Posted on 08/22/2004 4:12:55 PM PDT by TwilightDog
Dodging the Nuclear 9/11 by Howard Bloom
Osama bin Laden may soon have his hands on three Agosta 90B next-generation stealth submarines capable of carrying sixteen sea-to-land cruise missiles each. Those missiles can deliver atomic warheads. And Osama, I suspect, will have access to the forty nuclear warheads constructed by Pakistan. Washington and New York, two primary targets for Al Qaeda, are near bodies of water from which these nuclear-tipped missiles can be launched. So are many other major American cities. Here are the skeletal details:
In 1994, DCN, the government-owned company that builds France's naval vessels, agreed to help the Pakistanis build and learn to operate a rather amazing shipyard. It was a next-generation facility building next-tech, Agosta 90B stealth submarines. As of today two of these subs have been built and a third is scheduled for launch by 2006.
Each Agosta 90B is able to carry sixteen Harpoon Stand-Off Land Attack cruise missiles. According to the Pakistani Navy Captain Iftikhar Riaz Qureshi, who commanded both of these subs in their test phases, Pakistan purchased its Agosta 90Bs to provide itself with "second strike nuclear capability." Qureshi's words imply that from day one, Pakistan's intention has been to tip these missiles with atomic warheads. And guess what? Since Pakistan tested its first nuclear bomb in 1998, every nuclear device it's made has been a missile warhead.
According to Defence Journal, Pakistan's subs have a range of close to twelve thousand miles…they can travel to the Hudson River or the Chesapeake Bay, unleash their missiles on New York and Washington, then still be able to take refuge in mid-ocean, lay low and threaten other world capitals with a similar fate.
The United States operates a network of hydrophones scattered all over the Atlantic and Pacific seabed. We are listening for subs like these. But we may not be able to hear them. The Pakistani subs use a methanol-and-liquid-oxygen engine bedded on a suspension system that quiets its purr to a whisper. We may not be able to detect their silent running beneath the sounds of zebrafish fanning their tails.
Many a Pakistani would love to see the nuclear destruction of America's key cities. Pakistan has one of the most violently fundamentalist and anti-American populations of any of the world's 57 Islamic states. And that's saying something.
From 1979 to 1995, Pakistan was the headquarters for a group of "Afghan freedom fighters" who were not Afghans at all. They were an international army paid for by the US, Saudi Arabia, and China, armed by the CIA, and trained, in part, by China's Peoples Liberation Army. We trained an army of 50,000 men from 30 nations to bring down the Soviet Union's most advanced tanks, jets, and helicopters. Why? Our mutual goal was to embarrass a common enemy--the Russians. Chief among the recruits to our proxy Jihad were Osama bin Laden and the founding members of Al Qaeda.
Pakistan is the nation whose citizens rioted in the streets in 1989 over the title of a novel they didn't like--The Satanic Verses. It was Pakistan's street activists who forced the Ayatollah Khomeini to issue a Fatwa offering five million dollars to the Moslem who killed Salman Rushdie. The Pakistanis were more extreme than the most extremist Islamic leader of his day. And that was fifteen years ago! Since then anti-Americanism and anti-Westernism has grown.
Pakistan is also the nation that educated a generation of Afghan refugees who later went home to take over their country in the name of Islamic purity and justice. We know those refugees as the Taleban.
Today Osama bin Laden is one of Pakistan's two biggest pop-culture heroes. The other is "The Father of the Islamic Bomb", Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan. Khan and Osama have reportedly met in Afghanistan. Khan is the weapons expert. Osama is the weapons user.
Many a Pakistani militant fundamentalist cell identifies itself as an Osama ally. One of the strongest among these Osama-loyalists is arguably Pakistan's most popular leader, Fazlur Rahman Khalil, the man who told 60 Minutes that: "God has ordered us to build nuclear weapons."
