
4. Leave it for the next administration to sort out, the most likely scenario.
The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education. - Paul Feyerabend
This is not a nuclear power plant that's online (yet), but merely a facility that produces heavy water.
It's fun to get people worked up with such a headline (and almost all the AP wire sites did so), but on closer examination, it's hard to get too outraged at Iran for manufacturing something that you can buy on eBay.
You mean like this?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5217424.stm
On 15 August, 2004, Atefah Sahaaleh was hanged in a public square in the Iranian city of Neka.
Her death sentence was imposed for "crimes against chastity".
The state-run newspaper accused her of adultery and described her as 22 years old.
But she was not married - and she was just 16.
Sharia Law
In terms of the number of people executed by the state in 2004, Iran is estimated to be second only to China.
In the year of Atefah's death, at least 159 people were executed in accordance with the Islamic law of the country, based on the Sharia code.
Since the revolution, Sharia law has been Iran's highest legal authority.
Alongside murder and drug smuggling, sex outside marriage is also a capital crime.
As a signatory of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, Iran has promised not to execute anyone under the age of 18.
But the clerical courts do not answer to parliament. They abide by their religious supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, making it virtually impossible for human rights campaigners to call them to account.
Code of behaviour
At the time of Atefah's execution in Neka, journalist Asieh Amini heard rumours the girl was just 16 years old and so began to ask questions.
Crane for hanging in silhouette
To teach others a lesson, Atefah's execution was held in public
"When I met with the family," says Asieh, "they showed me a copy of her birth certificate, and a copy of her death certificate. Both of them show she was born in 1988. This gave me legitimate grounds to investigate the case."
So why was such a young girl executed? And how could she have been accused of adultery when she was not even married?
Disturbed by the death of her mother when she was only four or five years old, and her distraught father's subsequent drug addiction, Atefah had a difficult childhood.
She was also left to care for her elderly grandparents, but they are said to have shown her no affection.
In a town like Neka, heavily under the control of religious authorities, Atefah - often seen wandering around on her own - was conspicuous.
It was just a matter of time before she came to the attention of the "moral police", a branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, whose job it is to enforce the Islamic code of behaviour on Iran's streets.
Secret relationship
Being stopped or arrested by the moral police is a fact of life for many Iranian teenagers.
Previously arrested for attending a party and being alone in a car with a boy, Atefah received her first sentence for "crimes against chastity" when she was just 13.
Although the exact nature of the crime is unknown, she spent a short time in prison and received 100 lashes.
Atefah was soon caught in a downward spiral of arrest and abuse
When she returned to her home town, she told those close to her that lashes were not the only things she had to endure in prison. She described abuse by the moral police guards.
Soon after her release, Atefah became involved in an abusive relationship with a man three times her age.
Former revolutionary guard, 51-year-old Ali Darabi - a married man with children - raped her several times.
She kept the relationship a secret from both her family and the authorities.
Atefah was soon caught in a downward spiral of arrest and abuse.
Local petition
Circumstances surrounding Atefah's fourth and final arrest were unusual.
The moral police said the locals had submitted a petition, describing her as a "source of immorality" and a "terrible influence on local schoolgirls".
But there were no signatures on the petition - only those of the arresting guards.
Men's word is accepted much more clearly and much more easily than women
Mohammad Hoshi,
Iranian lawyer and exile
Three days after her arrest,
Considering Iran ordered Hezbollah to cause a war with Israel to distract attention of its program and its leader publically plans to destroy Isreal publically several times is cause for concern.
They already started a proxy war with Israel and mentioned the Lebannon war was proof that Israel must be destroyed. You want this country to have a nuclear weapon?
http://saveie6.com/
I voted for the guy. Not once, but twice, so don't preach at me about being mental. :)
FP was meant to be a joke...it isn't flamebait.
Why doesn't cringe every time the guys says Nucular?
And think of the dividends till things settle down. I love my canroys -- Canada is politically stable and Alberta doesn't get hit by hurricanes.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
http://www.amnestyusa.org/countries/iran/index.don /alert081606_ebadi.htm7 7bc-61bb-4b7d-87e0-663033df3404.htmlm
http://hrw.org/doc/?t=mideast&c=iran
http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/defenders/hrd_ira
http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2005/02/49f8
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4114621.st
From the BBC article:
The execution of children
Torture, as well as degrading punishments such as amputation, flogging and stoning
Discrimination against women and girls
The persecution of political opponents, following last February's mass disqualification of opposition candidates in the run-up to parliamentary elections
Discrimination against minorities, including Christians, Jews, Sunni Muslims, and in particular followers of the Baha'i faith, including arbitrary arrest and detention.
Can we start being worried yet?
Can we start telling them they can't do this yet?
Or are these still wonderful people who should have A-bombs?
*sits and waits for the moral equivalency arguments*
Never answer an anonymous letter. - Yogi Berra
How about this "sanction":
"If you do not shut down all of your nuclear weapon facilities, and dismantle anything used to develop such weapons, we will do it for you."
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
And yet George W still has the gun.
I for, one, do NOT welcome our new-clear, Shi'ite Overlords. No matter how you pronounce "nuclear", or, for that matter, "Shi'ite".
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
If Iran sells the oil to *someone*, it makes no real difference who. It just means that whoever would have sold to China, would sell to whomever Iran is now not selling to. This extra constraint on the distribution network just adds a small price per barrel. That's just as empty a threat as the UN's.
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
You can order deuterium from chemical supply companies.
http://unitednuclear.com/hw.htm
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
My naturally trusting personality leads me to the following theory:
The Iranians are indeed flying in the face of the UN by developing tech that could be used to develop nuclear weapons without letting the UN see it, just to piss 'em off.
However, they won't develop nuclear weapons, just so we'll all go "Oh. I suppose since they didn't develop nuclear weapons, we can trust them."
You see? We'll trust them! Then what? We'll have to invade!
Google: "All your data are belong to us."
They need nuclear power like a submarine needs a screen door.
They're sitting on one of the richest petroleum reserves in the world, and selling it off in order to get hard currency, which they want to use to develop a domestic energy industry that relies on imported nuclear fuel? Right.
I'm not saying it's a complete impossibility; under different leadership, in a different situation, if their priorities were obviously not what they are today, it might make sense for them to be looking for a post-petroleum energy source. Heck -- the rest of the world is. But building an obsolete plutonium-factory nuclear reactor (which hasn't exactly solved the rest of the world's energy needs) isn't the way to go about it.
If peaceful energy research was their goal, there are lots of ways they could go about it which wouldn't be so obviously antagonistic. But they're not, and the point is that they've done little to assure the rest of the world that they're out to do anything but build nuclear weapons and use them in a jihad against Israel or the West generally.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Since when were political actions based on the question of "violating basic human rights"?
I don't think any political power in the world cares whether or not another violates basic human rights. That didn't drive Americans to invade Iraq, and especially didn't drive Americans to do anything (because they haven't) about genocides around the world (including Sudan).
My page.
Well, we could dust off the MAD strategy; but maybe $100/bbl oil is a better outcome, frankly. It might certainly be good for me, since I now own property in the city, within walking distance of public transit. Sucks to be a suburbanite with $5/gal gas.
Actually, I rather like the $100/bbl outcome. Remember that line, "the cold war is over and the Japanese won?". How about, "the oil war is over, and those who bought property in the cities won".
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
They want to protect and spread their concept of right and wrong.. By force if needed. How is that different then what we are doing?
Dont get me wrong, i *dont* feel comforable with them having the bomb either. But what gives us the *right* to judge them when our track record isnt spotless either and a lot of this stuff is 'perception' of who is right and who is wrong anyway.. My god or yours.. who is following the 'correct' one?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I guess we think we are people who don't want to be blown up. At some point you have to look at who is "good" and who is "bad", and not let the bad people have nuclear weapons.
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
I agree. Why should Americans listen to Bush, when Iran's own president's speeches are much more effective propaganda against Iran?
Oh wow, dude....for a second there I thought you were describing New Orleans after Katrina hit that city and Blackwater USA took over....
Exactly.
There are other ways to obtain nuclear energy besides seeing how well Israel could deliver it *ooh sparklies*.
They could have gotten a monitored facility from, say, France, and have any pluto the plant produces safely removed by, say, France so it couldn't be used in weapons.
But noooo...
The Abrahamic god may be a bit schizophrenic, but the Roman and Greek gods were pretty much personifications of the darker side of human nature.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
It's totally proven. Iran openly admits that it provides Hezbollah with weapons. It's openly admitted that for over two decades. I agree with the rest of your post, that Iran didn't especially time anything, but Hezbollah is a wing of the Iranian administration.
So what? Every country has their share of government committed crime and acts against human rights. Search the news and you will find equally disturbing incidents within USA and EU countries. No such arguments can lead to the conclusion that a country can be told what to do by others.
Dubya's got a gun, sure.
But he hasn't said that Iran (Israel) should be wiped off the map, either.
Sounds like Pakistan.. Oh wait, the US doesn't mind Pakistan having Nuclear weapons because they are an ally.. A religious fanatic ally harboring terrorists, but an ally.
the only moral equivalancy here is the only moral action is to reduce tehran to being equivilant to a glass parking lot
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
this is clearly to meet energy needs, in particular the need unleash energy in israel on the megaton scale
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
I have no trouble at all with that idea.
Assume peaceful intent and treat everyone else under that pretence, until shown otherwise, then obliterate them *completely* ( as a world effort, not just us doing the job ) to serve as an example of why you should behave in the world..
( yes we can debate what that 'proof' is, and if iran already has shown this, but im sure you get the point im making )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
You mean like Hezbolla trolled Israel?
Unfortunately I think the US government is as resistant to trolling as the Israeli, that is to say; not at all.
