"Nuclear Standoff" with Iran

Re: "Nuclear Standoff" with Iran

We're trying not to let things get to the point where everyone is armed to the teeth with nukes and bioweapons, especially crazies, dictators, terrorists, etc. We're trying to intervene before the proliferation of WMD gets out of control, and the best way to do that is to prevent certain particularly dangerous entities from getting them. What could be simpler?

Try to stay on topic Brandon.

Why? People never do in my posts, nor even try to. But okay, I won't post on any other subject than this trivial one, just as long as the requirement to stay directly on this topic alone is enforced on every poster in the thread, and only that long.

How bout them Yankees?

The tirviality of the post is an assessment made only by you, and again is not the essence of the discussion.

The MEDIA is using the phrase STANDOFF moreso than the politicians (although there are poeple on both sides mis-using the word STANDOFF).

At this point in time it is NOT proper to call it a STANDOFF since IMO, the word implies we both have them and we are pointing them at each other.

The Cuban Missle Crisis could be represented as a STANDOFF.

....and I would agree that when thinking of a nuclear "standoff", we would be referring to something more similar to the Cuban Missile Crisis than a country without a nuke in their arsenal.

It sure makes for sensationalistic news reportage, though, and that sells magazines which is TIME's bottom line.

Since neither Germany nor Japan had an effective and viable nuclear weapons program was it then wrong for FDR to approve the Manhattan Project. The Manhattan Project was the largest and single most expensive public project in history. I suppose it could be argued that money and resources spent to produce the Atom Bomb, might better have been spent on more traditional military costs. It was so secret that the Vice-President was not in on it.

Spies for the Soviet Union stole atomic secrets, and put the awesome destructive power of the atom into the hands of a real dictatorship bent on world domination. Why was national security around the bomb tight enough to prevent the thefts? Even if the USSR had a bomb, they had no long range delivery system, so was it wrong for the United States to be concerned enough to develop an arsenal large enough to deter the Soviets from becoming adventurous. Was development of the H-bomb a crime, since no one else in the world had such a thing?

Did the world benefit in anyway by the Soviets helping India to acquire nuclear weapons, or did that provide a reasonable justification for Pakistan to develop, test and deploy its own atomic weapons? If we could go back and do it all over again, would it have been wiser to have prevented India from building a stockpile of nukes? Of course, that would have put us on a collision course with the Soviet Union that could easily have escaladed into a full-blown exchange of ICBM MIRVs.

If President Clinton had carried through on attacking the nuclear facilities of the DPRK, would we today be worried about a nuclear strike from a backward dictatorship on Seattle? Clinton had a choice, and he opted to "make a deal" with the DPRK as a less risky way to prevent them from building weapons that are a real threat to ROK, Japan, and in the near future cities as far away as San Francisco, or Australia. If the attack had gone on as planned, there was a grave risk of a major resumption of hostilities on the Peninsula. We probably could have prevented the DPRK from becoming the threat to world peace it is today, but at the cost of many lives in the resulting conventional war. Not only might the DPRK have been prevented from acquiring nuclear weapons, we might have seen a reunification of the the Peninsula under the ROK, and a more economically dynamic Korea. Did Clinton make the "right" choice? Who can tell, but it is certain that it was his decision to make and he made it.

Now we come to Iran, that land of peace and tranquility that wants only to be left alone to further develop an earthly paradise. Iran, with some of the largest oil reserves, NEEDS electrical power that can only come from nuclear reactors. Thats forward thinking, and a responsible policy to halt global warming. The Iranian Islamic government is saintly, aren't they. They refused to return spent fuel rods to Russian, yet the only purpose for retaining them is the enrichment of weapons grade plutonium. What else, besides warheads. is plutonium used for that Iran has to have more of it? If Iran is so dedicated to peace, why the strident and continual threats of extermination against its neighbors? If Iran is totally absorbed in creating an Islamic State to live peacefully with the world, why does it need nuclear weapons? Is it threatened by a first strike from Pakistan, India, Russia, China, France, or Britain? Would they be threatened by the United States or Israel, if they weren't insistent upon acquiring dangerous weapons?