On the other hand, the base of Pakistan's military dictator, Pervez Musharraf, is a slender reed. According to Syed Adeeb, head of Information Times, a militant Pakistani press outlet based in the National Press Building in Washington DC, "an Urdu-language letter written by Pakistan Army officers on a Pakistan Army letterhead and sent to many members of the Pakistan Parliament" calls, "'Pervez Musharraf and his clique…a band of thieves and looters…imposed on this nation'" by the United States.
Adeeb himself calls Musharraf, "a self-appointed 'President,' military dictator, army tyrant, human rights abuser, traitor and highly paid mercenary of war criminal George W. Bush".
Musharraf has been the target of at least five assassination attempts. The latest took place the very day Saddam Hussein was captured in December 2003. Yet only he stands between Osama and the Islamic submarines. Only Musharraf stands between Osama and the cruise missiles Pakistan's subs can carry. And only Musharraf stands between Osama and the 40 or more nuclear warheads Pakistan has built since it exploded the first Islamic atomic bomb.
Which means that only Pervez Musharraf stands between Osama and what bin Laden, in a January 2004 speech broadcast on Al Jazeera, called, "a surprising blow…one that…due to its magnitude…will change the international balances of powers…."
Here's what I strongly suspect is Osama's dream endgame: Nuke a few key cities in the United States. Blind and devastate the Great Satan. Then watch while France, Germany, Italy, and England capitulate. Capitulate to what? To Osama's dream, his passion, his vision of truth and freedom--to a global Islamic caliphate.
I want a world of peace. So do you. But until our understanding of ourselves goes a good deal farther, we have to face the fact that we live in a world of violence. If we pledge to remain non-violent, those who've declared themselves our enemies and who love "death more than you love life" will chuckle at our weakness…and use it to cheer their comrades on to new atrocities. They will fight the battle of the faithful and the good--the fight for what Osama calls "justice, manners, and purity"-the battle for the truth of God's messenger. They will assert the truth expressed by an al-Qaeda-allied author, Seif Al-Din Al-Ansari, that we live on an expendable "speck of dust called Planet Earth." They will use our reticence to make the mother of all wars. And it will not be environmentally friendly.
PROPULSION SYSTEMS
The Agosta 90B class submarines can be equipped with a diesel-electric propulsion system or the MESMA air-independent propulsion system. The diesel-electric system consists of two SEMT-Pielstick 16 PA4 V 185 VG diesels providing 3,600hp and a 2200kW electric motor driving a single propeller..
A diesel-electrical submarine has to surface to periscope depth to recharge the batteries using the diesel engine, leading to increased risk of detection. The MESMA air-independent propulsion system, being fitted to the Agosta 90B submarines for Pakistan, allows the submarine to remain submerged three times longer. The MESMA system consists essentially of a turbine receiving high-pressure steam from a combustion chamber, burning a gaseous mixture of ethanol and liquid oxygen. The Agosta 90B's performance remains the same in all other respects, except that the length increases from 67m to 76m and submerged displacement from 1,760t to 2,050t. http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/agosta/
> Each Agosta 90B is able to carry sixteen Harpoon Stand-Off
> Land Attack cruise missiles. According to the Pakistani
> Navy ...
The US Navy will always know exactly where those subs are
at all times. If any ever gets within Harpoon range of the
US, it will simply not return to base, and never be found.
One would certainly hope so.
Either way, the West's armament of and support for Muslim countries is an appaling betrayal of our fellow Christians in the East--not to mention an effective means for killing ourselves off.
One would certainly hope so.
Either way, the West's armament of and support for Muslim countries is an appaling betrayal of our fellow Christians in the East--not to mention an effective means for killing ourselves off.
Osama bin Laden may soon have his hands on three Agosta 90B next-generation stealth submarines capable of carrying sixteen sea-to-land cruise missiles each.Ridiculous.
I pray that you know what you are talking about, Boundless...