Well, except that the fuel to transport things like food will shoot up, so the cost of food will jump as well. As might the cost of electricity to run all that nice public transportation (I know that's mostly coal or other sources, but I'm sure it'll go up as well) Life in a city will probably be negatively affected even if you only have to walk to work...
Oh no, not again.
China and Russia cynical backing of Iran leaves the UN powerless to stop Iran. Indeed, I think the end is near for the UN security council as we've know it since the 50's. That Russia continues with nuclear projects in Iran, with Iran in flagrant violation of the NPT, is a disgrace. Unless the US and Europe fancy a terrorist nuke in one of their capitals or want to see Israel "wiped off the map", strategic bombing of all nuclear sites is a near certainty. The only question is when. The west will be reluctant to do the obvious because there will be a blockage of the straights of Hormuz by Iran. That will greatly disrupt the world economy. But you gotta do what you gotta do. Should have smacked these fools back in 1979.
an ill wind that blows no good
This is such a piece of blatent propaganda, and everyone seems to have fallen for it. The Iranian president has never said this, or anything like it. He says he doesn't recognise the legitimacy of the regime that occupies Jerusalem. Most Arabs say the same thing. He didn't say he wanted to wipe the country off the map, as is discussed here, amongst other places.
Additionally, the US could also be accused of fighting a proxy war in the region, and with more justification.
I don't want anyone to have nuclear weapons, but if you were Iran, you'd want them. Two countries pissed the US off a few years ago, Iraq and North Korea. One was attacked, one wasn't. Guess which one had nukes? The US administration keeps publicly intimating that Iran is next on the list. If you were Iran, it would be pretty clear that the only way to avoid being invaded would be to have nukes.
When a country in the middle east close to a lot of oil is thinking about makeing alternative energy, the US should maybe considering doing the same, instead of pushing DIRTY coal energy (what an idiocy) and driving 4liter engine trucks on completely flawless flat roads .....
....
...
./ crowd who I consider thinking people.
Oh well, and the us does not seem to be interested in Korea that much anymorem eventhough they are known to produce nuclear weapons and rockets
Sorry to say, but the US should not have the idea/power/facce of telling countries things like "you cannot have a nuclear plant" because we think you are all arab terrorists/and or financing terrorists and/or might be sometimes financing terrorists
They could suggest to the UN to tell a country not to make nukes (as in nuclear weapons) but still, on what ground? The US is a big nuke power, so it should not have the right to tell a country not to make the same weapons they are ?entitled? to produce on a God given bases. Because they are not Koreans, Russians, or they read a line in the other direction.
now tag me troll or flamebait, I am a very european and very white person who just cannot watch that injustice constantly without spitting out my thought, at least to the
cheers
ps: being as green and vegetarian and all as I can, I think Nuke power, when applied safely, could turn this rottening planet into a better place... definetely better than what we are doing now, burning oil and coal. And before you mention Chernobil, I was very close to taht when it happened, and we got a good dose of it,,,,,, that crap blew bacause it was carelessly maintained, in my country we have the same construction working for 20 years just fine up to today...
Won't Iran still be able to build a bomb if international trade shuts down? I don't think sanctions solve anything except make the place a rogue nation in the eyes of the world. Once established its a rogue nation, then maybe some military action on their nuke sites won't be condemned by the world. This is just my take.
God spoke to me.
Did we slashdot them? That's probably not going to go over too well...
I even tried the country code for Iran, .ir, but still no go. Someone let me know when they're back online, OK?
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
ummm you forgot the hypothsis, testing, and peer review parts. :)
As for the reactor I think I am missing something... I thought we were worried about Uranium enrichment, why the fuss about he reactor. Pluonium? Does having boh uranium and Plutonium make them more dangerous? (honest question not flambait). Or is it more along the lines of a reactor being able to make pluonium faster than the (what I have heard) is the slow process of Uranuim enrichment. Any one knowledgable in he subject?
Place a curse on their reactor
Eh? Heavy water is used in hundreds of modern fission nuclear reactors around the world--it acts as a moderator for the fission reaction.
This simplistic us versus them approach gets us nowhere - Iran does not rule Lebanon and Bin Laden does not rule Iran. Iranians don't even speak Arabic as their first language and really do not have much in common with Palestinians, they are not going to give Hezbolla the bomb, just as Israel didn't give a bomb to the Phalangists.
We should be more worried about Iran having a nuclear capability itself instead of James Bond fantasies of bombs ending up in the hands of supervillians. Thankfully uranium enrichment is a difficult and time consuming thing (despite what the nuclear power advocates say) so it may be a matter of a lot of time. We have a Cuba sitaution where Iranian leaders can sit back and blame many of their problems on the USA whether it is relevant or not and have public opinion on their side forever - the difference is they also blame Israel. Being a pariah state is a driving force for things like this weapons program and the worlds reaction to it is making things worse - we are not dealing with a resource poor North Korea here that has to buy goods from their neighbour at inflated prices - we are dealing with a resource rich country with a large population that hasn't even bothered to find where all it's oil is because they are getting enough. We are also dealing with a country with most of it's adult population in their 20's but reacting to events that only those over 50 took part in. We need to use more than just threats and sanctions to deal with this situation and the Iranians are probably more likel to listen to reason than we think. They know a lot about the USA - they even employ quite a few professional basketballers from the USA.
Gunboat diplomacy isn't working so we should just give up on it, not even the technological edge is as big as people think. Remember Iran even has classiifed US military equipment like the tank fire control systems given to Israel, sold from there to China, then resold to Iran (this really pissed off the pentagon - the enquiry was around 2000). The guys that get the big dollars to negotiate should do it - and restrictions on trade are counterproductive because the private sector can also negotiate (and the restrictions on everything to stop the weapons trade are restricting everything but the weapons trade).
Wrong. See for instance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CANDU_reactor - sure, you don't generate the power from the heavy water itself, but it's needed for that kind of reactor. Together with uranium, which, surprise, they also are building an enrichment plant for.
While I do not completely trust this enterprise to be peaceful, I don't trust the U.S., Israel, the U.K., Russia or any of the other countries that already *have* nuclear weapons, and in the case of the U.S. have used them. Until the nuclear weapon carrying countries that already exists have dismantled their last bombs and missiles, I'll continue finding their cries about others building research facilities or nuclear plants very hypocritical.
Well, at least this time the evidence is somewhat better than the "Oh, oh, they've got metal pipes - they're building nukes!" used as a motive to invade Iraq...
Ignoring the tear-jerk BBC trash, sure Iran has a poor human right history. But how many murders are commited because of the strong stance against crime? I heard somewhere there were 11,000 gunnings in US per year. That doesnt really stack up against Iran's 159 executions. I'm an independant european, from a western nation, taking a critical look at it. Don't judge so fast when every country in the world has enormous problems of its own.
Let Iran have nuclear electricity. Im more worried about when the next US-nutjob-president will end the world with his stock pile of 6,000 warheads.
Iran started its nuclear program back when the Shah was still a US puppet. Of course, I don't expect to hear anything about that from the Bushes, who put the Iran in "Iran/Contra".
It's always been a bad idea to proliferate nukes in the Mideast, a part of the world controlled by politicians defined more by death's rewards than life's opportunities. Reading more of the history of Iran's nukes helps explain why the French are so deeply involved, and how the roles of the US and Russia are so "complicated".
--
make install -not war
Doesn't it seem stupid to have only a handful of countries with nuclear weapons?
My solution would for the US to build one ICBM for each country in the UN. If you're in the UN, here's ONE nuke. You only get one.
* You want true equality around the world, there it is. Every country is now equal.
* You want to end wars, you've done it. No one can invade anyone else or risk getting nuked.
* Talk about one world government? Now it's really possible.
Give them all nukes.
Interesting. The United States and the Soviet Union pursued a course of Mutual Assured Destruction for decades, and were roundly critized by, well ... pretty much the rest of the world for it. Nice to know that other peoples, when faced with the EXACT SAME DILEMMA have reached the same conclusion: if I have to glow in the dark for ten thousand years you're gonna glow brighter. There really is no other short term solution that makes any sense at all when thermonuclear weapons are involved. If an ideologically murderous nation is threatening you with a (to quote Lewis Black) nuclear-fuck-holocaust you can a. depend upon their better nature and hope they don't nuke your ass (stupid and probably fatal) or b. build enough weapons yourself to hold them at bay (expensive but survivable.)
... you can build them but God help you if we think you're crazy enough to use them.
Here's one important point, however. M.A.D. only works if the enemy's leadership actually grasps what a nuclear-fuck-holocaust is all about. Nobody has seen a megaton-equivalent blast in a long time, maybe too long. Perhaps if we were still doing nuclear tests we could invite a few of Iran's top officials to witness one, simultaneously pointing out that the U.S. has thousands of the things. I mean, we've spent trillions on our weapons programs, weapons whose primary function is to sit in their silos and deter foreign governments from doing anything really stupid. Might as well use them for that purpose. It's better than having to actually drop them on somebody.
The Soviets, totalitarian empire-builders that they were, were rational enough to care that we could kill them all if we really wanted to do so. Consequently, they never dropped anything big on us, and we never dropped anything big on them. Hideously expensive as it was, as a foreign policy M.A.D. worked just fine, for that matter is still working. This is the problem as I see it: can we trust that the fear of swift and total radioactive retribution is sufficient to sway Iran's "government" from attempting thermonuclear genocide? Other posters have asked what right does the world have to prevent Iran (or any other nation with imperial ambitions and/or dangerous ideological imperatives) from building atomic bombs. That's your answer
{sigh} So far as I'm concerned America may be fucked in its collective head but the rest of the planet is just as screwed up if not more so.
I rest my case.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Whew, I was worried I would'nt see the moral equalivancy argument pop up at ALL.
THANK YOU! My faith is restored in Slashdot that you have said US = Iran for human rights violation.