Personally, I don't think that Iran has any worries that the U.S. or Israel will attack their nuclear facilities, and that's partially why they continue. They have no fear of UN sanctions, and they have a ready customer fore their oil in the PRC. They can continue supporting and supplying terrorist networks around the world, and build an arsenal to blackmail their neighbors into submission. If they are displeased with the purity of Islam in Arabia, all they need do is threaten a bomb on Riyadh. They will insist that no Western military force of any size be stationed anywhere in or near Southern Asia. They will set the price for oil, and deny it to anyone who doesn't toe their mark. Iran sees the possession of nuclear arms as the means to purify the region, and eventually to conquer the world for their ideology. They might be stopped now, but probably at terrible cost.

Is it better to make the effort to forestall the Iranian effort to gain world supremacy, or should we gamble that they will lead the world into a millennium of peace and prosperity. The UN isn't likely to do anything effective. China doesn't want to risk not getting Iranian oil, and Russia doesn't want to lose a customer and antagonize a major sponsor of Islamic unrest inside their sphere of influence. The decision to avoid the instability and threats that are certain to come if Iran acquires nuclear weapons seems to rest only on Israel (the most immediately threatened), or the United States. The decision in the United States rests with President Bush, just as it did awhile ago with President Clinton. Now there's a thought that must scare the bejabbers out of the left-wing who seem to believe that the President is a modern day equivalent of Hitler or Stalin. I don't believe he's evil incarnate, or bent on ruling the world for the benefit of a few wealthy chums. I don't believe he's determined to destroy other religions so that his own personal religious doctrines will universally prevail. I think hes a man, like any other, who has a very responsible job and who tries hard to do what he believes it best and proper. If Iran believes that President Bush is capable and determined to use whatever force is necessary to prevent them from acquiring nuclear weapons, they will halt their program in a heartbeat. They don't believe he will act decisively, and so they will continue. They are taking a gamble, and should probably get Saddam's opinion of whether President Bush might just do the hard thing, irrespective of personal consequences.

What!?

Ash,

She's made it clear that she won't allow any discussion in this thread other than discussion of whether the term "nuclear standoff" applies.

Who's "she"?

And yes, the thread was started to discuss a particular wording by the MSM of the Iran situation. I fail to see why this continues to bother you to such a degree. But I guess you'd prefer to be off topic and bitter than on topic and contributing.

Asherman spent a great deal of time responding and no time reading the question posed....I would make the same request of him I made of you. Stop being so sour and childish Brandon.

You just can't stay on topic, can you? My personal qualities are not related to your topic.

...and this I find troubling.
Elsewhere it has been noted that critics of the Bush administration label him a fascist. Many Bush supporters, and most MSM outlets openly, and quite incorrectly, refer to the Islamic militants as "fascists".
We are beginning to see the rampant use of propaganda in even the most main stream of media sources. Objectivity has been replaced with inaccuracy and sensationalism.
That there has been widespread acceptance and acknowledgement that this is a de facto "nuclear standoff" does 2 things IMO.
1. Unnecessarily elevates and dramatizes the perceived threat posed by the situation in the psyche of the average person. Iran does not have nukes, yet this has become a "nuclear standoff".
2. Allows little or no descriptive latitude should the Iran situation elevate, or should any similar disagreement on future nhclear technologies arise with other nations.

One can understand Iran's drive to go nuclear. Bush named it part of the axis of evil and than spoke of preemptive wars. Thus, Iran feels it must produce nuclear weapons to forestall an attack by the USA.

That was similar to my reaction, blatham, exception I believe I had an additional exclamation mark.

Ad sumnum nitamur. It's my high school motto which means either "strive for the highest" or "god, do I want to phuk those two cheerleaders on the end there". They've fogged together over the years.

With your mentoring, god knows what I might achieve, punctuationally.

What personal consequences??!!!

Bushie this week called Ahmadinejad a nazi, a fascist and a totalitarian. All that's left if Bushie really wants to get nasty is to call Ahmadinejad BUSHitler. The letter Ahmadinejad wrote Bushie says let's Jews, Christians and Muslims get back to our mutual roots, do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Bushie says I'll bomb you to smithereens. Some contrast. Easy to see who is the madman. And when it comes to who is the nazi Bushie's family have armed the likes of Hitler, Saddam and bin Laden and many others like them.

The US does not negotiate with terrorists....which shouldn't be confused with "the US doesn't negotiate".
I am unsure if Ahmadinejad has proven himself to be a de facto terrorist, but the policy remains in place to label him as such, and refuse negotiations.