I very much doubt you can stuff a Pakistani nuke into something as small as a Harpoon. A Thomawk, which can also be launched from torpedo tubes, maybe. I know you can stuff a US nuke into one of those, that was one of their original roles.
Harpoon doesn't have all that much range, and it would be shorter yet with a heavier warhead. That means that the Auguta built subs would have to get that much closer to their targets. A bunch of Jiahies isn't going to be able to sneak a sub all the way 'round the horn of Africa, accross the South Atlantic and a good chunk of the North Atlantic, without us getting a good track on it. The Los Angeles subs, (especially the newer ones) will have then before they cross the equator.
The AIP system would be pretty quiet, certainly as quite as a fairly modern nuke boat, probably quieter, but remember who would be operating it, and even though it can remain submerged three times longer than the diesel electric version, that's still not near long enough to make the necessary transit (they could go after West Coast cities just as well) without surfacing.
Iran or Pakistan can provide the support.
I very much doubt you can stuff a Pakistani nuke into something as small as a Harpoon. A Thomahawk, which can also be launched from torpedo tubes, maybe. I know you can stuff a US nuke into one of those, that was one of their original roles.
Harpoon doesn't have all that much range, compared to the Thomahawk, and it would be shorter yet with a heavier warhead. That means that the Augusta built subs would have to get that much closer to their targets. A bunch of Jihadies isn't going to be able to sneak a sub all the way 'round the horn of Africa, across the South Atlantic and a good chunk of the North Atlantic, without us getting a good track on it. The Los Angeles subs, (especially the newer ones) will have then before they cross the equator.
The AIP system would be pretty quiet, certainly as quite as a fairly modern nuke boat, probably quieter, but remember who would be operating it, and even though it can remain submerged three times longer than the diesel electric version, that's still not near long enough to make the necessary transit (they could go after West Coast cities just as well) without surfacing.
We also knew where the airplanes were at all times on 9/11. Somewhat different situation, but didn't prevent a surprise attack. I wouldn't become complacent with our naval defense capabilities, even if they are the best in the world.
This praise is not meant to boost the credibility of this piece here.
I heard Mr. Bloom on Art Bell last night and he claims to have contacts in the CIA and U.S. military Intel sources. Paki land is notoriously pro-bin Laden and OBL is very popular with the Arab street (60% + support by Pakis). He claims that the Pakistanis would be subject to the Muslim belief that the only way to heaven is to become a martyr. Ergo, Blum's belief that al Qaeda would gladly sacrifice half the population of Pakistan by means of U.S. nuclear retliation.
Do a Freeper search on "Agosta 90 B" and try Google for the same key words.
The subs cannot hide, but I hope somebody is watching them. If they bomb half a dozen cities, our American dream will be over for a long time.
It's always been possible in James Bond movies. Unlikely, but possible.
>> The US Navy will always know exactly where those subs are at all times.
> We also knew where the airplanes were at all times on 9/11.
Had we been thinking of planes as "hostile" then (as we do
now), the outcome would have been different, if only
because the passengers would not have been compliant.
These Pak subs will be treated as potentially hostile from
the moment they first hit the water, just like Russian
and Chinese subs.
When the Cold War ended, people were wondering why the
tempo of our sub ops was kept up. This is why. However,
if Kerry gets elected, all bets are off. Move 1000 miles
inland.
> There is a reason why criminals and guerrillas
> and terrorists do not strike us ...
Forget even "strike". There's a reason why drug smugglers
don't use subs, and it's not because they can't afford them.
Thanks all. Even if some elements of this scenario sound a bit spurious and sensationalistic it makes a compelling read.
Was hoping maybe to get a US Navy freeper to pronounce this nonsense. Wasn't there someone with the online moniker, something like Submariner, who had extensive understanding of this whole realm of warfare?
Heard this guy on Art Bell last night...seemed a little farfetched...
It's just a matter of time, and I'd be quite surprised if they used this way to get nuclear weapons to detonate in our cities.
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