Too bad you are an AC.
Never answer an anonymous letter. - Yogi Berra
Same thing every other nutjob president has done.
Use them as the big stick to protect the US and Europe after WWII but not use them.
Never answer an anonymous letter. - Yogi Berra
Good plan.
Let's ask Iran, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon etc who they think are the "good" and "bad" guys.
America can hand their nukes in at the door, on their way out of the Middle East (after explaining what exactly they're doing there in the first place).
v4sw6HPU$hw5ln6pr5$ck4ma8u7LMO$w2m6l7DL$i2e3t4MWb9AHKMRTen5a29s0r1p-5.88/-8.36g5CST
It's also a shame that no one has offered to supply them with nuclear fuel.
Oh wait, they have vast amounts of oil and gas, and the rest of the world has recognized their right to develop nuclear power and offered them cheap nuclear fuel if they give up their enrichment program.
http://www.sundayherald.com/57551
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
is that it provides a deterrent against any foreign powers because they could hold Tel Aviv hostage.
Of course it doesn't work that way. The political backlash that would occur from anyone using nuclear weapons in today's world would be sufficient to cause serious long-term problems for the one who initiates a nuclear confrontation.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
It's more than plausible that going with nuclear power for their domestic needs, and selling oil to foreign buyers, could offer the greatest return.
While you're right, it's possible that could be true, what makes me very suspicious of it, was that if they could make energy for their own consumption at a lower cost than they could sell their own oil on the world market for, why wouldn't the states they're selling oil to (the West), who already have nuclear programs, already be doing that? After all, when we burn oil in the U.S. to generate power, we also have to pay for its transportation cost halfway around the world.
It seems rather specious that they would sense for them to spend billions of dollars developing an alternateve source of energy, when one is so readily available -- so readily available, in fact, that most other countries forgo nuclear energy in favor of simply buying it.
But overall I think this is a silly argument to have; it's not Iran's domestic energy reserves that have really sparked so much international concern over their nuclear program, it's because of its government's attitude with regards to Israel, particularly in light of recent comments by their President. Were it not for their stated aim of destroying the Israelis, and their "peaceful nuclear research" looking so much like a bomb factory, I doubt anyone would really give a damn if that's where they decided to spend their money.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
This is not the same as a troll getting somebody's goat who then overeacts. This is an administration looking for excuses. This administration needs "enemies" so that it can keep pushing it's domestic agenda while the majority of the American people are looking the other way.
We really really Really REALLY mean it this time. Pretty please stop.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
stay with their current US-supplied light-water reactors then?
Yes Iran wants a nuke as a way of offering deterrence against a situation like we see today with Iraq.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Now you know why I'm not President.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Well, except that the fuel to transport things like food will shoot up, so the cost of food will jump as well.
I don't know very much about economics, but it would be interesting to know what kind of impact the increase in transportation costs would have on the US economy and what effect this would have in the short and long-term.
Would more agricultural and textile goods need to be produced domestically in order to reduce transportation costs? I guess the argument could be made that this could increase jobs outside of the "Information Economy" which could help diversify the United States' economic base and maybe reduce the US trade deficit and reliance on foreign countries for goods.
Would this rise in the cost of oil help to drive innovations in alternative fuels and energy?
The old adage is that necessity drives innovation. And where there's necessity there's money to be made, which would be good for the US economy. I believe both of these statements to be true.
Increased oil prices are most likely not good for the short-term, but what about the long-term?
This is BS. Isreal has working nukes with an accurate ability to deliver them. Iran is not interested in mutual self destruction. If Iran is indeed building nukes, it is in response to American agression in the region. The Bush adminstration has already threatened them and shown it is willing to invade a country for it's own purposes.
Israel will take out their nuclear infrastructure, if it looks like they could even be close to producing weapons-capable fissile materials. Look what they did to Iraq's Osirak reactor. If they have to turn Iran into a bloody Trinitite car park to stop them aquiring weapons, they'll do it.
This is not morally equivalent.
Well, considering that our concept is that we want to spread freedom, and they want to spread strict Islamic law.
That means a lot of the rights that people have fought for during the last 200 years (in the US) would go straight down the tubes, not the mention what's going on in the country these days.
Gay rights? Not for them. They KILL people for being gay.
Women's rights? Nope.
One of the Islamic states actually passed a law that a woman that was raped could be PROSECUTED for it!
There's a HUGE difference about what countries in the West do, and what the Islamic states want to do.
The U.S. and Israel will not allow Iran to go nuclear, and they can prevent it without a single soldier having to be part of an invasion force. They can knock out Iran's air defense network in a matter of days if not hours, then roam freely through their skies dropping buster-bunkers on anything suspected of being a nuclear facility.
The U.S can park a few Seawolf submarines near Iran and rain cruise missiles on them for days without being detected. The only stage that is being set, is for the future ass-whipping the U.S. and Israel are about to give Iran. The sad thing is that clearly, Iran wants this, in order to bring other Arab nations into the fold of Western-Hating dictatorships. They believe that they can cut the flow of oil to the west with the cooperation of Hugo Chavez.
All that really needs to be done here, is for western nations to cut off head off the snake, so to speak; Just kill Iran's president, wipe out the Mullahs, and the 81% of Iranians held captive by that regime will form a true democracy.
You need some more energy research. They don't even yet have enough refineries to make all the gasoline they need, they *import it*. They are trying to get away from totally relying on mass exportation of about the only natural resource they have. And what they do export, they are trying to take considerable sums and rebuild their nation from a decade of war with the US backed iraq, recover from two decades of "royal" shah rule where cronies became millionairiies and millions of others starved, etc. And remember, our CIA assassinated their democratically elected leader, then helped that shah jerk get in. The dead guys crime? He wanted 20% of the oil revenues for his own nation. That's it, that's where this started, and the US and UK were THE BAD GUYS, they started it. Iran has EVERY right in ther world to feel antagonistic towards us.
Like most other large nations with oil, they have to think many years in the future, when that stuff runs out,. and it will. If they don't start switching now,while it is still affordable to do so, what will they do in 20 years, which isn't that long a time span all things considered? Start some project then? With what? Why are they supposed to wait?
Glass houses. The US and UK have a century plus trying to dictate reality in the middle east and it has finally backfired to the point that we have "problems". Well, DUH, I guess so! The US and UK have a long history of fucking with other nations for no apparent reason other than money and exploitation. UK and china-the opium wars, look it up who was the bad guy. UK fucking with India, look it up, who was the bad guy. US supporting tin pot dictators like Pinochet, and etc. We even supported saddam for years and years and years!
I say, much as it might hurt, people need to honestly review some history, then to cut them some slack, they have a long standing legitimate gripe. Anyone would react as they have, in fact, they have been restrained to the max in the face of decades of provocation.
So by that logic, I assume that you're ready to hand the land you're squatting on back over to to the Native Americans and catch the next plane back to Europe?
Well let's see, at the time we dropped A-bombs on Japan (1945), segregation was still alive and well in America. We also executed prisoners. We also forcibly relocated approximately 120,000 Japanese-Americans to internment camps for no other reason except their ancestry. Feminism was still in it's infancy; in 1945 in America women had their place and for the most part they stayed in it. And it was around the time Mccarthyism began (no explanation necessary) Wow, a country like that certainly was in no position to be in control of A-bombs, what were we thinking??!
Well, considering that our concept is that we want to spread freedom, and they want to spread strict Islamic law.
This is why we should not be trying to spread freedom in the middle east. If you let muslims vote, they will vote in a bunch of insane terrorists. The "palestinians" have done exactly that. The Iraqis have done that. The Iranians have done that. The closest thing to "free" an islamic country is going to get is with a dictator.
Under the Shah, women were treated decently, non-muslims were not being persecuted. The only people that were being persecuted were those trying to overthrow the Shah.
Instead of trying to get rid of Sadaam Hussein, we should have been SUPPORTING Sadaam Hussein. Look at the facts. Under him, Iraq was stable and there was more oil coming out of there than there is now. He gassed his own people? Well, boo-fucking-hoo. They were trying to overthrow him and they probably deserved what they got. He tried to assasinate Bush I? Who hasn't wanted to do that? (Note to the gov't official reading this: it is a JOKE!)
The fact is Sadaam Huessein is as good of a leader as you will EVER have in a muslim country.
We should not have invaded Iraq. We should have invaded Iran - and we should have done in 1980.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
"Once the US learns live with that, maybe the Iranians will get over their hatred of the US and it's involvement in their own country, and its continuing involvement in the countries that surround it."
Doubt it. Iran with a same minded leadership as now will view their success as the strengthening of a new world order alliance, and feel they have the backup to pursue stated goals re Israel, among other things on the agenda.
Another thing to consider is why the CIA gave designs for nuclear weapons to Iran that accelerated their program. Has the invasion of Iran been in the planning stages already before 9/11? How long has the US been implementing the Project for the New American Century's vision?
Hezbollah (Hizbullah?) crossed into Israel and kidnapped two Israeli soldiers.
Dark Reflection
I only watched the intro for the first one because it's a long vid, but I did learn that the history of failed UN resolutions goes back much further than I was aware.
The Galloway video... Well, I don't agree with Mr. Galloway on much of anything, but he does make monkeys out of talking heads who try to act like they "know stuff" when they don't have that "stuff" scripted out for them to read. Whenever I watch an unscripted interview with him, I think of the old joke about a tragedy ocurring when the TV news anchors held a conference and took questions from the public -- someone in the audience asked them a math question and all their heads exploded. Unfortunately, in this case, the tragedy is that because the interviewer is just a talking head, Mr. Galloway is allowed to get away with painting Israeli as a big bully in the region, when one only has to look at a map to see how absurd that idea really is. Galloway never mentions that Israel has been constantly attacked from Lebanese territory, or that the "illegal prisoners" held by the Israelis are those brave freedom fighters who sneak into Israel and kill sleeping families (and not by mistake).
The Iranian Prime Minister doesn't believe that the holocaust took place, and that all the scholars who say it did occur are lying because they will be imprisoned if they say it didn't. I guess I'll have to tell my old engineering professor (now emeritus) that the Nazis didn't really put that tattoo on his arm, and that camp they called Auschwitz was really a vacation resort. If my professor's parents were alive, I'm sure they'd like to know this, too -- but the "activity director" at Auschwitz put them into the left line, and not the right. So yes, Ahmadinejad sounds crazy, and dangerous. I wonder if he knows how the modern name "Iran" came into use. I'll go further and say that a nuclear armed Iran is a bad idea.
Those 911 links are something. I'm really going to take the word of an archaeometrist over the architects and engineers at this site. If the World Trade Center towers were brought down by precisely placed demolition charges, do you think the placements were selected by an archaeometrist, or an architect? And who set them off... Elvis?
Good grief, man. If you hurry, you might still be able to catch the "mother ship" flying behind the Hale-Bopp comet.
3 things about computers: they're alive, they're self-aware, and they hate your guts.
Would this rise in the cost of oil help to drive innovations in alternative fuels and energy?
Yes, I think it would. It takes a while to "tool up" to a different economy though. It's this short-term pain that keeps us from doing it. The OPEC nations realize this too. As a general rule, they don't want to see sustained high prices because they know that it will cause structural changes in consumer economies, and they know that once those changes are in place there won't be an immediate reversion. This has already happened to some extent in the US economy due to the first oil shock. Remember how cheap gas was in the 90s? On an inflation adjusted basis it might have even been less than pre-OPEC. That's because many US drivers switched from gas guzzlers to Japanese econo-boxes. The SUV eventually turned the tide on that; but heavy industry and power production facilities had diversified their energy inputs, and that hasn't changed. The $3/gal price we are seeing today is comparable to what happened during the first oil shock, but it's less likely to impact the economy as much as it did in the 70s because fixed power plants in heavy industry didn't get suckered back to oil. We have less of an industrial based economy anyway. As SUV sales decline, this will lock "structural conservation" into the transportation economy, at least for the life of the replacement vehicles that are now being purchased. Where I live, the power company is required to periodicly state where the energy comes from. Oil is only a small fraction of it. Coal and nuclear are #1 and #2 here. Anyway, I'm sort of mish-mashing the industrial and transportation effects here--it's really two separate economies.
Oil sustained at $100/bbl would have some interesting effects. Shale oil becomes economicly viable (but it's an environmental nightmare). Maybe long haul freight railroads will convert to electricity instead of diesel (how much would oil have to cost for that to happen?). People will be less inclined to choose overnight shipping just because they want it now when air frieght costs $100 vs. $30 for rail+truck (and the truck will be powered by natural gas, which we have more of).
Anyway, long story short, we don't really need their black gunk in the long run. The US created an autocentric lifestyle for itself; we can uncreate it too.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Which government? Mine, yours or theirs? I don't think my point was inane or screeching, but it's all kind of subjective isn't it? Which, funnily enough, is kind of the point here:
Everyone assumes they're the good guys - who gets to decide, and why?
America? Because you happen to have been born there?
So explain to me why America is morally superior and gets to play with all the nukes.
Indeed.
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Ironically, the United States which incidentally signed the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty) and also signed against testing nuclear weapons, questions the very non-proliferation treaty and then criticizes Iran for wanting to produce nuclear weapons when Israel is allowed to have them? Considering the US is the only country to use nuclear weapons in combat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_we apons_of_mass_destruction) it seems a tad bit hypocritical if you ask me.
Second of all, if you have the regional superpower (Israel) and the global superpower (US) breathing down your neck would you not want a bargaining chip or do you just remain as their pawn? It does change the geopolitical make-up of the Middle East and that is what the US is really concerned about; the amount of control the US has in the region (military dominance is control). The odds of Iran actually using a nuclear weapon is about nil since they would be obliterated in response.
By the way, I am absolutely not condoning Iran having nuclear weapons as I believe all stockpiled nuclear weapons and weapons of mass-destruction should be disposed of properly. My main fear of this is another arms race.
Now I do believe that the Iranian government is guilty of crimes against humanity (stoning and executions for example) and should be prosectued for such; however, the government of the United States is also guilty of crimes against humanity (torture) and such is not one to be critisizing the actions of another government in such a matter. Nor should they be marching the wardrums against Iran for this unless they renounce the use of all crimes against humanity.
and the Neocons?
There is perception and then there is reality. Few politicians are what they appear.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Does having boh uranium and Plutonium make them more dangerous? (honest question not flambait). Or is it more along the lines of a reactor being able to make pluonium faster than the (what I have heard) is the slow process of Uranuim enrichment
I am not a nuclear physicist (Wikipedia is), but having both Uranium and Plutonium doesn't really make either more dangerous. Plutonium, however, is infinitely more dangerous than Uranium - it is much more easily fissible and a 10cm sphere of it approaches critical mass. It's not that having them "together" is a problem, it's that Plutonium is all that's bad about Uranium, squared.
DATABASE WOW WOW
>>The US doesn't talk directly with Iran. Or with Syria.
No shit. They refuse to recognize Israel and their main goal is to eliminate Israel and the Jews from the planet.
I'll give you a quick history lesson... before MySpace, YouTube and IM... there was a guy name Hitler who wanted the same things as your friends in Iran and Syria. And he almost succeeded.
Israel is in defiance of more UN resolutions than any other nation on this planet, and it is a well known fact that they have constructed more nuclear bombs than any other nation in their region (without getting any sort of ok from the UN for doing this of course).
Where is the call to go to war to disarm Israel?
Sam has one liberty, which he sacrifices for one security. Can you tell me what Sam has now?
To my mind, the only possible outcome is for the US, and by extension, its allies, is to move toward acccepting the eventuality that Iran will in due time have nuclear weapons and nothing anyone says or does is going to change that.
But that is Soviet-era thinking. The difference is that the Soviets *wanted* to live. This newest batch are suicidal fanatics. They would blow up the entire world even if it means their own death. Thus, the old rules that kept things in check are dead and gone. They want 72 virgins, not stability.
Table-ized A.I.
Israel doesn't go rioting over Dutch cartoons, they're a rational state. Iran goes berserk over Salman Rushdie -- did Israel create him?
You can't go blaming everything on Israel everytime Iran goes ballistic, even though the Iranians try to drag Israel's name into everything.
Yes, Pakistan could be disarmed without addressing India's arsenal. India detonated its first nuclear bomb back in 1974, while Pakistan had diddlysquat -- since when does India being nuclear automatically equate to Pakistan being able to? Besides, what you really mean is that all of India would have to be wiped out before Pakistan abandons its nukes, since India has a huge numerical advantage over Pakistan in conventional forces -- over 1 billion people, remember? India is a responsible democracy, while Pakistan has nearly always been a military dictatorship.
Other posters have asked what right does the world have to prevent Iran (or any other nation with imperial ambitions and/or dangerous ideological imperatives) from building atomic bombs. That's your answer ... you can build them but God help you if we think you're crazy enough to use them.
The problem with MAD in the modern age vs. the Cold War is that in the Cold War both the US and the USSR assumed that each other would be responsible if a nuke went off in one of their major cities. In fact, the preferred delivery vehicle would've been visibly launched from the home country for no other purpose but nuclear death hours in advance.
Now days, nukes are everywhere, and there's no clearly defined us-vs.-them line. Furthermore, if and when a major US city is nuked, the delivery vehicle will be land or sea based instead of a ballistic missle, and it will be a shadowy terrorist organization that does it instead of a publicly visible military.
If Iran wants to nuke us, it will do so by proxy and leave the US unable politically to retaliate with an immediate strike because doing so raises the possibly of committing genocide in a potentially innocent country. That breaks down the entire Mexican standoff nature of MAD and could lead to a series of cascading attacks from allied countries and international condemnation by surviving 3rd parties.
Also, Ahmadinejad uses a lot apocalyptic rhetoric in speeches. The possibility that he's some sort of fanatic that wants to kick off armaggedon is raised constantly as a spectre by US pundits, and there's the possibility that there's some shade of truth to their rhetoric that worries me.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
deterrence works for, say, North Korea....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Because they don't have to worry about protestors stopping the construction of nuclear plants? Because we have a LOT of nuclear plants?
Unless the US with it's big mouth stops making Nukes (they are even going to replace their current weapons with new ones) IMHO everybody else also has the right to create nuclear weapons. This doesn't mean that I would like it (far from it, nukes should be banned from this planet), but fair is fair, what gives the US the right to have nukes over other countries? The UN should also demand from any country to stop making nukes, and the ones that have them should dispose of ALL nukes... So as long as the US is making nukes themselves they have no right to tell others to stop making them... Again, I'm say that NOBODY should have nukes...........
You're wrong about the designs. Any fissionable material can be used in the "gun" type of fission bomb, wherein two or more pieces of fissionable material are pushed together by an explosion. Hell, you can even do it by hand, as proven in some of the early accidents with nuclear materials. So fission bombs can be dirt simple. Fusion bombs OTOH are complex. See the Nuclear Weapon Archive for details (but remember: "Don't believe everything you read!").
Sorry, but you presume everyone's reasonable. That's already proven not to be the case.
Exactly! I've argued elsewhere that too many are using Soviet-era thinking. The Soviets didn't believe in being awarded 72 virgins for killing Amerikans at any cost.
The new generation would take the whole damned world down to get their way. They are suicidal fanatics.
Table-ized A.I.
Or rather three different ways of looking at it:
One is the grandfather clause. Basically when the nuclear non-proliferation treaty was signed it allowed those nations who already had nukes to keep them. So the US can have them for the same reason as Russia, the UK, France, and so on. That would be the legalistic view.
Another would be because the US has a stable government with excellent protections against accidental launch, or deliberate launch by a rogue person. You can Google around for the details if you wish, but what it comes down to is that GWB can't just wake up one day and decide to nuke a country for the fun of it. He lacks the authority and the ability. The US also cares for the lives of its' citizens to a high degree, and has a stable government that doesn't get overthrown all the time. That's the somewhat moral view.
Finally, there's the simple matter that nobody can stop them. They've got the biggest military, and the amount of nukes they have is such that they can annihilate anyone they wish. There's no possibility of any sort of invasion or strike that could take out even a fraction of the US arsenal before they could retaliate. So there's simply nothing anyone can do about it. That's the practical view.
You can take it any way you like but it really isn't comparable to Iran getting nukes. The US is allowed, under internal law, to have it's nukes, they are not (despite some ranting on Slashdot) run by extremists that can launch them at any time, and there's just really nothing anyone can do to take them away. Iran isn't allowed to develop nukes, there is a concern that they would use them given that there are no controls in the country stopping their hard line government from doing so, and as it happens they can be stopped.
I'm not saying that they should be stopped, that's a different argument. However trying to say "The US has nukes so Iran getting them is the same thing," isn't the case, regardless of what level you choose to look at it on.
I'm glad I'm wrong. What a deep sigh of relief that Isreal, France, the U.K. and the United States have been using their spent reactor fuel for peacefull purposes only. I thought they had all been somewhat naughty. Here I was thinking blue helmeted U.N. inspectors with an open mandate wouldn't be warmly welcome at classified nuclear research sites in the U.S. red states.
p.s. Zero of the IAEA signatories allow unfettered access to their most sensitive sites. The IAEA's prime stated purpose is non-proliferation to those states NOT in the club. Therein somewhere lurks a mysterious problem which noone seems able to quite put their finger on.
"If you don't have eyes you shouldn't have wings" -- Carl Pilkington
That assumes that all countries are run by reasonable, rational, leaders that care at all about their people. That's just not true in some places. Some countries are run by thugs, essentially. They aren't interested in anything but their own power and don't acre at all for the lives of others. People like that are the kind that would use a nuclear weapon just to prove a point, just because they hate someone enough. Don't say people like that don't exist either, you can see it with criminals. Those that kill just because they hate someone else, with no regard or planning for not getting caught. Well if one of those people were to have nuclear weapons, the world is in a lot of trouble.
This also assumes that a nation is fair to it's people. Even supposing they wouldn't use the nukes aggressively, as a defensive weapon it gives them permission to do whatever they want in their country. The controller of the nukes controls the nation and do as they please. Nobody can object or do anything to stop it. Just look at the genocide that has happened in Africa, and tell me if those leaders would be the kind of people who should have nukes.
This kind of thing is a great example of the quote: "For every complex problem there is a solution that is clear, simple, and completely wrong."
Your blatant racism aside, you should note that Persians have very little to do, ethnically and linguistically speaking, with Arabs.
A heavy water plant is not a nuclear reactor. Nothing in a heavy water plant is radioactive. Or, for most processes, even toxic. Here's a tutorial on heavy water plants. They're not very complicated or especially large. This is the easy step in the process.
The next step is a nuclear reactor fueled with natural uranium and moderated with heavy water, which can be used, with difficulty, to produce plutonium. This is the route Pakistan took. Here's Pakistan's heavy water plant and its companion nuclear reactor. Israel's Dimona reactor is also of this type. So this is the standard route to nuclear weapons for small countries. This step is much harder and riskier, but the technology is half a century old.
There are other approaches. The United States initially used water-cooled graphite-moderated reactors fueled with natural uranium for plutonium production, as did Russia. Britain used air-cooled graphite-moderated reactors. (Bad idea. The Windscale reactor had a fire in 1957, releasing a considerable amount of radioactive material.) Once both countries had uranium-enrichment capability, newer reactors mostly used low-grade enriched uranium. Both the US and the USSR got so good at plutonium production that both now have tons (literally) of the stuff in storage, in addition to the weapons using it. A nuclear weapon requires about 5Kg.
ASSERTION: If the Iranians build nuclear weapons, then the Iranians will use them without reservation.
If the above assertion is false, then the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) should proceed playing word games with the Iranians and allow them to continue using delaying tactics. Of course, the Iranian Muslims are offering false promises in order to buy the necessary time for building a nuclear bomb.
On the other hand, if the above assertion is true, then the Western nations (which includes Japan) must act immediately without waiting for the Chinese to manipulate the UNSC into playing more word games. One possibility is to arrange for unmarked German fighter-bombers to bomb the Iranian nuclear facilities. This military action should be synchronized with the bombing of North-Korean nuclear facilities by unmarked Japanese fighter-bombers.
So, is the assertion true? The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the assertion is true.
How do people behave if they are genuinely committed to peace and economic development? Consider Vietnam. Washington dropped tons of agent orange on Vietnamese farmlands and forests. Today, thousands of Vietnamese are suffering and dying from this poisoning. Yet, the Vietnamese are not spending every waking moment in plotting how to kill Americans. The Vietnamese government spends most of its budget on economic development and is not attempting, in any way, to build a nuclear bomb.
Consider the Czech Republic. Czechoslovakia was under Russian/Soviet oppression for more than 40 years. Yet, today, the Czechs are not spending every waking moment in plotting how to kill Russians. The Czech government spends most of its budget on economic development and is not attempting, in any way, to build a nuclear bomb.
Now, look at Iran. The Iranians spend every waking moment in plotting how to kill Americans, Iraqis, and Israelis. The Iranians give millions of dollars to Hezbollah and other terrorist groups. The Iranians spend millions of dollars on building a nuclear bomb.
Is Iran committed to peace and economic development? You make the call.
An even better question is "What is the fastest way to de-capitate the Iranian government and Iranian society?"
"If you don't have eyes you shouldn't have wings" -- Carl Pilkington
Why should they though?
They are totally in their right by the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to enrich Uranium.
Why isn't someone bombing Israel for having nukes (course they'll never admit it) and not signing the NNP treaty?
There are even better than bullshit rumors that they've used micronukes in bali and against the former Lebanese president.
This will end badly for everyone involved, and that sucks.
Quote from -The Fifth Element-
...just a thought.
Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg: "Life, which you so nobly serve, comes from destruction, disorder and chaos."
As an aside, M.A.D. sounds to me like a flawed idea. Flawed in that, whoever starts it, may not give a rat's ass?
Why, if not because?
part of the problem is that Israel has never been *serious* about earning a sustainable peace. Sure after decades of war, there are now peace treaties with Jordan and Egypt and a sort of alliance with Turkey. However the fact remains that the large cause of the conflicts are almost always about nothing more than land and water.
Additionally you ahve to understand that while the vast majority of Israelis are reasonable folk and peaceloving, there are extremists (including terrorists) who feel that it is their sacred duty to create a greater Israel spanning from Sinai through Golan. These lands, in their view, must be conquered, depopulated, and resettled by Jews (a term not exactly equivalent to Israeli by modern demographic standards).
What Galloway fails to note is that Israel is an area, like Northern Ireland, where over six decades of conflict have created some really insane dynamics. Indeed I cannot think of a country whose political dynamics make less sense than modern Israel. After all, when a former Nazi sympathizer (who tried to build an alliance between a Zionist resistance group and the Nazis during WWII) can be serve a lengthy term as Foreign Minister and a short term as PM, the last place one would think this could happen would be Israel, and yet that it happened there in the 1980's with Shameer (Shameer's Nazi sympathies were well documented).
But the fact remains-- Israel is a military superpower in the region who is almost unquestioningly backed by the US, France, and other countries. Their alliance while it is their greatest strength is also their greatest weakness. For example, in the run-up to the Iraq war, Lebannon exacted some serious water rights concessions from Israel despite threats by Sharon to go to war.
Now, we are bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan. While we have many troops which are not committed to the field of battle, most of the active duty troops are committed in various strategic roles (such as South Korea) and are not readily available for redeployment. I do not think it is possible to invade Iran and win by any lasting measure. What was that B5 quote about the heir to the throne of the kingdom of idiots? At the same time there is the fear that if Iraq stabilizes, then the US might be free to attack Iran.
So what is Iran to do?
1) Destabilize Iraq-- keep us bogged down there.
2) Develop a deterrent nuclear capability capable of holding Israel hostage in the event of pending US military action.
3) Develop ties with terrorist organizations so that if balistic missiles fail to have deterrent capabilities, other deployment options exist.
Iran has seen deterrence work on the Korean penninsula. They know that their only way away to have power in the region is to threaten US allies with massive and illegal weapons.
Ahmedinejad is hardly mad any more than Bush is as dumb as he appears. He is playing a very sophisticated game and doing quite well, and politicians are never what they appear.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
hug the world with nuclear arms!!
Giving arms to Hezbollah does not mean that Iran orcastrated the Israeli incursion into Lebanon. Especially when you consider that Israel gave the US its proposed plans *BEFORE THE KIDNAPPING*.
I also find it ironic about people going on about Iran when Israel for example actually built a fake nuclear control room so that the UN inspectors couldn't determine that they where building nuclear weapons.
But the most classic is that people stating they should bomb the plants, some even say nuke the plants. Have you people even looked at where the actual plants are. They are very near cities in Iran. I am sure some people will go "OMG! They are using these cities as human shields", try comparing locations to other countrys.
Last I checked North Korea already HAS nukes. And South Korea and Japan ARE sitting around.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Iran has been a totalitarian theocracy since 1979. What part of this is A Good Thing, exactly, and for whom? Also, totalitarian regimes have a track record of carrying out their stated goals if not interrupted, particularly the goals involving weapons and wars and genocides.
So? The Nazis "had to" overthrow the US-supported Weimar Republic to "get their country back". (Don't give me any Godwin crap, I know my history well enough to make valid analogies.) This, in itself, is far from an acceptable argument in favor of the current regime in Iran.
WTF? Either you've been smoking some potent stuff, or you're a deranged post-modernist. Here are some facts that don't depend on anyone's "view": On the morning of July 12, Hezbollah launched an unprovoked offensive against Israel, by crossing the internationally recognized border (along which Israel had realigned itself in 2000), killing three soldiers, capturing two others, and killing five more soldiers shortly afterwards. At the first hint of an Israeli military response, Hezbollah began firing rockets (mostly Iranian and Iran-supplied) directly at civilian cities throughout northern Israel. These rockets (3,970 of them before the ceasefire) killed 44 civilians and injured 2,000 others.
And Israel is a threat to Lebanon?
This next one cracks me up...
And if they don't get over it? Israel gets nuked. Bah, bloody Jews deserve it anyway, eh?
Appeasement won't work here unless your goal is, in fact, to get Israel nuked. I point to Hitler again; I'll let you figure out the analogy.
IMPEACH XENU
Does *ANYONE* really believe that sanctions (like limiting the visas for certain high-ranking officials and other meaningless inventions of the UN) will change anything at all? This won't be anywhere NEAR over until a city has been nuked. This is going to get ugly; the UN is powerless and corrupt.
Mark my words; there's a reason why N Korea and Iran are working on this at the same time. And don't think the only place the nuke will go off is NYC; Amsterdam, Vienna, Dortmund....almost any city is at risk. Just remember this comment. I've been right so many times before.
--- For a good time mail uce@ftc.gov
Well you are being cynical about the US governments motives, why not apply the same logic to Israels government? I think the two acts in much the same way.
on the other side you have a theocracy who glorifies honorable death, and has publicly stated it's will to distroy the other side.
Theres a big difference between having some kid strap on a suit bomb and having your culture and people completely eradicated. The theocrats in charge of Iran are no more theocratic than Stalin was a communist. Their trick lies in making people think they MIGHT be nutty enough to pull the trigger; thats what gets results. Just like the US and Soviet Union in the cold war.
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
And I'm sure we helped Germany plenty before Hitler rose to power too. How can I put ths so even YOU can uderstand: crazy people with nuclear weapons is bad.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Most of your comments reflect the reason the Germans conquered your countries in a matter of days. Maybe, I should just quote the "misunderstood" Ahmadinejad.... "If you want to have good relations with the Iranian people in the future, you should acknowledge the right and the might of the Iranian people, and you should bow and surrender to the might of the Iranian people. If you do not accept this, the Iranian people will force you to bow and surrender." Maybe he is just still upset about the crusades or maybe you are all a bunch of appeasement pansies.
Yep, we can rest easy - the UN will solve the problem. GWB can sit back and let the UN lead us to a more peaceful world.
We will see what happens - critics say the US shouldn't "go it alone". That the US should work with the world community to solve problems.
End result - we will see an Iranian made nuke explode in Israel, UK or USA someday.
if they did, they haven't had them for that long.
N. Korea's deterrence is the fact that they can launch an artillery barrage that could kill at least 100000 residents of Seoul. Nukes would also allow them to hold hostage a larger area.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Iraq is facing an imminent civil war, this is not an improvement for the world... further to this, the hatred of the US for their actions in Iraq has only increased, this has not 'ended' terrorism, instead it has sown the seeds or fanned the flames of what may have been only a marginal feeling. This is a failure on the part of the current administration, who lied to the US public in it's reasons for war in Iraq, as WMD have still not surfaced.War does not make peace.
Afghanistan, which was originally funded heavily by the US during the occupation of Afghanistan by then USSR, had led to the training and development of the armed Taliban fighters. This is on the record. Proof that War does not make peace, yet again. The same forces that the US armed 'allegedly' plot to kill them today.
Nicaragua is more proof of US foreign policy failure. In fact the US was ordered by the International Court of Justice to make reparation to Nicaragua for it's funding Contras and 'unlawful use of force' The US rebuts that finding and as is typical, despite being founding members of the United Nations, only plays lip-service to the ideals enshrined by that august body. Instead, the US is typically against the UN, and works actively to undermine the success of International co-operation and International rule of law.
The current administration has made previous administrations all appear to be boy scouts by direct comparison, despite their foibles. In recent times, rather than focus on a cease fire, the administration supported and condoned the wholesale destruction of Lebanon, and viewed Israeli response as measured. This flies in the face of International agreements on proportionate response. If there was proportionate response, an area EQUAL to that utterly destroyed in Lebanon would be found in Israel. If there was proportionate response, Lebanese fighters under Hizbollah would have killed and targetted an EQUAL number of Israeli civilians. Instead the Lebanese took the high ground, and in the eyes of the world, came out not only the moral victor, but in many respects the combat victor as well.
Your administration has not ingratiated the Lebanese people, who have democratically elected a government. Instead the state of US diplomacy is so bad that 'Condi' was refused audience. Furthermore, Mr. Bush was unequivocal in his damnation of Iran and Syria and claimed their direct involvement in the conflict with Israel, hoping to incite further violence on his "Hand that Rocks the Cradle" (of civilization) tour.
Is it not odd to you that the current administration seeks to change laws to legitimize their illegal behaviours AFTER they have been caught? Notable instances recently are the Rumsfeld war crimes, and the NSA wholesale spying on Americans violating fourth amendment rights.
Please don't take me wrong as being 'antiAmerican' because I have many friends and family in the US. I just believe that the current administration is criminal in the whole and must be impeached as quickly as the constitution allows for, that will be a great step in the 'War on Terror'. War is NOT peace. The defense through superior offense is only further entrenching antiAmerican sentiment in the world through the spread of violence by the military. The credibility of the US, once a loved leader of the world has eroded dramatically under the current leadership. It's time for a change.
Bush lied, thousands died.
if I claimed I was emperor just because some watery tart lobbed a scimitar at me they'd put me away!
Certainly not. It made no sense to leave America in the hands of a few brutal stone age hunter gatherers and deny the great political experiment that is the United States, and in which native Americans are full partners.
Similarly, Israel is a great experiment in democracy in the otherwise blighted middle east. It must necessarily displace people who are hostile to it. There are plenty of places for them to go.
an ill wind that blows no good
"Most of your comments reflect the reason the Germans conquered your countries in a matter of days."
You are obviously referring to the effect the terms of the versailles peace agreement had on the german people.
FRA: STFU GTFO
Hezbollah was using civilians as cover.
I cried real tears when Li Mu Bai died.
Good ol' Hal Porter. You're a semantic webbist, not a economist. Don't venture out of your domain, chico.
Financially, they're better off selling their petrochemicals to nations like the United States and China, who are willing to pay (at this time) $70 for each barrel. They could use their oil domestically, of course, but then they're not maximizing their return. In economics, failing to maximize one's return shows that some resources are being wasted, and that's not a beneficial thing to do.
Iran knows better than to deal with the US. They've seen what happens to countries (Iraq, Lebanon) that aren't self-reliant. And again, it may be a matter of economics why they didn't subscribe to such a deal. Their return may be maximized if they perform the enrichment themselves. Anybody with even the smallest amount of financial or economic knowledge should be able to comprehend their stance.
Saudi Arabia has given more than $500 million, and Kuwait has given $800 million dollars to Lebanon in support because of this conflict.
Perhaps we should go after those guys too?
--jeffk++
ipv6 is my vpn
Ranks right up there with 'Micro$oft' and 'Chimpy McBusHitlerburton', eh? I suppose I could post details of his public statements on the subject of Shi'ite eschatology, the return of the Hidden (12th) Imam, the status of Israel as a 'temporary country', etc. But that would probably put people to sleep faster than listening to a John Kerry speech.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Can I ask why other countries are allowed nukes? Other non-brown countries? Other non-brown countries with questionable military policies and a history of bloody warfare, particularly civilian atrocities?
I like to place meaningful quotes in my sig, so people will know that I know what meaningful quotes are.
If we had only gone to Iran vs the Iraq mud hole the wasted man power to the whole thing we could have the real evil the whole time Iran out of the way. What about Iran's total vision of evil, the hate, the oppression of 60 Plus % of the Iran's that don't want these nuts running the place. Where's the funds for Radio Free Iran to get the Iranians wanting to hear something free from the oppression of Iranian Nuthouse leaders.Massive amounts of money for the Iranian underground that really want them out.I get sick to my stomach when I see the Iran thugs talking their crap and hate on the cheap ass stages they setup with flowers and missiles, curtain rods and some Elmer's glue. Flowers and missiles what a bunch of oxymoron Thug Iranians. These are the ones that sent their 12 year old children to be blowup on the Iran border during the Iranian war.They have no religion except the religion to oppress their own fine countryman minds and their children's minds.Oppression of free thought is the biggest Iranian evil and they use it well like all dictators have used from the beginning of time.
To objectively evaluate the situation, we could sum of acts of aggression by Iran and the USA, from the present to 1776. The one with the most points should not have any nukes.
Please don't let Bush plunge the world into the Realm of $200 a barrel oil prices by attacking Iran.
Why not? Oil crises are good for you. The 1973 oil crise made us think about using oil more efficiently for the first time since WWII. Higher oil prices will make alternative fuels more viable. If it is a result of politics rather than that the oil wells really have dried up (as they surely will sooner or later) it means that we will still have oil for making funky plastics that are difficult to make from etanol.
And remember that this guy actually believes he is to here to prepare for the return of the Mahdi -- the islamic Messiah.
I'll gladly pay $200 a barrel to keep him from getting the bomb.
Iran is doing quite a good job of making themselves seem violent.
Stated without argument ofcourse. pwnd!
an ill wind that blows no good
Nice analogy. We've drifted a bit here, but as a reminder, someone suggested that the good guys be allowed nukes, and the bad guys not. I pointed out that it's subjective as to who the bad guys are.
This is because there are no "good guys". Not one country in the world has got it right. And if it ever happened, that country would sink into the sea under the weight of everyone who moved there.
If I was "screeching" against the US government in Syria, I doubt they'd mind much. Same for the UK government, same for the Thai government (I live in Thailand). And yes, if I criticised the Syrian government in Syria. I might suddenly have a little more explaining to do. But you read the PATRIOT act, right? Sure, death is by a surprise bullet is probably worse than being held indefinitely in Guantanamo, but there's only shades of wrong here - no right.
Sure. You just get flown to Eastern Europe and tortured in secret jails instead. Or locked up without charge in Guantanamo. The USA have got a way to go on the morality front yet, I'm afraid.
Yeah, unless you happen to be an Asian on an aeroplane, or a Brazilian on public transport. It's also turning into a police state, although not as swiftly as the US.
I never said anyone was perfect - just trying to point out that the only people who think that America are the "good guys" are generally Americans. And that they're a minority, globally. If you want to arrange the nations of the world into "good" and "bad" sets, great - but be aware that everyone's idea would be different, and yours would not be the most popular.
Ah. So everyone outside the borders of the US is insane? Good work.v4sw6HPU$hw5ln6pr5$ck4ma8u7LMO$w2m6l7DL$i2e3t4MWb9AHKMRTen5a29s0r1p-5.88/-8.36g5CST
Of course I can't go into any actual numbers, the people in the spiffy suits and sunglasses would take me away for a long vacation elsewhere. You've got it about right though and yes, Pu-239 aside from being highly radioactive also is extremely toxic. Turn a few kilograms, if that, into a dust and you could wipe out NYC easily with the right approach, the heck with turning it into a nuke.
"[I]t is a wise man who admits the limits of his knowledge or skill, and that pretending either causes harm." --Terry Go
I don't think so, and this is a very tasteless joke IMO.
Why would you say that? Just because I think that the article was inappropriate, biased, and totally brainwashing with the Bin Laden commercial on he right?
Because I think anyone has the right to open a nuclear powerplant (I am not talking about nukes), I do not think anyone should have flagged me anything wrong.
I am sorry, but I think many peolpe take all the crap granted what they hear on Fox news. I think maybe you should express what you think, instead of just throwing a one-liner, that many would take as a simple insult. If you think it is right to tell someone how to make energy in their own country, while not urging your own people to burn less harmfull stuff into the air totally carelessly, then say so. If you think it is not tasteless to put a terrorist's name with a half page ad, next to a news article talking abount someone opening a nuclear reactor, then say so.
"you are on the tsa list" hahaha very funny, maybe you should have been modded troll haven't you ?
I am just illustrating some aspects of the Israeli/Arab conflicts.
On the whole I think that it is important that Israel not only survive but also prosper, evolving through normal democratic processes into a state more inclusive of their Arab minorities. This is occurring (a few years ago for example, Druze were afforded all the same responsibilities in defending the nation that Jews have-- once the other Arab communities are included in this way... Well that is what I want to see).
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
The US chose to develop nuclear weapons, then accepted the risk of 50+ years of MAD. If the Iranians want to develop nuclear technology, even nuclear weapons, fine. Good luck, be careful not to have any accidents and further pollute our planet.
Just one thing though. If we have to accept them as a nuclear power, they have to accept our disapproval of their choice. Fair is fair. Why should they be allowed to make decisions in a consequence-free environment?
As for the US continuing to build nuclear weapons... What has been proposed is a replacement program. Not an increase in warhead count. The idea is to update the arsenel for increased reliability and safety. Kinda hard to argue against that. In a land where everyone is forced to wear seat belts and motorcycle helmets "for their own good" it's hard to argue against replacing 20 and 30 year old technology where nuclear weapons are concerned.
--- Just another Code-Monkey
Europe is littered with towns where there used to be a thriving Jewish population and today there is none.
And since they did not go to the US, the UK or France (the allied powers) I guess the most likely explanation is that they became thin air. And this is not me trying to be funny, just deadly serious.
Have you been to Warsaw? Paris? Rome?
Warsaw for example was leveled. All what you see today is reconstructed. All jews Killed or gone.
For goodness sakes, this is vastly documented. Why do we need to keep discussing this?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
You grossly oversimplify; actually, the situation was a lot more complex than that. Saddam was selling oil way too cheap, in euros, to the French. So we didn't like him.
.... that is why we "didn't like him".
Right.... and the reason that Enron's executives are liable for repaying $183 million, and probably jail time, is that their stock "under-performed" the market.
Saddam used the wholly corrupt "Oil for Food" program to bribe all manner of foreign officials, buy influence in the Security Council, undermine UN sanctions, buy weapons, and fund terrorists, all the while skimming billions of dollars off the top. Even UN Secretary General Koffi Annan's son took bribes, and the Deputy Secretary General was eye deep as well. So, it was that, his refusal to fully and voluntarily comply with the weapons inspections, his record of genocide, aggression against pretty much every country around him, the abysmal human rights record, his military regularly fired on US aircraft (act of war), his support for international terrorists, well.... you get the picture,
Personally, I think you want to let President Saddam "I grind my opponents alive, and my sons are worse" Hussein off the hook a little too easily.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Pakistan is full of religous fanatics, but it isn't ruled by them at the moment, and they are cooperating in fair measure in the fight against Al Qaeda.
If the Pakistani government were to fall into the hands of fanatics, and it stopped cooperating, it might be time for a policy review.
I'm sure that they have noticed that the US is friends with their archrival India as well, and that plenty of funds could head India's way if warranted by other events.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Well, instead of replacing them, just don't make new ones...
He did all the things you mentioned, but frankly the US didn't give a toss about that.
The problem was that the second largest oil field in the world would soon only be available in Euros. Which would mean that oil buyers wouldn't have to buy dollars to get the oil. Which reduces the demand for US dollars. So. supply and demand. demand for dollars decreases, the value decreases, the US dollar begins falling in value. The dollar is worth less the more of them you need to buy things, That's called inflation and guess what, devaluing dollars severely limits the US government's ability to print more of them with abandon, to pay their huge military, to pay huge subsidies to industry and farmers etc etc.
Guess what. Iran is planning to set up an oil exchange which would operate in Euros. I wonder who's going to be hit next.
Deleted
Oh wait, the US doesn't mind Pakistan having Nuclear weapons because they are an ally...
/. opinion, most US citizens aren't really in favor of randomly toppling democratic governments - regardless of past US actions from the cold war.
I wouldn't say that the US doesn't mind it. However, at this point it is a moot point - the US isn't in a position to reverse the current situation.
The current administration wasn't in power when Pakistan developed nuclear weapons. If it were US action would have been somewhat more likely. However, one issue is that the nuclear weapon escalation in that region started with India, and the US would have been unlikely to use military force against India - a democratic borderline-1st-world nation. At the time the US was offering substantial benefits to Pakistan if they did not test nuclear weapons in kind. However, having allowed India to test them the US really wasn't in a position to take a hard line with Pakistan. It certainly would have been possible though - I'm sure India would have allowed the staging of attacks from its soil. Contrary to general
Their oil will run out within 25-30 years, and since it takes around the same time to build the many, many nuclear powerplants that would be needed, then it's pretty smart to start that right now.
Watch yourself buddy, the liberals will attack you soon. Expect liberal flames by end of day
If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. --James Madison
Umm.. did you ever think that COULD be done but countries like Iran won't follow this? How are you going to enforce that no one can have nukes? You would be right back in the same boat as we are right now, only YOU wouldn't have nukes to fire back when Iran sends their nukes to a town near you.
Chemical weapons were banned but Sadam used them in the 1980's against the people in his own country.
How can you possibly know that?
What would you say if I told you that observers from the US military were present when those same chemical weapons were deployed?
That is your opinion. I wonder what the average Iraqi would say?
*** Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket?
Remember, that Iran is a signatory to the NNPT (nuclear non-proliferation treaty). Iran can choose to withdraw from the NNPT (by giving notice like North Korea), or they never had to sign it in the first place (like India, Pakistan and Israel). The purpose of the NNPT was so that signatory countries can avoid a multi-sided destabilizing nuclear arms race by being reasonably sure that it's neighbors and enemies aren't doing so. This would be your so-called leagalistic argument.
The US's argument (at least from the legalistic point of view) is that Iran signed the NPT and need to abide by it's provisions. Iran could of course withdraw from the treaty and the US couldn't have any arguments (legalistly anyhow), but I'm sure Iran has thought about it, but for some reason rejected this course of action. I'm guessing that it is probably because they don't want to become an international pharriah like North Korea, given that they have a booming economy and likely can become the dominate economic powerhouse in that region in the world.
It seems like the core of your argument is that Iran thinks that US isn't being honest so Iran is free to ignore US protestations of guilt. But why isn't the converse also true that the US thinks that Iran is not being honest so it is free to ingore Iranian protestations of innocence? The only thing that I can see in your argument is that the US is "bad" and has a history of being "bad", so it must be "bad" in this case too. I'm not so sure that Iran is in any position to call the kettle black...
I also don't understand your argument about "morality". If any thing, your quote "no rational government with any interest in preserving the independance of their country could possibly swallow the treatment" could equally be applied to Iran and Israel. I'm no defender of Israel, but they seem to have taken the brunt of "immorality" from other neighbor nations using your argument.
Perhaps some historical perspective, some of the middle east's issues can be traced to post-imperialistic european map-line-drawing (or more specifically Sykes-Picot and Anglo-Russian Entente). Perhaps you blame that on the US, but I think that most of the world is to blame for this phenomena, and the US being a one-time victim (but since recovered) of Dutch-French-English-Spanish map-line-drawing, can be blamed as the orginator of this problem (although the US isn't totally blameless on many of the map-lines that exist today, e.g, korea, taiwan, etc). This specific middle-east problem seems directly attributable to Russia, England and France circa WW-I. The US is only a recent player in this probably, although you seem to attribute all ills to the modern US involvment. I for one blame the Europeans in their post WW-I zeal to hang on to their fading imperialistic empires. This one has been festering on for a long, long time...
Sadly, so the conclusion (which seem to be indeed playing out today), is that neither the US or Iran really has anything to say to each other and the "war" is really just a war of public opinion (in this case, the public being the governments of the world). I don't see how it could be any other way, and some of the "public" sees the US as a bully, and some of the "public" sees Iran as a thug, but of course that is only an opinion (e.g., vi vs emac, c++ vs java). There's no winner in a war of words, and no convincing staunch zealots on either side. Basically either one side will just give up (e.g., the cold war or Libya) because the don't want to argue any more or they can't afford to argue any more, or it'll eventually come down to a real war. That is the way history has generally played out. Regardless of who is right and wrong, generally these things end up in a war and as you say usually in that case "might makes right"...
..but there are a few problems with your Iranian problem.
You are the only country to have used nukes. You are the country that supported and funded Osama, while his dirty work suited your purposes. You are the country that funded and supported Saddam while he suited your purposes, then killed over 100,000 innocent civilians to oust him from power, justifying the slaughter with obviously blatant lies. You are the ones preaching to the rest of the world about freedom, democracy and due process of law, when you have things like Guantanamo Bay camp and the death penalty, and you can't even hold verifiably free and open elections in your own country. You have a leadership which is in the top rank of science-ignoring religious fundamentalists on the planet. You ignore the UN when the resolutions are against you or Israel, but you're happy to use the UN when it suits you. Talking of Israel, they secretly develop nukes, are frequently over-agressive to their neighbours which puts your 'gas' prices up and detabilise a big part of the planet - but because they are white(ish) and speak English with American accents, you unquestioningly back them up (if there's a better explanation I'd love to hear it). You're the worst polluters on the planet, by a long stretch. You're the biggest debtors on the planet, despite being the so-called richest country. You spend more on the military than the rest of the world, when no-one is truly a threat to you, and your weapons kill innocents the world over every day. You wave the flag and declare 'war on terroism', and then do more to change your way of life because of the terrorists than anyone else - while at the same time twice the number of people killed on 9/11 die every day from easily-preventable causes.
On a different front, you are pushing on us the RIAA, MPAA, fast food, subsidised tobacco, your twisted patent, copyright and IP protection laws, DMCA, the most obnoxious tourists (I live in a big tourist city and Americans are consistently the most rude, inconsiderate and disrespectful). You ignore history in a bewilderingly inconsistent way - take those "cheese-eating surrender-monkeys" who helped you gain independance, for example.
Seriously, why should we (being the rest of the world) follow your example or listen to anything you have to say?
Parent post is blatant plagiarism. Scroll towards the bottom of this page for the original post, or if you're too lazy to actually RTF comments before moderating, just click here and check the timestamps.
Caution: May contain nuts.
"If you don't have eyes you shouldn't have wings" -- Carl Pilkington
Voicing certain views like this in public WILL get you consideration for the TSA's no fly list. Who do think is making the determinations these days? Have you observed the news recently? There are true neo-facist in real positions of power in the worlds one remaining superpower. Is that news to you? Is it news to you that you are not anonymously posting?
p.s. I didn't mod you troll. I didn't dissagree with you. I just would've kept those thoughts to myself until a free country exists again.
"If you don't have eyes you shouldn't have wings" -- Carl Pilkington
no insult taken then.
:> just bothered by it).
:) and meditate on that ...
I think you are a bit paranoid though. You can disagree with you country's fuel/energy politics, and you can criticise your politicians for pressuring an other country for opening an alternative energy source. Granted, if they make nukes, the UN should take action after considering the dangerousness of the nation in question, but the UN should do that, not any other country. Theoretically I do not agree with it, however I agree, that there are dangerous people out there, who should not have nukes. (IMO no one should at all, they should have been converted to fuel rods, or whatever peaceful purpose. But than again, that should involve the US, the French and every other nuclear power.).
Now on the article: strange that no one else criticised the association. That kind of association of the plant, its county, and a known terrorist, is not right, and if I was of/from the race/country in question, I would be offended (not the kind of offended and upset, that needs to be on a TSA list
How much nicer would that be to put a greenpeace article/ad agains nuke power, in case the news agency disagrees with the whole idea, a hybrid car, a BP commercial, a "support your coal mine friend senator" ad, save the penguins, or Michael More, or whatever else, but an ad, with Bin Laden. That clearly ment, that those guys are claiming to be making clean energy, but in reality, they are going to do something terrible, just as the guy on the right did.
But then again all that is just speculation in my head:) maybe the ad was invoked by a stupid PHP script, that associated the ad with the article based on keywords.
Hmm... well. I am going to bed
cheers
Ofcourse it can't be done if countries like the US keep theirs... the US thinks it is the boss of the world, but they aren't, they are almost the biggest threath to the world because of that thinking (at least a bush-government).. A nuke against a nuke war doesn't work (yeah, it works for the people in control, as they sit nicely in protective bunkers)....
Iran has, despite all the propaganda that has been emitted by the likes of Fox News and the US government, been a fairly reasonable power in the Middle East. They certainly were before their current president got elected, and I wonder if he didn't get elected because the Iranian people felt that the West were simply out to get them, no matter what. A lot of things in the world would much better if the US would put their ambitions on the backburner and instead start using the brains that my American friends keep assuring me you actually have.
So perhaps it would be better to let them have their nuclear facilities and try to open up the relations just a fraction. Not that I think there is much hope of that, seeing how the clowns in the White House keep roaring and posturing while on the other hand letting Israel get away with absolutely anything and everything.
"We (I speak as a Canadian of European decent) and they (immigrants to Israel) have benefited from our position. For the most part, we have good comfortable lives."
Agreed. It should be stated that that good life came as a result of hard work building that better life through developement, commerce, culture, learining etc. this good life didn't materilise out of thin air. not in canada, nor in israel. not in australia nor in the US.
"They (Native North Americans and Palestinians), on the other hand, have suffered in their position and are dealing with the resulting massive unemployment, poor living conditions, and so on."
agreed.
"Why then can we, in recognition that we have benefited at their expense, not help out. Would it really be too much to have something like a 1-2% sales tax for 100yr whose proceeds are directed to improving their plight. We could then meet with them and figure out what they need to help them help themselves (I suspect the most could be gained by education and hiring them to build up their own infrastructure)."
great idea. I think the implementation of this is extreemly hard (as has been prooved in the 90s peace process in israel) - but I agree that should be the prefered course of action.
Truth is this war in Iraq has cost the US almost a trillion dollars. Think about the kickass health care system ya'll would have if you invested alomst a trillian dollars into it. How man American's lives would have been saved if the money was better allocated back home, to health and education?
Considering the obscene amount of money that the federal, state and local governments as well as private and faith-based interests have poured in to health and education programs, we can make a good case proving that we can't solve America's problems by throwing money at them.
Invading and occupying Iraq (and arguably Afghanistan) was a simplistic and mis-guided solution to a complex problem. Pouring money down a frickin' bottomless hole is also simplistic and mis-guided as the issues of health and education in America are no less complicated. ...and just like those military solutions,
trying to buy our way out of every unfulfilled expectation always
seems to encourage bad habits and behavior.
Meaningful and lasting solutions involve the folks - who are powerful enough to make decisions that will get things going - actually and directly communicating with the folks who need help with problems which they cannot solve by themselves.
...and it doesn't always involve an exchange of money or bullets.
Simple, fast, and dirty fixes are easier to formulate, easier to implement and the bill can be passed along to future budgets. They play out better on commercial TV and tabloid print media where there isn't time nor space to go in to complex detail anyway.
...s'cuse me while I go microwave some lunch.
WHY DO YOU HATE FREEDOM??
So you're saying if the US was to send all its nukes into space never to be seen again there would be world peace?
Nope, but the world would be a lot safer because of that... But if the US disposes of their Nukes, then they can talk about other countries not allowed to create nukes.. until then they should just shut up..
"Little boy" was the gun method with U-235. Pu is not usable for this geometryn
"Trinity" and "Fat man" was the big bombs using symmetrical implosion with Pu-239. Both U-235 and Pu-239 is usable for this geometry. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon_desig
Iran's path is certainly the one that can give them a nuclear weapon ASAP.
And BTW, Iran are obviously and clearly focussed on developing a nuclear bomb and multiple delivery methods. They are currently testing the pod and software for the delivery from their fighters.
As much as it scares me, If I were Iran, I would also develop nuclear capability ASAP after beeing listed on the axis ov evil, just to ensure my survival.
"Fix it"
Being cowards they hide among the civilian population. Since they get tacit support from them, the civilians are also guilty. I am very disappointed that Israel backed off.
Uh huh. Then you shouldn't be sorry for each Iraeli civilian who gets killed, because with their compulsory military service, each Israeli is a current solder, former soldier or future soldier involved in the occupation of Palistinian lands. Yes, Palistinian. If you want to talk anchient history, Jews aren't native to Israel anymore than WASPs are to the US.
In the end holy land belongs to whomever can hold it. Like Joshua and the Israelites gained the promised land, so do the Israelis keep it today. No one can forsee Israel (backed by the United States) being conquered by outside forces. Indeed, Israel has not likely reached its full extent. The Arab interlopers should be deported to Arab lands of their own.
an ill wind that blows no good